12.1 Working in partnership

Working in partnership to generate new historical knowledge is usually an exciting and fulfilling experience for supervisors and researchers alike. Often close friendships are generated which last a lifetime.

On the other hand, sometimes (relatively rarely) the relationships can go wrong and become unproductive. That’s a real shame, but should not be allowed to develop into a catastrophe. The best advice for all parties, when becoming aware that things are going wrong, is to behave calmly and professionally. And to involve a third party, who can intervene to break the deadlock. So asking for help is a positive first step. Seeking practical alternatives turns a potential melodrama into an organizational reshuffle, which is near to routine.

In the ‘bad old days’ (in this context up until the 1980s), supervisors were very hit-and-miss. A number of them were marvellously stimulating. Another number were utterly negligent. And many were in between, not giving much supervision, chiefly because most of them had not been closely supervised themselves. In caricature, the learned don would offer a glass of sherry to the neophyte; murmur a word of encouragement; and direct the student to the nearest archive. If, after a period of ten years or so, the self-motivated researcher emerged with a thesis, everyone would be pleased. (This account is a caricature, but only just.) However, those days have truly gone. Most supervisors now supervise pro-actively; all departments and faculties provide clear frameworks for the process; and students have much higher expectations. Hence, if things go less than well, there are mechanisms in place which will help to find solutions.

12.2 Resolving general problems of supervision

To be sure, problems of supervision can initially loom large. Postgraduates, as the junior partners in the relationship, often feel anxious and intimidated. There are unruly human emotions involved. And there are grey areas, where supervisors’ attempts at encouragement may spill over into bullying, even if not intended as such. And there are other potential sources of postgraduate ‘blues’. These may include writer’s block (discussed in chapter 9); intellectual loneliness; worries about future job prospects; and, possibly, stress from intentional bullying or harassment (see section 12.3).

However, there is no point in struggling on in silence. And still less point in dropping out in despair. That outcome used to be more common. Today, by contrast, all parties realize how detrimental it was, to the research process, to the well-being of individual researchers, and to the reputation of the department or faculty. Institutions are judged on completion rates, so having effective systems of supervision and review is essential. Therefore problems can be raised in a calm and professional manner, expecting a calm and professional response.

As already noted, departments and faculties already institute regular reviews of progress and they require that each session of supervision is formally recorded. Such systems are explicitly designed to pick up any problems and to find solutions. It’s generally rare to find a state of postgraduate blues which cannot be alleviated.

Incidentally, a new communications hazard has emerged with the advent of social media. People can take to the airwaves too rapidly for considered judgement; and they can share too much. Since academics should try to write coolly, rather than in a polemical frenzy, it’s not a good idea for any party to fire off hostile or combative messages on social media (see fuller discussion in chapter 8).

Very much the same advice applies to freelance historians working outside the academic world. Much the most frequent problem confronting people carrying out research without an institutional framework of support is intellectual loneliness. It’s good therefore to enlist a few friends who will act as informal mentors. Getting someone to listen sympathetically to problems and perhaps to read some chapters can be truly helpful, even if the friends have no special expertise in the field.

Another variant of that tactic is to join a discussion or reading group with others who share similar interests. Contact with others breaks down feelings of isolation and can often provide a first step to finding solutions. As in the case of unblocking writer’s block (see chapter 9), the art of coping sensibly with difficulties can be made into a positive learning experience.

12.3 Resolving problems of bullying and harassment

Most workplaces have comprehensive policies which address problems of bullying and sexual harassment. In educational institutions, both forms of behaviour are banned outright. A complete interdiction includes all sexual relationships between staff and students.¹ And the ban applies even in cases where mutual agreement might be forthcoming. Love affairs should also be put on hold for the duration of a professional relationship. The inherent inequality of power and status between academics and students means that consent between equals is deemed impossible. Similarly, the disparity in institutional roles means that the potential for bullying is always present.

