Glossary of Obnoxious Insider Philosophy Job Market Jargon

PJMB reader JH has pointed out that some of the acronyms and other bits of jargon we've been using around here might be a wee bit obscure to the non-philosopher. Fair enough.

Here, then, are some definitions for some of our most commonly used terms:

AOC: Area of Competence. Departments expect you to be able to teach undergraduate-level courses in this area. Some departments might expect you to get around to publishing something in it at some point as well.

AOS: Area of Specialization. The area your dissertation is in, and what you expect to publish about most of the time. Also, when you go on the job market, departments expect you to be able to teach courses in this area at all undergraduate levels. They also expect you to be able to teach a variety of different advanced seminars for undergraduate majors and honors and grad students in this area.

APA: The American Philosophical Association, strictly speaking. Just as often, though, "APA" is used to refer to the Association's conferences. There are several APA conferences held throughout the year, in different parts of the country. The biggie, though, is the Eastern Division conference held in December--that's the one where all the horrors of the job market go down.

JFP: Jobs for Philosophers. A newspaper published several times a year by the APA that lists--you guessed it--jobs for philosophers. It lists every philosophy job that's open in North America, and a bunch from the rest of the world too. It's not as thick a paper as you might think.

(I'll likely pop back here and update things as new terms get abused.)