Professor, Associate Professor or Assistant Professor of Literary Studies

The Faculty of Arts invites applications for the position of

PROFESSOR, ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR OR ASSISTANT PROFESSOR OF LITERARY STUDIES

The successful applicant may be appointed to a permanent professorship or a fixed-term assistant or associate professorship (tenure track system), depending on their qualifications and career stage. The appointment is planned to begin on 1 September 2025.

Job description

The successful candidate is a versatile literary scholar who will teach and supervise a wide range of key genres of writing (prose, poetry and drama), literary history and methods of literary studies. They must have an international outlook, theoretical versatility and an understanding of both their own specialist field and other research orientations. Experience in research on literature from both Finland and other language areas is considered an asset. The appointee is expected to have knowledge and skills relevant to not only their own specialist field, but also the University’s strategic plan and the Faculty’s focus areas.

At the University of Helsinki, literary studies is a broad and multidisciplinary field. Strong research fields in the disciplines of Finnish and comparative literature include literary history, poetry, multimodal literature, ecocriticism, genetic criticism, travel literature, theories of fiction and narrative, and literature and emotions. The appointee is expected to collaborate with literary scholars and representatives of other Faculty of Arts disciplines, such as art studies and, more broadly, textual and language studies.

As the primary focus of teaching and supervision for this position is literature from Finland and written in Finnish, strong proficiency in the Finnish language is essential. The role also includes teaching translated literature and literature from other language areas. The holder of the position will contribute extensively to teaching and thesis supervision in the Bachelor’s Programme in Art Studies, the Bachelor’s Programme in the Languages and Literatures of Finland, the Master’s Programme in Literary Studies, the Master’s Programme in Art Studies, the Doctoral Programme in Philosophy, Arts and Society and the Doctoral Programme in Language Studies.

Appointment criteria

An appointee to the position of assistant professor or associate professor must hold a doctoral degree and have the ability to conduct independent scholarly work as well as the teaching skills necessary for the position. In addition, the appointee must have the ability and motivation to pursue an academic career, as demonstrated by publications and other means.

An appointee to a professorship must hold a doctoral degree and possess top-level scholarly qualifications and experience in the supervision of scholarly research, as well as the ability to provide top-level research-based teaching and supervise theses. In addition, the appointee must present documentation of international cooperation in the research field they represent. They must also have academic leadership skills.

When assessing applicants’ qualifications, attention will be paid to both scholarly and teaching qualifications. The former include scholarly publications and other research results of scholarly value, success in obtaining external research funding, scholarly work outside Finland and international elected positions. The latter include teaching experience and pedagogical training, the ability to produce learning materials, other teaching merits and, if necessary, a teaching demonstration, as well as participation in doctoral education. Furthermore, consideration will be given to applicants’ leadership and interaction skills as well as their active participation in the research community and public engagement. Also considered in the appointment are the applicants’ views on the development of research and teaching in the field and, for the shortlisted applicants, assessments by external assessors and interviews.

Pursuant to the Government Decree on Universities (770/2009), appointees to teaching and research positions at the University must be proficient in the language in which they provide instruction, i.e., Finnish or Swedish; in this case, Finnish. To successfully attend to the duties of the position, the appointee must also have satisfactory skills in Swedish and good skills in English.

Salary

The salary will be based on levels 7 (assistant/associate professor) or 8–10 (professor) of the job requirement scheme for teaching and research personnel in the salary system of Finnish universities. In addition, the appointee will be paid a salary component based on personal work performance. The annual salary of an assistant or associate professor is approximately €55,000–68,500, while that of a professor is approximately €66,500–99,000, depending on the previous experience and qualifications of the appointee. The position includes a six-month trial period.

The University of Helsinki provides its staff with occupational health and fitness services, professional development opportunities, as well as a first-class research and teaching environment and the conditions necessary for international cooperation. Read more about staff benefits on our website .

How to apply

The application, together with the required attachments, must be submitted through the University of Helsinki recruitment system by clicking on the link below. Internal applicants (i.e., current employees of the University of Helsinki) must submit their applications through the SAP Fiori portal.

Applicants are requested to enclose the following documents in English with their applications as a single PDF file:

Please see instructions  here .

Applicants are kindly asked to prepare to select up to 10 publications from their list of publications and submit them for assessment through the recruitment system after the application period.

Doctoral degree must be completed by the application deadline.

The application deadline is 27.3.2025.

The University of Helsinki welcomes applicants of any gender, linguistic or cultural background, or minority group.

Further information

Further information on the position can obtained from Department Head, Professor Terhi Ainiala (terhi.ainiala@helsinki.fi ) and Department Head, Professor Hanna Korsberg (hanna.korsberg(at)helsinki.fi ). Further information on the recruitment process can be obtained from HR Specialist Reeta Korhonen (hr-humtdk@helsinki.fi ).

Further information on careers and the tenure track model at the University of Helsinki is available on our website .