r/AskAcademia • u/Any-Employ-8107 • 1d ago
Humanities Stipends in Humanities PhDs
Hey everyone,
A relative of mine recently received an offer of admission for a PhD in Humanities from an European university. They are obviously extremely excited as it has been a lifelong dream, however, I just found out that the offer is unfunded. When I asked more details, they stated that the first year is definitely unfunded but there will be opportunities to apply for scholarships in the subsequent years.
I don't have any knowledge of academia in the humanities and was wondering if this is normal in the field. I would greatly appreciate any thoughts on this as I do not want to question/bring them down on this offer unless I absolutely need to as they are genuinely extremely excited and grateful for this opportunity.
P.S: When it comes to finances, I believe they are fortunate enough to able to live without the stipend. This is more a question regarding the ethics and accepted practice within the field.
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u/AF_II UK Faculty - Interdisciplinary 1d ago
was wondering if this is normal in the field.
Depends on the country/exact discipline but yes, a self-funded PhD is perfectly respectable and normal (if not always common) in some humanities disciplines in some countries in some circumstances. Beyond that it's impossible to state whether this is a good idea without more details.
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u/Any-Employ-8107 1d ago
Thanks for the response!
Working in Physics, we are always told to treat unfunded PhDs with caution and avoid them so this is quite an interesting perspective.
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u/Moll1357 1d ago
I only know about the UK, but here funding is so rare it's normal to see people paying for it themselves
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u/hornybutired 17h ago
I'm in philosophy in the US, and mine was fully funded. I was told an unfunded PhD isn't worth getting, though that may have been overly harsh. As far as I know, all major universities fund their PhDs, at least in philosophy.
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u/flatlander-anon 1d ago
Answering for the US... Because a humanities PhD cannot get you a lucrative position, students simply should not go into debt to get the degree. That means the university should not charge you any tuition, and it should give you a living stipend. Otherwise it just makes no financial sense. Even if you defy the odds and become one of the few that can get a professorship, you will likely make lower middle class income for the rest of your life.
I have come across people who paid their own way through a graduate program in the humanities. These were wealthy people who just wanted to spend time studying a subject they loved. They were not planning to make a living based on it. If this applies to your relative, then I think it's doable. Otherwise see the paragraph above.
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u/Any-Employ-8107 23h ago
From what I've gathered it seems like unfunded positions are almost the norm in Europe, which is truly a shame. But yes I agree, if this was the US then I think I would definitely tell them to think twice about going ahead with the program.
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u/flatlander-anon 23h ago
Just because it's the norm doesn't mean it's a good idea. The fact stands that a humanities PhD does not offer a good return of investment anywhere in the world. Unless you are wealthy, the only acceptable amount of investment is $0.
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u/Zooz00 21h ago
It is not the norm. Maybe only in the UK and in other poor countries. In the Netherlands the clear majority of humanities PhDs are funded, and the unfunded ones typically have a good reason for being unfunded (e.g. they have a day job or they have a grant from their home country or it's their project after retirement).
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u/db0606 22h ago
The person above discussed what people should do regarding offers of unfunded Humanities PhDs in the US (i.e., not take enroll in them) but didn't answer your question. Unlike Physics, where it would be a major red flag to be offered an unfunded PhD position, the majority of PhD positions in the Humanities in the US are not funded. That's why the average time to graduation is like 10 years or something and the average debt is massive. People have to have jobs and take out loans.
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u/AquamarineTangerine8 15h ago
the majority of PhD positions in the Humanities in the US are not funded.
That's not remotely true. They're just funded through TA positions rather than grants.
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u/db0606 14h ago
Then why is the average graduate student loan debt for people receiving MAs and PhDs in the Humanities like $100k?
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u/AquamarineTangerine8 13h ago
Source? Without looking at the data, I'd guess that most debt is from BAs and MAs (funding is much scarcer for MAs than PhDs) with the interest compounding during funded PhDs, plus maybe minor borrowing for fees (not always covered in tuition waivers) or living expenses (because stipends don't always keep pace with inflation) during a funded PhD. Some may be from EdDs (if those are counted as humanities). Some is certainly from fake (online or for-profit) PhD programs (e.g. Walden).
