In the academic world, particularly in the U.S., an adjunct is a person who teaches in a university but who does not enjoy the benefits of being a professor. In Canada they are usually called sessionals. Think of them as the academic equivalent of temps:

• they are paid by the course, rather than on salary;
• they receive no employment benefits;
• their contracts run semester by semester and can be cut at any time;
• they are not entitled to office space, or they have to share an office with other adjuncts;
• they receive limited research and travel funding, or none at all;
• they cannot work with graduate students;
• they cannot be involved in university governance.

Once upon a time, adjuncts were only hired in extraordinary circumstances, like replacing a full professor who suddenly died. The assumption was that all qualified holders of doctorates would eventually become professors.

But in this outsourced, downsized world, adjuncts are making up a larger and larger part of the academic workforce. (According to one study, adjuncts now make up nearly 70% of teaching staff in the U.S.) A graduate student, even an accomplished one, can no longer expect a position as an assistant professor immediately upon her graduation; she will almost certainly adjunct, sometimes for years, with no promises of continued employment.

Many adjuncts have Ph.D.s and publications under their belts, and in terms of qualifications they differ in no way from "real" professors. But, like temps, they are overworked and underpaid, and the stress often causes their performance to suffer. This creates a vicious circle: longtime adjuncts are the first to be passed over for "real" jobs, since they have no time or institutional support for their research. This is the result when cost-cutting becomes more important than education.

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Ad"junct` (#), a. [L. adjunctus, p. p. of adjungere. See Adjoin.]

Conjoined; attending; consequent.

Though that my death were adjunct to my act. Shak.

Adjunct notes Mus., short notes between those essential to the harmony; auxiliary notes; passing notes.

© Webster 1913.

Ad"junct`, n.

1.

Something joined or added to another thing, but not essentially a part of it.

Learning is but an adjunct to our self. Shak.

2.

A person joined to another in some duty or service; a colleague; an associate.

Wotton.

3. Gram.

A word or words added to quality or amplify the force of other words; as, the History of the American Revolution, where the words in italics are the adjunct or adjuncts of "History."

4. Metaph.

A quality or property of the body or the mind, whether natural or acquired; as, color, in the body, judgment in the mind.

5. Mus.

A key or scale closely related to another as principal; a relative or attendant key. [R.] See Attendant keys, under Attendant, a.

© Webster 1913.