McCutcheon/Religious Studies Beyond, 5. A Manifesto on Earning and Awarding a Ph.D.

Relying on the collaborative input from doctoral graduates in the study of religion who have gone on to successful careers outside of academia, this essay offers a critique of the field for not adapting far quicker to the changing economic conditions of higher education over recent decades but also provides a variety of practical suggestions for how programs in our field can make tactical and substantive changes to better prepare graduate students for a far wider variety of professional futures, inasmuch as we all know that few, at least for the foreseeable future, will ever be hired as tenure-track faculty members.