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greenmt

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greenmt last won the day on March 27 2016

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  • Gender
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    MD
  • Interests
    19th C American poetry, poetics, sound studies
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  • Program
    PhD

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  1. Fall 2017 applicants with an interest in the eighteenth century might find useful this announcement, which appeared in a list-serve that I'm subscribed to (see below). For the record, you can search or subscribe to the list-serve (and other 18th C resources) here on this web site. This is not my main scholarly field, but I'll take this opportunity to plug the University of Maryland's very good faculty with specialization in the eighteenth century - Tita Chico is an excellent teacher and scholar, and if I were in 18th C I would want her as an advisor. I don't check in here often, but I found grad cafe a very useful resource when I was applying, and I'm happy to answer questions (gholmes at umd dot edu). I'm also happy to talk about 19th C American, my little corner of the world. Dear List,I write to announce that now that the University of New Hampshire will be hosting the ASECS journal Eighteenth-Century Studies, the English department will be seeking to recruit Ph.D. students in the field of the long eighteenth-century, broadly conceived to include British, Irish, Early American, Transatlantic, and other Anglophone literary and cultural studies. Enrollment of such students at UNH may lead to opportunities to participate in our UNH 18th-Century Interdisciplinary Seminar as well as in the activities of the journal. UNH is proud to have several leading faculty in the period in the departments of English, History, Art History, Philosophy, and Modern Languages who participate in the seminar and work with graduate students from English and other departments.The deadline for applications is January 15, and information on applying can be found here: http://cola.unh.edu/english/graduate-programsWe would be grateful if you could circulate this announcement to interested students, and please do not hesitate to have them contact me with questions.Sincerely,Dr. Sean Moore|Associate Professor of English|University of New Hampshire|Hamilton Smith Hall|Durham, NH 03824|
  2. Wow, you went deep to find that. Yes, I wouldn't trust them for anything except general info, which is what it sounded like the original poster was seeking, and I didn't even consider looking at them when I was applying. The only research-based resource I found when I was looking was the National Academies' 2010 report, which has its flaws and is a few years old now. I found it useful because I was able to sort by lots of factors, and thereby narrow down to a limited set of programs that fit my criteria.
  3. There are list-serves focused on particular periods and such, that might be associated with a particular discipline. There's H-Net, which swings widely but includes a lot of English Lit CFPs.
  4. Not long ago, I discovered, by accident, that the US News & World Report rankings have fairly detailed breakdowns by specialty. This should show the listings for American Lit. after 1865, if that helps.
  5. I'm going to shut up in a minute, partly because I have two papers to write, but my hope is that humanities departments will start to be able to simply own up to their place in the economy of the university, and that universities will be able to own up to their place in the larger economy. On my campus, the proportion of English faculty who serve as Deans and other high level administrators is higher than the proportion of English faculty in relation to faculty overall. (For example, both the Dean of Graduate Studies and the Dean of Undergraduate Studies came from English.) That to me is one answer to the Provost, President, and the Trustees and legislators they see themselves reporting to, when the question arises, "Why do you need to keep this faculty line tenure-track?" And universities, especially big, public research universities, need to do a better job of talking about what they bring, as businesses, to their communities. I don't mean that it's their only value to the communities. But they employ lots of people, and many of those jobs pay better than comparable jobs in the surrounding community. They bring people to the area, some of whom stay and do stuff that also supports the economy. Tenure is another way of saying to a faculty member, "It's a safe bet for you to buy a house here," and that builds stability in communities. Universities have institutional imperatives to diversify, and that makes neighborhoods more diverse. There's stuff to do on campus, and so people come from near and far, and spend money. These things aren't the reason for the university, but they're a beneficial result of the everyday work of a functioning university. When legislatures slash budgets, or cut tenure, there are practical implications for the communities they represent, and they and their constituencies have a right to know about that. When I see stories like this, one of my responses is, "Madison is fucked." Since Wisconsin seems to be a test case for radical-right initiatives, in recent years, it's reasonable to expect that the outcomes there will help determine the shape of battles that will be fought in center-right state legislatures over the next few years. We should probably be prepared....