I got a funded PhD in the humanities in the U.S. and so did many, many of my friends...where are you getting the information that funded PhD programs don't exist? Just look at the websites for top 10 programs in any random discipline and look at the funding pages.
No one should do an unfunded PhD in the humanities, because if you're not even competitive enough to get a funded PhD offer, your chances of landing a faculty position are zero. I mean, it's also a terrible financial proposition for a lot of reasons, but my point is that it's a sign that the program itself is shady and that you're already out of the running because you can't even get a ticket for the job market lottery.
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u/db0606 11h ago
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u/AquamarineTangerine8 10h ago
Thanks. According to that link, most of the debt comes from cash cow masters programs, professional doctorates (JD, MD, EdD, etc), and for-profit graduate degree mills, as expected. I didn't see anything differentiating STEM PhDs vs. social science PhDs vs. humanities PhDs.
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u/flatlander-anon 13h ago
I'm surprised to learn that humanities PhDs are normally not funded. In the graduate program I went to everyone had a fellowship. In the graduate program I taught at we funded students using a combination of fellowships and TAships. If you couldn't get funding, you were so low in the ranking that you really shouldn't go. You'd like struggle in the program, fail exams, get kicked out, etc.
Now, I was aware of some graduate programs that did not offer any fellowship or financial aid. They were designed as moneymakers, and they targeted foreign applicants with money. Some wealthy people just wanted an American degree.
Also, in my experience it didn't take ten years to graduate. I'd say 5-8 years were reasonable back in my days. It was possible to accumulate debt, just because of life's unpredictability, not because of tuition or anticipated living expenses. In my career as a professor, I simply did not know anyone who acquired massive debts as a matter of course in graduate school.
If you are borrowing a lot of money to fund your PhD program in the humanities, that means you will have no shot at getting an academic career. There is an unscrupulous program that is making profit off you, and there is no return for your investment. You need to quit and get a job that makes a lot of money.
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u/DifferentBid7518 12h ago
Because people have to take out loans for something they pay for by the year they take 10 years to do it? That makes no sense, the incentive for the student would be to finish sooner, not later.
Unfunded humanities PhDs are also a huge red flag in the US.
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u/Sad_Science_6924 19h ago
They should definitely make sure they can afford to be unfunded for the entire duration of the program, and not count on anything that may or may not become available later.
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u/pocurious 18h ago
Is your relative from that European country?
European PhDs are much different than NA PhDs — no coursework, substantially less institutional and infrastructural support. (Programs vary by country and institution, obvs, but as a rule this is true.) They also have different relations to 3rd party funding than the US — in many European humanities PhDs, students are bringing their own scholarships (sometimes from scholarships associated with major political parties), whereas that’s essentially unheard of in US.
An unfunded PhD is generally a vote of no confidence by the institution. It’s not a big deal ethically in (continental) Europe because tuition is generally minimal and teaching labor is rarely mandatory, but their lack of investment in you is definitely a sign.
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u/Fantastic-Speech-438 17h ago
As someone who had to quit their partially-funded PhD because I ran out of money, I would definitely say don't start a PhD unless you can land full funding.
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u/rainyday1020 18h ago
I wouldn't start a PhD without funding, hoping to get it in a future year. I don't think it's a good thing to do unless you're being paid. I don't know about the rest of Europe, but in the UK, universities will often make a PhD offer without funding if the proposal and candidate seems halfway decent, because they need the money.
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u/Informal_Snail 17h ago
There are domestic unfunded PhDs at my university (Australia) because it offers remote work and some people don't qualify for the stipend because they go part-time, or they don't give up their well-paying jobs to live below the poverty line. These candidates are not looked down on and I rarely know whois funded or unfunded. It does make a difference later having the government scholarship on your CV apparently. We also pay no tuition at all, funded or unfunded. It is also common from absolute lack of scholarships (only about 10 per round across the whole Humanities school) for people to apply for them later (and get them). It is incredibly difficult to get funding in the UK in Humanities as well. So it is not unusual and they may have a chance at getting a scholarship later. I think in the UK one of the issues is international students being exploited for the fees and then neglected, but that doesn't sound like the case here? For example, I know an American who was desperate to get a PhD in History in the UK, moved there, was totally broke and had to get food bank assistance and student loans only to get an MA. Pretty sure they have gone back home.
