zones of the sociology job market

Academic job markets are odd. They are “thin,” in the sense that there are relatively few buyers. And they are balkanized in the sense that there all kinds of weird niches. And they are fluctuating, in the sense that trends come and go. Despite all that, sociology, like most disciplines, have consistent “streams of jobs” that merit discussion.

1. The stratification zone: The study of inequality is at the core of field and every year people get hired. In fact, it is so central to the field that advertising a strat job is almost like admitting that you’re really doing an open search.
2. The health/crim/aging zone: Sociologists don’t say that health, or criminal justice, or gerontology is at the core, but we can’t say no to the enrollments and the grants. The result is that this zone is almost always healthy.
3. The urban zone: A small zone, but a consistent one. Most urban sociologists can honestly argue that they do race or inequality, so they tend to do well.
4. The econ soc/institutions/political soc zone: Usually in the middle in terms of jobs. The econ soc/orgs/institutions side of things do well, but the political side can be tough. On the up side, people in this zone can often move into jobs in b-schools,policy or ed schools.
5. The demography/family zone: Big grants, big jobs. Most programs have these folks and some invest deeply in this zone. Jobs available.
6. The Prada Bag zone: Named after Monica Prasad’s description of historical comparative scholars, the Prada Bag Zone exists mainly in top 30 programs and some elite liberal arts colleges because they are luxury items. Good to have, and desirable, but they won’t bump off the health/crim zone in less competitive programs. Prada bags include the historical comparative people, hard core ethnographers, and movements people, among other. Tiny zone, few jobs.
7. Niche zones: Sociology has a number of very small job market zones, for specialties that have limited appeal and meager funding. The great example of sociology of science. Another is old school political sociology. Life in these zone is nasty, brutish and short.

I intentionally left out education, because people in that zone tend to swept up into other zones (stratification or urban or institutions).  What else did I miss? What else should we talk about in terms of the sociology job market?

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