This is in the English department, though she is actually a film lecturer (film belongs to English within University of Exeter). She does speak to lots of other lecturers though, this culture of being measured on output and the stress levels and workloads is common there. Again though... sample of 1.
Do you think this is a problem of too many willing candidates? For a subject like film, and indeed for English, you have a lot of people passionate about the field, but not many jobs available in industry. So many graduates will bounce back to academia and try to join the faculty, which is their only other option to pursue their subject in a professional capacity. The universities know this, but keep collecting fees from students while tendering the staffing requirements to the lowest bidding graduates. My undergraduate was English at a Russel group university... at one point I was encouraged to pursue a post-graduate degree in literature, after which I'd probably try to double down and get a faculty job. Thank god I didn't.
