Visiting Assistant Professor of Race

University of Puget Sound

Visiting Assistant Professor of Race & Ethnicity
Job ID: 6813
Location: African American Studies
Full/Part Time: Full Time
Regular/Tempoary: Temporary

Faculty Posting Details

Appointment: A two semester Visiting Assistant Professor position housed in the African American Studies Program with a focus on race & ethnicity in the U.S. for the spring and fall semesters of the calendar year, 2023.

Responsibilities:

Teach three courses in spring ‘23 and three in fall '23. This teaching will include two sections of AFAM 401: Narratives of Race; one section of AFAM/LTS 320: Race, Power, and Privilege; two AFAM electives which can focus on the primary content area of the professor, with faculty mentorship for establishing such courses into the curriculum; one first-year writing seminar. The University of Puget Sound offers faculty the opportunity to teach in the summer for additional compensation. If the candidate should desire such an option, mentorship will be provided to support the process.

Qualifications:

A doctoral degree (ABD considered) in Ethnic Studies or a relevant field in the Arts, Humanities, or Social Sciences, and a commitment to liberal arts education are required. We particularly seek a colleague with training in Ethnic Studies for this visiting position with approaches that are interdisciplinary, and even more so, transdisciplinary, who deeply engages decolonial thought. Such a colleague's training would support the continued work of African American Studies, in collaboration with the Race & Pedagogy Institute, to bring the critical insights of the African American Studies discipline to course content across the university campus.

With this kind of intellectual orientation, such a colleague will advance our relationship-making work and engagements with differential publics within our campus communities. We highly desire candidates with the theoretical foundations which allow them to teach about, and engage, beyond one racially ethnic people. Candidates trained in racial and ethnic intellectual foundations that include, but are not limited to: Native American, American Indian, and/or Indigenous Studies; Chicana/o Studies; Latina/o Studies; Asian American Studies; and Oceania, Pacific, and Pasifika Studies, are particularly desirable for this position. In this time of intensified public calls to recognize and come to terms simultaneously with the differential histories of peoples and communities of color who are oppressed, we are looking for a colleague who is ready to do the intentional work of critical and reflexive inclusivity through a decolonial framework. To expand the reach of our course content and expression of our intellectual, collaborative, and community commitments, we welcome candidates focused on Native American/American Indian/Indigenous, Chicana/o and Latine, Asian American, Oceania, Pacific, and Pasifika, and multi-ethnic communities, who are confident in teaching ethnic-based content to our Pacific Northwest, small liberal arts, student body.

In closing, we want to recognize the complexity of our call, regarding content, timeline, and of course it being a visiting position, and share our urgency and desire to support our future colleague in transitioning to our campus, and as they continue their career beyond.

Application Deadline: Review of applications will begin October 17, 2022, with a goal of hiring for spring 2023, but application reviews will continue until the position is filled.

Required Documents:

Curriculum Vitae Letter of Interest/Cover Letter Teaching Statement Writing Sample Diversity Statement (see prompt below) Contact Information for three (3) Reference. You will be prompted to enter the contact information for all three (3) reference providers. The system will automatically email these reference providers to request a letter.

Note: In the online application system, please submit curriculum vitae when prompted to submit resume. Additional documents can be attached within the application.

Applicant's Diversity Statement:

As a department and university, we are strongly committed to creating an inclusive and effective teaching, learning, and working environment for all. In the applicant's diversity statement, applicants should comment on their ability to contribute meaningfully to our on-going commitment to be informed and competent with regard to issues of diversity, equity, and individual differences. We encourage applicants to reference the University of Puget Sound's current Diversity Strategic Plan (DSP) at https://pugetsound.edu/about-puget-sound-0/mission-core-values/institutional-equity-diversity prior to writing this statement. While not an exhaustive list, the following are some ways applicant's can express their qualification:

• Your lived experiences and/or identities that speak to the department and university's commitment to inclusion and diversity;
• Demonstration of your awareness of inequities for underrepresented student populations in education, research experience, and other opportunities;
• Brief insights on why diversity is important at institutions like the University of Puget Sound;
• Infusion of diversity and diversity-related issues into your research, pedagogy, and/or service;
• Previous and/or current activities involving mentoring underrepresented student populations;
• Creative ideas or strategies you could enact as a member of the University of Puget Sound campus community to support the university's DSP;
• Brief insights on how cultural competency increases one's effectiveness as an educator and department/university colleague.

Compensation and Benefits:

Rank: Visiting Assistant Professor

Salary is commensurate with education and experience. Faculty salaries at the University of Puget Sound are based on a common salary scale based on experience. Assistant Professor salaries in 2022-2023 begin at $69,074 for an assistant professor in their first year of full-time post-doctorate teaching.