Such rules contribute to the continuing challenge within wider society as well as within the education system to subdue interpersonal aggression and to entrench socially acceptable and non-coercive codes of sexual relationships.² The universities have long known that putting bright, admiring apprentice scholars with bright, admirable academics, as many are, can generate intense relationships. Indeed, the whole process of one-on-one supervision is designed to generate a kind of intellectual intimacy; and that closeness can tend to develop into other varieties. Having a crush on one’s best teacher is a common, if often fleeting, educational experience. And academics may equally get caught up in their own maelstrom of emotions, with the wide-eyed admiration from apprentice scholars making up for any other problems in the wider world.³

For many years, considerable latitude was tacitly allowed to senior figures (usually powerful men). Illicit affairs and bullying featured regularly in campus plays and novels.⁴ Willy Russell’s wry drama, Educating Rita (1981), and David Mamet’s darker Oleanna (1992) explored implicit and explicit sexual tensions between the teacher and the taught.⁵ Alison Lurie’s witty War between the Tates (1974) also extracted humour and social observation from illicit campus entanglements. Meanwhile, Malcolm Bradbury’s The History Man (1975) featured both bullying and wily sexual intrigues. The novel’s main protagonist, the academic Howard Kirk, saw himself as a left-leaning progressive figure, encapsulating the trend of the times. Hence he was the ‘history man’. Yet he is a deeply manipulative figure. Bradbury seems to half-admire his resourceful anti-hero. In all, however, the novel satirizes male power politics and sexual entitlement – even among ‘right-on’, trendy left-wingers.

Moreover, bullying and sexual harassment spread doubt and disillusionment throughout the wider community. Would-be secret affairs rarely remain completely secret for long. At one point in Bradbury’s novel, Howard Kirk remarks that: ‘Most beds aren’t as intimate as people think they are’.⁶ It was a telling point. Staff–student affairs – or even rumours of the same – generate pervasive jealousies, resentment and accusations of favouritism.

Today, however, the framework is shifting, even while problems can and undoubtedly still do occur. These issues are no longer shrouded in silence. Apprentice scholars expect their mentors to behave with dignity and self-restraint; and equally expect to have access to sympathetic support and remedial action, if needed.

Over the long term, the power imbalance within higher education, while still apparent, has shifted somewhat. Senior ‘dons’ may have institutional, intellectual and personal kudos. On the other hand, most academics entirely lack the glamour, wealth and power of (say) successful media moguls, film stars, TV personalities, pop stars, glitzy financiers, business tycoons and (even) politicians. Furthermore, the sociological profile of the professoriat is becoming much more variegated, no longer dominated by white heterosexual males. Practically, too, educational administration has become much more bureaucratized. Students’ examination grades, prizes and subsequent appointments are awarded by boards and panels, and vetted by committees, rather than by autocratic professors, acting in isolation.

The outcome is a shifting world, where people need to think carefully about their behaviour. Apprentice scholars may also be at fault. Stalking is a complex and destructive phenomenon;⁷ and there have been cases of students stalking professors. Nor is that all. There are instances of harassment, bullying, violence and sexual coercion between fellow students, generating another set of difficulties. At best, these are fundamental issues in need of pre-emptive education, assisted by good management and trusted mechanisms for resolving problems. At their most intractable, however, they are matters for the law.

12.4 Ethical safeguards

Codes of good practice can’t regulate every permutation in polymorphous human behaviour. Instead, they establish expected norms, which are built into bureaucratic rules. If things go wrong, institutions have mechanisms for reporting complaints. These systems are designed to provide a fair, robust and independent procedure for investigating and dealing with all such cases, bearing in mind (as in any legal system) the possibility of false accusations. In the event of a complaint, it’s helpful to have good evidence (such as notes of key meetings), and to present it in a calm and factual manner. Bullying and harassment are highly emotive subjects. And evidence is the best foundation for complaint – and, conversely, the best antidote to false accusation.

