Grad School Grain of Truth

A colleague just passed along to me a spoof Tumblr blog comprised of fake MLA ads, http://mlajobs.tumblr.com/

The MLA (Modern Language Association) is of course the big professional organization for language and literature departments. If you have any interest in attending graduate school in language and/or literature, particularly if you relish the idea of becoming a college professor yourself, you will have to go through the MLA, and their JIL (job information list). 

But times are hard, and jobs have been squeezed into some spectacularly strange shapes, like this one on the spoof blog:

• Notre Dame University is hiring an Assistant Professor of Medieval Studies. Fluency is required in at least seven of the following: Middle High German, Old Dutch, Old Norse, Middle Welsh, Cornish, Galician, Catalan, Occitan, Provençal, Anglo-Saxon, Old French, Frisian, and Gothick. Secondary specialties in Jutish or Pictish love poetry and steampunk fiction highly desirable. Teaching duties will be 4/4, seven of which are Beginning Latin for theology students.

If you don't see what's sadly funny about the requirements--well, I'd be happy to talk about it if you're really interested in grad school.