  6. Me, too. Thanks for the link, ProfLorax. The following is not directed to you, particularly, but more generally to the group here. From what I can see, the subcommittee is more about theory than practice. Which is fine, of course. But I wonder whether theorizing the job market is not another way of avoiding looking at the bigger picture. For me, that's this: universities are businesses, and the intellectual work we do is supported by some combination of undergraduate tuition, taxes, and donated dollars. I like doing that work, presumably you all like doing that work, and we'd all like to see things change so that more people can do that work with job security and a decent salary. Someone has to pay for that. It won't happen if the people responsible for distributing tuition, taxes, and donations see humanities enrollments going down and the (well-funded) other side is arguing, as they have, with increasing success, for at least 20 years, that the problem is ivory-tower deconstructionists who can't or won't even speak plain English, and can't teach undergraduates to write a cover letter and resume. Acknowledging that, and figuring out what practical steps to take in response, does not inherently imply submission to the dominant neoliberal narrative - no more, in any event, than signing on as an employee or quasi-employee of the university does. If we think what we're doing matters, outside our narrow subfields, isn't it a good thing to be able to articulate that in plain language, even to an audience that doesn't particularly think they believe in what we're doing? For example, my advisor told me a story the other day about a bunch of faculty going to Annapolis a few years ago, when funding for the nascent LGBT studies program was threatened for the usual reasons, and testifying in front of the legislature about why the program should matter to them and their constituents. The funding reappeared. The same outcome might not happen everywhere, or all the time, but one reason the right has won more often than not during my lifetime is that they show up and talk about why what they believe matters to other people, in language other people can understand. (If your response is, "Yes, but they lie," I'm with you, and I say showing up gives you the chance to point out the lies.) I actually think there are hopeful indicators: for example, in a recent faculty meeting, the chair said that undergraduate majors in English on my campus are diversifying, and at a faster rate than the college overall. This is good in itself, of course. It is also a useful bit of information to include in a proposal to XYZ Foundation or a presentation to the state legislature. We do no one, least of all these undergraduates, a favor by refusing to quantify this information for bean-counters, if that's what it takes to get the funding to support them. Anyway, for what it's worth, my experience both over the last year and earlier, in my MA program, has been that faculty, especially those moving toward tenure or who've recently gotten tenure, tend to be refreshingly practical about balancing the how-to-get-a-job part with the how-to-maintain-scholarly-integrity part. Overall, the faculty at my institution seem a bit baffled by the challenges they face, but I see them attempting to take practical steps (like speaking with English departments at other public research Us about their responses to threatened budget cuts), which at least means they're trying to look the problems in the face.
  7. I have a suggestion. Let me preface it by saying that I don't come on here very often, but I've *been* coming on here for three years now, so I've seen three application seasons play out. In general, it seems to me that people are very supportive and civil *until* this kind of discussion comes up. I tend to think we (certainly graduate students and prospective graduate students, but I include faculty, and administrators, too) have more in common than we have differences. If you think I'm wrong, or naive, feel free to ignore the rest of this. My life experience, in and out of academia, has led me to this conclusion, and I'm not really interested in arguing the point. I will say that my general hunch about this has been confirmed by sitting in meetings with faculty and administrators from time to time over the last year: from what I see, they're scared, too, for different but related reasons. In general, my sense is that this set of problems can only be solved if people all up and down the hierarchy start to work together: administrators, faculty, and graduate students. The legislators in Annapolis (or your state capital), and certainly in DC, aren't really hearing our voices now, and they don't have any particular reason to worry about the plight of English Departments, unless we give them one. My experience has been that more voices together get heard more easily than lots of individual voices in solitude. I'm not talking about protest, which is useful, but typically as a last resort, if there's no other way to be heard. We're already inside the tent, at least part way, and my hope is that we can have conversations. I've found that busy administrators are more apt to listen if you come with a solution, and if you can convince them that they can be part of that solution, and especially if the solution makes their job easier, in the bargain. So my suggestion is: if folks here are going to MLA in Philly, in January, what about meeting, either in some sort of formal MLA sanctioned way, or off to the side, over coffee or drinks, to see whether we can identify some common solutions to our common set of problems? I'm interested in thinking about cross-campus and cross-disciplinary solutions to as many as possible of the problems that have been identified here and elsewhere. Can our programs do something different to help prepare us for the job market as it is? Can we help them to enroll more undergrad English / language majors, so they can make the case to their higher-ups for hiring more faculty? Should the programs, or MLA, have some kind of mentoring program, in which people who've gotten jobs informally work with late-stage PhD students, and late-stage grad students work with new students? Can we help them to convince the Mellon Foundation or the NEH to support this with a big, fat grant? These are off the top of my head. I think better when I'm thinking alongside other people who care about the same things. If you're interested in thinking together about these things at MLA in January in Philadelphia, let me know.
