For this panel, after getting over how infuriated I was by the use of passive voice – “how is contingent labor defined” – I thought of a pair of small problems I face when I send articles to journals: using my sometimes-unavailable university account and describing myself in the author bio.

“Christian Long is unsure of how to write his author bio”

An under-appreciated part of academic publishing for adjuncts is the author bio. Even a cursory overview of a journal or book back cover reveals the near-universal deployment of institutional affiliation in author bios. My presentation will investigate the question of the contingent faculty member who finds time and energy to publish. Exactly how do you describe yourself to the academic community – with its interest in institutional affiliation – when your very condition is one of non- or tenuous affiliation? While terms like “Visiting Assistant Professor” and “Instructor” are useful tools, they are not (to mix the metaphor) blunt enough instruments to make clear to our audience that “this is written by an adjunct.” I will argue that for adjuncts, author bio conventions at their best reflect the collegiality of particular departments, but at their worst paper over the many sins of the institutionalized contingent academic labor racket.