One crucial rule is that no academics should be put into positions that enable them potentially to abuse their power in relation to marking and assessment. Otherwise, there is a risk that confidence in the system could be undermined. At the undergraduate, and MA/MSc level, there are safeguarding processes of double-marking, which are adjudicated by an external examiner and the examination board. At the doctoral level, there is a carefully chosen panel of experts in the field, usually with at least one from an outside institution or department. And then the final award is made by the university’s examination board, based upon these examiners’ reports. Academic success and all forms of research evaluation should depend upon merit, and merit alone. And be understood as such.

All parties should seek to inculcate a supportive but non-sexualized, non-bullying, non-prejudiced, anti-discriminatory and cooperative work environment.⁸ Behaviour that contradicts that aim is morally wrong, often legally prohibited and harmful both academically and personally. As the world of learning is gradually being expanded and democratized around the world, so the entrenching of improved codes of interpersonal behaviour has to be a big part of the process. These are matters of concern for everyone, and future generations of historians will look back with close attention to check how well (or otherwise) the research communities of today have managed.

12.5 Summary: the pleasures of intellectual companionship

Close intellectual companionship is exciting. The pleasures of shared debates and research endeavour can be intense and mentally electrifying. And many of the most rewarding aspects of advanced historical research are found in the informal exchanges and social interactions that are integral to the process.

Lengthy discussions over coffee or in the bar – which may continue late into the evening – are part of the magic of intellectual companionship. And not without reason. It’s useful, when mulling over complex ideas, to have a chance to talk them through in depth, with an advisor who is both critic and guide. A good intellectual prod in the right manner and at the right moment can help to hone existing ideas and generate new ones.

Nonetheless, such togetherness should be enjoyed without getting side-tracked into unprofessional behaviour. Academic relationships between supervisors and researchers – or private sessions between mentors and freelance authors – are based upon imbalances of power and experience. Yet the positive footing of shared commitment can, with sense and goodwill in a non-coercive environment, turn what might be purely routine exchanges into fizzing intellectual firepower.

1. 1  There are some well-known cases of happy marriages between teachers and their former students (one being that of President Macron of France, whose wife taught him French and Latin when he was at high school), but convention today requires that romantic and sexual relationships be postponed until the pedagogic relationship is ended.

2. 2  For long-term trends – not without controversy – see J. Weeks, Sex, Politics and Society: the Regulation of Sexuality since 1800 (Abingdon, 2017); S. Pinker, The Better Angels of Our Nature: the Decline of Violence in History and Its Causes (London, 2011).

3. 3  Among a growing literature, see B. W. Dziech and L. Weiner, The Lecherous Professor: Sexual Harassment on Campus (Boston, Mass., 1984); A. C. Saguy, What Is Sexual Harassment? From Capitol Hill to the Sorbonne (London, 2003); C. A. Paludi and M. Paludi (ed.), Academic and Workplace Sexual Harassment: a Handbook (London, 2003); and R. Refinetti, Sexual Harassment and Sexual Consent (London, 2018).

4. 4  D. Fuchs and W. Klepuszewski (ed.), The Campus Novel: Regional or Global? (Leiden, 2019).

5. 5  Compare W. Russell, Educating Rita: a Comedy (London, 1981), on stage (1980) and film, dir. L. Gilbert (1983); with D. Mamet, Oleanna, on stage (1992), on film, dir. D. Mamet (1994), and in print, ed. D. Rosenthal (London, 2004).

6. 6  M. Bradbury, The History Man (London, 1975, 1977), p. 171.

7. 7  J. A. Davis (ed.), Stalking Crimes and Victim Protection: Prevention, Intervention, Threat Assessment and Case Management (Boca Raton, Fla., 2001); O. Chan and L. L. Sheridan, Stalking: an International Perspective (Hoboken, N.J., 2020).

8. 8  D. C. England, The Essential Guide to Handling Workplace Harassment and Discrimination (Beverley, Calif., 2018); N. Thompson, Tackling Bullying and Harassment in the Workplace: a Learning and Development Manual (Lyme Regis, 2009).