TT or not TT, VAP is the question.
Demand side here: The more details the better. It looks bad if the letter is less than 3-5 page long. We want to learn everything about you. In addition to your research and teaching statement we want to know: What motivates you? What are your views on the current world affairs? What do you like doing for fun? Do your interests outside school coincide with those of your future colleagues? What made you enter a graduate school?
I hope you find it useful and good luck with your market!!
Five pages minimum!
I suspect OP is a troll deliberately giving bad advice. At the very least s/he does not speak for everyone. Cover letters, like any prose the applicant generates specifically for the job file (teaching statements, I'm looking at you!) are cheap talk. I won't read more than a page and a half of the cover letter. After that I'm bored and on to the important stuff: vita, writing samples and recommendation letters. Spend the time to craft a good letter, but don't make it too long or you risk losing your audience.
^horrible advice. I think I will stick to OP's.
I just read the CV first - it gives the basic information, and the cover is only if I'm interested after that.
Don't write a corporate "these are the skills I bring to your department", "this is why I am a great fit in your department", "I am the best candidate for the job, "I would love to be your colleague" kind of crap. Short summary of your dissertation, where it fits in the literature, what it contributes, and what you can teach is enough.
I had a bad experience on the job market where someone read all kinds of bizarre things into what I thought was a fairly standard cover letter. This person called my advisor to say I was arrogant, misinformed about their department, etc.
My next year on the market my cover letter was 3 sentences, and I got a job.
Is it just that when this troll posts the same goddamn bullshit post every hour, there's a new group of gullible shits ready to add their penetrating commentary?
Munger's advice (given in a previous thread, which I'm sure Otis will find for us) is 2 pages, no more, no less.
^ A.S. go back to the gym!
Demand side here: The more details the better. It looks bad if the letter is less than 3-5 page long. We want to learn everything about you. In addition to your research and teaching statement we want to know: What motivates you? What are your views on the current world affairs? What do you like doing for fun? Do your interests outside school coincide with those of your future colleagues? What made you enter a graduate school?
I hope you find it useful and good luck with your market!!
Yop wins tool of the year award.
If you don't want to hear from a tenured associate who has sat on 6 search committees (and will be on another one this year) that's on you. But trust me, when I've got read 65 files, each of which has 75-150 pages of text, I will cut corners. Others will too. Good luck guys and gals!
The cover letter should be a like a woman's skirt: long enough to cover the subject but short enough to keep their attention
Two pages.
It's really freakin' simple; write a tight, succinct but detailed cover letter, and run it by: your advisor, your committee, every grad student/AP colleague, spouse, friend, etc., that will possibly read it. Don't rely on specific advice given here.
^political scientist don't have friends