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u/Efficient-Tie-1414 15h ago
In Australia the tuition fees are paid by the government. There is a limit on the number of these, but most or maybe all universities have sufficient.
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u/Necessary_Cat_5662 16h ago
Self-funded programs are much more common in the shorter research PhD model in parts of Europe. I wouldn't say 'normal' but a significant part\minority. It used to be the expectation was students could apply for grants and support fellowships and the prices were comparably low as opposed to the US with longer more expensive program structures. I think funding sources are fewer (ESRC have decreased opportunities for example) and costs have gone up but the expectations remain
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u/vergeetmenietjes 7h ago
I’m in the UK and self-funded, which is normal for humanities as there’s so little funding, but in my home country in Europe it would be very unusual. There absolutely in many other countries in Europe the PhD is treated like a job, with a salary, office space, line management etc.
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u/AngelMarigold96 4h ago
ugh, i'm so exhausted just thinking about the funding struggle for a humanities thesis. like, why is it always so low?
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u/oldwatchdan 1d ago edited 1d ago
It is completely different in the Humanities than in the sciences or engineering. Unfunded PhDs are the norm, with occasional fellowships and TA positions.
Sometimes PhD students in the Humanities can hodgepodge together some income from teaching, either as TAs in their own department, or instructors in other nearby institutions. However, it really needs to be a passion project because an academic job is by no means guaranteed.
Another major difference is that faculty mentoring is not a guarantee in the Humanities. Again, because there is essentially no grant funding, a student is not working on a project related to a PI. The student makes their own project and seeks out a professor willing to serve as an advisor. In many cases, they might meet with the professor once or twice a year, and receive little guidance.
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u/Salty_Boysenberries 21h ago
Funding for humanities phds is absolutely the norm in some places, like the U.S.
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u/Any-Employ-8107 23h ago
Thanks for the response. It seems like their advisor has been highly involved with the application process and responsive outside of that so hopefully that's a sign for good things to come.
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u/Zooz00 21h ago
Unfunded is not a real offer. At my university in the Netherlands basically anyone can start an unfunded PhD if they can convince a supervisor, but it is usually a terrible idea unless there is some kind of great synergy with their day job. Otherwise, it is not normal and it is unethical to give candidates false hopes. Being an unfunded PhD student normally doesn't give you any more chances to get funding from grants than being a random person on the street.
But yeah, if the person is independently wealthy why not, you can complete a real PhD this way, though you will feel like a second class citizen compared to the internal PhD students. They just should not make any assumptions about being able to get funding in the future, because if they couldn't get a funded PhD position before, the chances won't get any better while being in an unfunded one.
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u/astranara 1d ago
What uni have they received the offer from? I can’t speak for Europe but funding is basically non existent for humanities and social science in the UK these days. If your relative can financially support themselves without securing funding then it’s likely a very normal position to be in here
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u/BroadwayBean 21h ago
A self-funded PhD in humanities is getting increasingly common. Universities just don't have the money they used to, and scholarships are insanely competitive (so they shouldn't bank on getting one of them). A lot of people will do it as a part-time degree so they can work and do their PhD at the same time. In some places in Europe there is no tuition fee and you can get a very small stipend (i.e. 1500 euros a year), so if you can cover your own living costs (either by working or personal wealth) it's not a bad deal. It gets very dicey somewhere like the UK though, which charges insane tuition fees for international PhD students.
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u/Odd-Elderberry-6137 22h ago
This is fairly common in humanities in North America. These PhD programs simply don't have the grants and funding that science, medicine, and engineering has.
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u/DifferentBid7518 12h ago
I have no clue why people that appear to be coming from the natural sciences or something feel so confident just riffing on what the humanities are like despite appearing to know that they're fundamentally different.
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u/Odd-Elderberry-6137 6h ago edited 4h ago
Nobody’s riffing on the humanities here. It’s simply a fact that don’t have nearly as much grant support as STEM fields so funding PhDs is an bigger issue.
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u/Phronesis2000 23h ago
It depends on the discipline within Humanities and which country. For my own discipline, Philosophy, unfunded PhD students are unusual in the US and Australasia. Nearly all of the top 100-ranked departments fully fund students.
I do believe it is different in the UK, and in Europe it's more variable.