Post Academic

A friend let me know of some wild happenings at the University of New Mexico, where a tenured English professor was discovered working for a dominatrix phone-sex hotline … along with her grad students. Here’s the Chronicle of Higher Ed attempting to take an Enquirer-esque turn:

Life has become extremely complex in the University of New Mexico’s English department in the three years since Lisa D. Chávez, a tenured associate professor, was discovered moonlighting as the phone-sex dominatrix “Mistress Jade,” and posing in promotional pictures sexually dominating one of her own graduate students.

Well … when we were thinking of jobs that grad students could take to supplement their income, the word “submissive” did not come to mind. But, if that’s your thing and it’s legal, who are we to judge? It’s a rough economy. But … you might not want to take on one of these gigs if you’re doing it to please or impress your professor. The dominant-submissive thing puts a whole new twist on an imbalance of power in the classroom. But, in the end, it’s up to UNM to sort this one out, if it’s possible given the number of lawsuits that have ensued. Of course, these kinds of lawsuits are to be expected once people start mixing business with pleasure.

If Lisa Chavez wanted to destroy academic stereotypes, she did a hell of a job. Even her phone-sex scripts name-checked her day job and played on the professor persona: “Do you want a biker bitch, an imperious goddess, or a stern teacher ready to punish unruly students?” While Post Academic is more focused on the job landscape, I had to bring this up because I never imagined that a professor would be working for a phone-sex hotline. That sounds like something you’d see in old ’80s comedies like “Doctor Detroit.” I also never imagined that the Chronicle of Higher Ed would be writing about phone sex.

This legal matters swirling around this case are epic–so all charges alleged until proven under law or sorted out by lawyers.