Puget Sound offers a generous benefits package. For more information, visit: https://pugetsound.edu/human-resources/benefits

About African American Studies: It is an interdisciplinary program that focuses on African American experiences, while recognizing that other academic subjects bear importance on the understanding of these experiences and should have a place in the African American Studies curriculum. Within the interrogative mode that guides African American Studies students in the program 1) acquire sophisticated knowledge of African American and other African diasporic experiences; 2) become conversant with local, regional, national, international, as well as personal and intersectional issues of race, power and difference, and recognize the implications these have for equity in daily life; 3) cultivate skills in analytic, transdisciplinary, reflexive, and community-based research methodologies, and modes of written oral, and multimedia communication allowing for the formulation, articulation, and interrogation of ideas in private and public spheres; 4) develop critical, intellectual, and ethical perspectives that can guide and advance personal, educational, vivid, political, and professional actions; and 5) engage and elaborate nuanced understandings of the role of race in African American life and also in broader social and institutional relations in the United States, other parts of the Americas, and elsewhere. https://www.pugetsound.edu/academics/african-american-studies

About the Race & Pedagogy Institute (RPI): is a collaboration of University of Puget Sound and the South Sound community that integrates intellectual assets of the campus into the mutual and reciprocal partnership with local community experience and expertise, and pursues the vision of education students and teachers at all levels to think critically about race and to act to eliminate racism. Alongside African American Studies, RPI contributes to a transformative educational vision regarding the work of re-envisioning the imperatives of liberal art modes of education. https://www.pugetsound.edu/race-pedagogy-institute

About Puget Sound:

The mission of the University of Puget Sound is to develop in its students the capacities for critical analysis, aesthetic appreciation, sound judgment, and apt expression that will sustain a lifetime of intellectual curiosity, active inquiry, and reasoned independence. Puget Sound is a 2,600-student, residential, national undergraduate liberal arts college in Tacoma, Washington, drawing students from virtually every state and several countries. 65% of students live on the 97 acre campus and the remainder typically live within a mile in the surrounding neighborhood. A low student-faculty ratio provides students with personal attention from faculty members who have a strong commitment to teaching. The university offers 1,200 courses in more than 50 areas of study, numerous experiential learning opportunities, 23 D-III varsity sports, and extensive co-curricular and leadership opportunities. Puget Sound graduates include Rhodes and Fulbright scholars, notables in the arts and culture, entrepreneurs and elected officials, and leaders in business and finance locally and throughout the world. In 2012, Puget Sound was named as one of 40 schools in Colleges that Change Lives.

Puget Sound has a well-established Shared Faculty Appointments Policy. More information on faculty resources can be found here: https://pugetsound.edu/resources-faculty

University Diversity Statement

• We acknowledge the richness of commonalities and differences we share as a university community; the intrinsic worth of all who work and study here; that education is enhanced by investigation of and reflection upon multiple perspectives.
• We aspire to create respect for and appreciation of all persons as a key characteristic of our campus community; to increase the diversity of all parts of our University community through commitment to diversity in our recruitment and retention efforts; to foster a spirit of openness to active engagement among all members of our campus community.
• We act to achieve an environment that welcomes and supports diversity; to ensure full educational opportunity for all who teach and learn here; to prepare effectively citizen-leaders for a pluralistic world.

All offers of employment are contingent on successful completion of all required background checks. All new hires will be required to submit proof of current COVID-19 vaccination (including booster) or receive an approved medical or religious exemption from the university.

The University of Puget Sound is an equal opportunity employer.


How to Apply
For complete job description and application instructions, visit: www.pugetsound.edu/employment

About Puget Sound
Puget Sound is a selective national liberal arts college in Tacoma, Washington, drawing 2,600 students from 48 states and 20 countries. Puget Sound graduates include Rhodes and Fulbright scholars, notables in the arts and culture, entrepreneurs and elected officials, and leaders in business and finance locally and throughout the world. A low student-faculty ratio provides Puget Sound students with personal attention from faculty who have a strong commitment to teaching and offer 1,200 courses each year in more than 40 traditional and interdisciplinary fields, including graduate programs in occupational and physical therapy and in education. Puget Sound is the only nationally ranked independent undergraduate liberal arts college in Western Washington, and one of just five independent colleges in the Pacific Northwest granted a charter by Phi Beta Kappa, the nation’s most prestigious academic honorary society. Visit "About Puget Sound" (http://www.pugetsound.edu/about) to learn more about the college.

As a strategic goal and through our core values, University of Puget Sound is committed to an environment that welcomes and supports diversity. We seek diversity of identity, thought, perspective, and background in our students, faculty, and staff. EOE/AA



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