How does professor emeritus fit into this scheme? Like, does that free up an actual tenured position for someone?
It took me some time, but I looked into this! It depends on the university and the person in question; but, to make a generalization, emeritus professors are treated like adjuncts, meaning that they teach classes on a per-course salary. Because they're a source of cheap part-time labor, their existence is often used by universities to justify not creating a tenure line to hire a new person to fill the position they've ostensibly left.
The history behind this is that, during the postwar education boom of the 1970s, there were relatively few grad students and professors on the market, so the prospect of tenure (which wasn't an established system then) was used to entice people to jobs. This actually benefited universities in that the person would only be up for one or possibly two promotions, meaning that their salaries would be fixed even in the face of inflation.
I think there's a stereotype of a superstar emeritus professor whom the university wants to retain for their prestige, but a lot of people can't fully retire because of their economic precarity - and because they've devoted their entire life to the university (as per the demands of the tenure system) and don't have anything else.
It's awful and I hate it, and I'm glad I'm getting out while I'm still relatively young.
no subject
It took me some time, but I looked into this! It depends on the university and the person in question; but, to make a generalization, emeritus professors are treated like adjuncts, meaning that they teach classes on a per-course salary. Because they're a source of cheap part-time labor, their existence is often used by universities to justify not creating a tenure line to hire a new person to fill the position they've ostensibly left.
The history behind this is that, during the postwar education boom of the 1970s, there were relatively few grad students and professors on the market, so the prospect of tenure (which wasn't an established system then) was used to entice people to jobs. This actually benefited universities in that the person would only be up for one or possibly two promotions, meaning that their salaries would be fixed even in the face of inflation.
I think there's a stereotype of a superstar emeritus professor whom the university wants to retain for their prestige, but a lot of people can't fully retire because of their economic precarity - and because they've devoted their entire life to the university (as per the demands of the tenure system) and don't have anything else.
It's awful and I hate it, and I'm glad I'm getting out while I'm still relatively young.