  8. Since we're tooting our horn - and why not? - another graduating MA was accepted to several top library schools, and is choosing to stay here, because UMD has pretty fine rare book / archive resources, and is strong in digital humanities. Also, to go way off topic: I've seen the women's basketball team handily win against tough opponents, twice in the last couple of weeks. Go Terp Women!
  9. @DJS, I stayed at the Best Western on Rt. 1, aka Baltimore Ave. It's walkable to campus, though I wouldn't necessarily recommend the walk at night. But if I'm reading right, that you live in New York City, you might be fine - it's something like Atlantic Avenue in Brooklyn or upper Broadway. Apartment buildings, groceries, gas-stations, restaurants, and liquor-stores... there are buses, but there's not a stop directly in front of the hotel.... I would avoid the Quality Inn, which is close but I'm told is a bit shady. I may have said this above, but I live in Greenbelt, which is both affordable and pleasant, and mostly use a shuttle bus that runs hourly to the U (though not on weekends or during breaks). I could give more info about that via PM if you are interested. In general, while I was looking, I found the options both expensive and sort of unpalatable. The best rental options I saw were something like in-law apartments in Hyattsville, specifically a section called Riverdale. The spaces I saw were finished basements, with separate entrances, kitchens, utilities included, and use of the yard. You might ask how the department supports students MA students, both in the program, and in their transition to whatever is next. My guess is that they do a lot. I never see faculty make distinctions between MA and PhD students in classes, but I don't know how things are with choosing and meeting with advisors, and so on. I happened to run into a couple of graduating MA students yesterday, and asked them what's next. It turns out that one is likely going to Princeton, the other to Cornell. So MA graduates do move on to top-level PhD programs.
  10. I went to one, during the most recent admissions season, as a waitlister, and without stayover funding (it was drivable), and found that a place I was sure I would like was not for me, after all. It was well worth it. A PhD is a big, multiyear commitment. There are parts that are hard to see from a distance.
