A vexing problem for academics is burnout: the experience of exhaustion, cynicism, and ineffectiveness that results from stretching across the gap between the ideals of your academic vocation and the reality of your academic job. Jonathan Malesic left his job as a tenured theology professor at a small liberal arts college after undergoing burnout over the course of several years. Since then, he has published dozens of articles on work and burnout in academic journals and general-interest publications. He has also published a book on this topic, The End of Burnout: Why Work Drains Us and How to Build Better Lives (University of California Press, 2022). In this workshop, he will address what burnout is, why academic workers are so vulnerable to it, and how building more compassionate institutions can help prevent and heal academic burnout.

In addition to The End of Burnout, Malesic has written about work and burnout for the New York Times, The New Republic, the Washington Post, The Guardian, the Chronicle of Higher Education, Inside Higher Ed, The Hedgehog Review, and several academic journals. He holds a Ph.D. in religious studies from the University of Virginia and has been the recipient of major grants from the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Louisville Institute. His writing has been recognized as notable in Best American Essays (2019, 2020, 2021) and Best American Food Writing (2020) and has received special mention in the Pushcart Prize anthology (2019). He teaches writing at Southern Methodist University and the University of Texas at Dallas.

Register by November 2nd for in-person attendance in Graduate Student Commons, Room 204. The event will also be accessible virtually via Zoom. Complimentary vegan lunch provided to in-person attendees.

This workshop is presented by the Division of Graduate Studies and co-sponsored by The Humanities Institute as part of our 2022-2023 PhD+ series. The Division of Graduate Studies’ workshops are for current UC Santa Cruz graduate students and postdoctoral scholars and require an active UC Santa Cruz email address.

About the PhD+ Workshop Series

Join us for the seventh year of PhD+ Workshops, hosted by The Humanities Institute. We meet monthly to discuss possible career paths for PhDs, internship possibilities, grant/fellowships, work/life balance, elements of style, online identity issues, and much, much more.