Mapping Your Academic Career: Charting the Course of a Professor’s Life
Book Summary • Gary M. Burge, Mapping Your Academic Career: Charting the Course of a Professor’s Life, (Downers Grove: IVP Academic, 2015), Kindle. Kindle Edition. 140 pp. $12.
Read time: 4 min
Summary
Gary Burge’s Mapping Your Academic Career articulates three stages in the professional lives of academics, focusing on the psychological and developmental patterns faculty members experience over their careers. Burge identifies three key transitions and milestones: (1) the quest for security in early academic years, (2) the pursuit of success in mid-career, and (3) the search for significance in later years. He draws from psychological theorists like Erikson and Piaget to frame these stages and provide practical advice for navigating the opportunities and challenges of each phase. Burge reflects on the role of mentorship, the impact of institutional culture, and the evolving relationship between professors, their work, students, and their institutions over time. Additionally, he discusses the emotional toll of academic life, touching on risks like isolation, anxiety, and the challenge of maintaining resilience in the face of changing institutional demands. His insights on finding purpose and adapting to new roles show the importance of community, continuous development, and academic productivity as central to a fulfilling academic career. While Burge’s three-stage paradigm is a helpful start to the conversation, his exclusive reliance on psychological theories without biblical wisdom—often at odds with secular theories—is surprising, given that he is a biblical studies professor. Burge’s omission of biblical perspectives on life stages feels like a missed opportunity.
Quotations
“I used to think about that hour in the classroom as the delivery of tightly organized information, a style not unlike the defense of a thesis or the presentation of an academic paper. Today I wouldn’t imagine doing such a thing” (9).
“Personal validation by peers contributes powerfully to whether we believe we are cool or amazing, smart or eloquent, or if we decide we are simply frauds because we’ve accepted our own worst self-criticism. Peers build those foundations that either inspire us to go on or cripple us” (36).
“The chief problem with the pursuit of student popularity is that it robs us of our integrity in the classroom” (38).
“When energy is focused less on the lecture notes and more on the audience, the students sense it. They hunger for it because it means they are being engaged as persons, not as recorders” (69).
“One of the deeper joys of Cohort 3 is learning that a new role is before us. Students will come to us for reasons that may surprise us. . .. It is important to remember that they are not coming looking for a new friend. They are seeking a friendly adult who will remain an adult” (126).
“Have a plan and a purpose. . .. When we retire, we cannot think that what gave us meaning before retirement will continue to do so after we retire. We may not be teaching and writing or speaking opportunities may dry up. A busy, productive professional life must be replaced by something meaningful or else we will find ourselves slipping into lethargy and despair” (130). ❖
Quote this Review
Footnote: Timothy J. Harris, “Mapping Your Academic Career: Charting the Course of a Professor’s Life,” Practical Theologian, June 28, 2024, https://www.practicaltheologian.com/blog/bookreview-c8mw9.
Bibliography: Harris, Timothy J. “Mapping Your Academic Career: Charting the Course of a Professor’s Life.” Practical Theologian, June 28, 2024. https://www.practicaltheologian.com/blog/bookreview-c8mw9.