  11. I'm in my first year in UMD's PhD English program, and I'd also be happy to answer questions directly. I didn't speak up before b/c I felt that Proflorax and Wyatt's Terps pretty much covered what I would say. But having negotiated the stipend and moved here quite recently, I have two specific thoughts in response to AudreLorde's question. First, if they've offered you a spot, it means they want you to enroll. When I was admitted, it was off a waitlist, and so I didn't feel in a great position to negotiate. When I hesitated, Ralph came back, unprompted, with a slightly sweeter offer that made it feel possible to move and live here. That was instructive, and, every step of the way since, I've had the sense that the people in the department want students to stick around and be supported. They're all facing competing priorities - you do have to speak up if you need something - and there is a Big U bureacracy to deal with, but I have felt, so far, that faculty (and the department staff) were willing to go a little ways out on a limb to help me advocate for what I need. Second, if I were accepted today, I would apply for graduate housing tomorrow (or as soon as it opens up). It's by far the best deal I came across the the area, but there are very few spaces available compared with graduate admissions overall. I think two, maybe three, people in my cohort got apartments there. They seem satisfied if not thrilled with the accommodations. (I could connect you with them.) It's also right across the street from campus: easy access. It's managed not by the U., but by a for-profit company called Southern Management, that also owns buildings across the area. They have a reasonably good reputation, from what I saw, compared to other property-management companies. I considered renting, and found the options so wanting that I bought a house in the Greenbelt cooperatives. I love it here: affordable, community minded, basically a hidden gem. They also have a little known rental building with one bedrooms and efficiencies that, again, are no-frills but affordable. http://parkway.ghi.coop/ There's a bunch of other apartment buildings here in "old" Greenbelt and the more strip-mallish part of town where the larger apartment complexes sit. There's a very reliable shuttle that passes about a block from my house, passing through parts of "old" and "new" Greenbelt, but it only runs once an hour, and not on weekends or during breaks, so depending on circumstances, it may not be ideal. If you want more info., don't hesitate to ask.
  12. I entered with the intention of returning to nonprofit-land, where I've been for most of my working life, to maybe narrow to a different level of specialization. Already I can feel the pull of academia, because the rewards of landing a tenure-track gig are so great. I guess I'm hoping for a meaningful gig in arts / culture / humanities, that would allow me to incorporate some of the research / writing / presenting that makes academia exciting. And I do think, btw, that there's plenty of room in the Humanities, including Lit., for a generous, philanthropic, or plain old leveling-the-playing-field way of being. I see it among friends, colleagues, and mentors.
  13. This article in Inside Higher Education discusses a new book out soon from Harvard University Press on the subject of how (elite... but aren't they sorta all?) PhD admissions committees work. It's not clear whether any of the profiled departments are literature departments, but at least some are in the humanities, and I remember this topic coming up fairly regularly when I was a more consistent checker-in here. Unsurprising surprises: GRE scores seem to get more consideration than programs like to let on, internal department politics play a role, and participants support diversity in the abstract while prizing people with backgrounds and career goals like their own. That summary sounds more cynical than I meant it to. I have to say I find it refreshing to see people owning up to some of this stuff, and I look forward to reading the book. Change starts with the recognition of an unsatisfactory situation. The surprising thing to me was glimpsing how much the process is driven by fear. Real attention to genuine diversity - race, gender, age, cultural and educational background - has made many other fields more robust. Corporate America, for all its many faults, recognized that a long time ago now. Academics have everything to gain, and very little to lose, by broadening the scope of voices being heard. For example, one way to recruit more undergraduate English majors is to have more English professors who share some life experience or cultural background with the (infinitely more diverse than when I was 18) undergraduate population. [steps off soapbox]
  14. I was thinking that the other day, too, when I randomly checked in, after a couple/few weeks away, and found nothing to reply to. Maybe applicants are finally listening to the hype and applying in smaller numbers? In any case, best of luck to everyone applying this fall!
  15. If anyone reading this is in a similar situation in New York City, I would put in a similar plug for the city colleges. They're affordable, and many of the faculty are accomplished scholars and co-teach at the Graduate Center. You have access to all of the resources of all of the city colleges - libraries, courses - and I think the Grad Center still credits the courses you take within the system for the MA, toward the PhD, if you ultimately decide to apply there. I didn't do this, because I had a job and took just one or two courses per semester, but some MA students adjunct within the system to help pay the bills. I did get a reasonably generous fellowship, within the department, and thus got to know a lot of the faculty, as well as a better understanding of how the sausages get made in academia. At Hunter, anyway, there was a healthy mix of people studying to be English teachers, MFA in writing people, and folks who wanted to go on (and did) to PhD programs, so a variety of perspectives. After 10 years out, when I went back to faculty to ask for recommendations, they all remembered me. I'm where I am now because my MA thesis advisor took the time to talk through with me a list of schools I should apply to. I don't have direct experience with the other city colleges, but I would highly recommend Hunter.
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