CCollegeMatcher

Area, Ethnic, and Cultural Studies Teachers, Postsecondary

US occupation · SOC 25-1062

Job titles people report: Adjunct Professor, American Studies Professor, Assistant Professor, Associate Professor, Black Studies Professor, Ethnic Studies Professor, Humanities Professor, Lecturer, Professor, Women's Studies Professor

Pay and outlook

Median annual wage, May 2025
$85,020
Half earn more, half earn less
Middle half earn
$65,660 – $110,710
25th to 75th percentile
People employed, May 2025
11,300
Wage and salary jobs (OEWS)
Projected change, 2025–35
+2.7%
Growing slower than all jobs (0% to under 3.5%)
Openings a year (projected)
1,000
New jobs plus replacing people who leave
Typical education to enter
Doctoral or professional degree
BLS
  • All figures are for the United States as a whole. Pay varies a lot by state and city.
  • Wages are for everyone working in the occupation in May 2025, at every career stage. They are not starting salaries or figures for new graduates.
  • Growth and openings are BLS projections for 2025–35. They are estimates, not promises. Openings include jobs that open up when people retire or change occupation, not just new jobs.

What the work involves

Teach courses pertaining to the culture and development of an area, an ethnic group, or any other group, such as Latin American studies, women's studies, or urban affairs. Includes both teachers primarily engaged in teaching and those who do a combination of teaching and research.

Main tasks

  • Initiate, facilitate, and moderate classroom discussions.
  • Evaluate and grade students' class work, assignments, and papers.
  • Prepare and deliver lectures to undergraduate or graduate students on topics such as race and ethnic relations, gender studies, and cross-cultural perspectives.
  • Prepare course materials, such as syllabi, homework assignments, and handouts.
  • Compile, administer, and grade examinations, or assign this work to others.
  • Keep abreast of developments in the field by reading current literature, talking with colleagues, and participating in professional conferences.
  • Plan, evaluate, and revise curricula, course content, course materials, and methods of instruction.
  • Conduct research in a particular field of knowledge and publish findings in professional journals, books, or electronic media.

Description and tasks from the O*NET® 31.0 Database.

Getting in

Typical education to enter (BLS)
Doctoral or professional degree
O*NET Job Zone 5
Extensive preparation
Most of these occupations require graduate school. For example, they may require a master's degree, and some require a Ph.D., M.D., or J.D. (law degree).

Interests it suits

The strongest of the six O*NET interest types for this occupation, highest first. The short glosses are ours.

  • Social: helping, teaching and caring for people
  • Investigative: research, analysis and solving problems with ideas
  • Artistic: creating, designing and self-expression

Fields of study that lead here

From the federal CIP–SOC crosswalk, which links 66 programmes to this occupation. A link means the programme prepares people for this kind of work. It doesn't mean the programme is required, or that it's the only route.

Social Sciences

  • Cultural Anthropology

Find colleges that fit you with our matcher: choose Social Sciences at the Major step.

Where many students take social sciences

Ordered by the field's share of degrees awarded times undergraduate enrolment (College Scorecard), among colleges with at least 1,000 undergraduates. Online universities are included. It's a rough measure of how big the programme is. It says nothing about quality. The share counts every programme in the field, not only the ones linked to this career.

Philosophy & Religion

  • Islamic Studies
  • Jewish/Judaic Studies
  • Catholic Studies
  • Mormon Studies

Find colleges that fit you with our matcher: choose Philosophy & Religion at the Major step.

Where many students take philosophy & religion

Ordered by the field's share of degrees awarded times undergraduate enrolment (College Scorecard), among colleges with at least 1,000 undergraduates. Online universities are included. It's a rough measure of how big the programme is. It says nothing about quality. The share counts every programme in the field, not only the ones linked to this career.

Other fields

Our college matcher doesn't offer these fields as a major, so we can't suggest colleges for them here.

Area, Ethnic, Cultural, Gender, and Group Studies

  • African Studies
  • American/United States Studies/Civilization
  • Asian Studies/Civilization
  • East Asian Studies
  • Russian, Central European, East European and Eurasian Studies
  • European Studies/Civilization
  • Latin American Studies
  • Near and Middle Eastern Studies
42 more programmes
  • Pacific Area/Pacific Rim Studies
  • Russian Studies
  • Scandinavian Studies
  • South Asian Studies
  • Southeast Asian Studies
  • Western European Studies
  • Canadian Studies
  • Balkans Studies
  • Baltic Studies
  • Slavic Studies
  • Caribbean Studies
  • Ural-Altaic and Central Asian Studies
  • Commonwealth Studies
  • Regional Studies (U.S., Canadian, Foreign)
  • Chinese Studies
  • French Studies
  • German Studies
  • Italian Studies
  • Japanese Studies
  • Korean Studies
  • Polish Studies
  • Spanish and Iberian Studies
  • Tibetan Studies
  • Ukraine Studies
  • Irish Studies
  • Latin American and Caribbean Studies
  • Appalachian Studies
  • Arctic Studies
  • Area Studies, Other
  • Ethnic Studies
  • African-American/Black Studies
  • American Indian/Native American Studies
  • Hispanic-American, Puerto Rican, and Mexican-American/Chicano Studies
  • Asian-American Studies
  • Women's Studies
  • Gay/Lesbian Studies
  • Folklore Studies
  • Disability Studies
  • Deaf Studies
  • Comparative Group Studies
  • Ethnic, Cultural Minority, Gender, and Group Studies, Other
  • Area, Ethnic, Cultural, Gender, and Group Studies, Other

Multi/Interdisciplinary Studies

  • Cultural Resource Management and Policy Analysis
  • Ancient Studies/Civilization
  • Classical, Ancient Mediterranean, and Near Eastern Studies and Archaeology
  • Classical and Ancient Studies, Other
  • Intercultural/Multicultural and Diversity Studies
  • Cultural Studies/Critical Theory and Analysis
  • Cultural Studies and Comparative Literature
  • Economics and Foreign Language/Literature
3 more programmes
  • History and Language/Literature
  • Digital Humanities
  • Textual Studies

Related careers

Related occupations from the O*NET database, in its order.

← All careers

Sources

This page includes information from the O*NET 31.0 Database by the U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration (USDOL/ETA). Used under the CC BY 4.0 license. O*NET® is a trademark of USDOL/ETA. CollegeMatcher has modified all or some of this information. USDOL/ETA has not approved, endorsed, or tested these modifications. O*NET 31.0 Database · CC BY 4.0

Changes: we show the core tasks in the O*NET database with the highest importance ratings (up to eight, in that order), the top three O*NET interest types by score, and shortened Job Zone names. Titles, descriptions and task text are unchanged.

Wages: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025. Projections, typical entry education and training: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Employment Projections 2025–35. Fields of study: NCES and BLS CIP 2020–SOC 2018 Crosswalk. All public domain. OEWS · Employment Projections · CIP–SOC crosswalk