OldOldMan

Hey everybody! Looking to hear some advice from somebody who knows about this. I will keep this short. I'm one of those students who realized halfway through a masters in economics that I wanted a career in sociology. I managed to finish that masters nonetheless with a good GPA and owing to various reasons, I had to take up a job right after I finished. 3 years later, I am free to pursue my dreams again. I took the GRE and got a 166Q/163V, 5.5 W which I am told is decent enough. I really want to apply for a PhD but since that time, I have not been in touch with my uni professors and when I requested a letter, they said that they would not be as detailed as one would like. I have some great references (people I have worked and researched with, albeit not in academia, more of a professional nature) but they are non-academics. I understand I am an unconventional candidate but how much would the lack of academic referees be held against me? And what would this mean for my chances at a school? Any help would be really really appreciated.

Wow jacib! You answered all that I wanted to know and more. I will keep all your points in mind. Because I am switching fields, I want to be as surefooted as I can about this. Thanks for the help!

Hello everyone! Long time lurker here. Finally stepping out to ask all you kind people your honest opinion. I am currently finishing up with my Masters in quant econ but for the past few months, I have been really interested in sociology. I have not had that much formal training in sociology (just a class in cinema from a historical/sociological perspective and visual anthropology in undergrad) so mostly I am self taught up to this point. My interest in sociology is based on two major areas: one is immigration (which is also the focus of my masters thesis, of course from an economics perspective), and the other is the study of religious minorities (which is more based on personal experience). Now, my question is how are diverse interests perceived by the departments? Maybe on one level I can characterise them both as a study of identity assertion and integration (perhaps in that sense they are somewhat related), but my approach to both these topics is essentially different. While I want to pursue the topic of immigration with quantitative methods like I have done so in the past, I want to pursue the second topic in a more historical comparative way. Since I belong to the specific religious minority I wish to study, it is a personal passion of mine. The difference between the two gives me this feeling that maybe I am in two boats in the same time and I should pick one. Would you see this as confusion or a lack of focus? Do you feel I should pick only one to pursue academically, or at least only focus on one when writing my SoP? I am considering applying in the next cycle (2015 Fall start) but so far, I am not sure if this is the right path for me. Can you shed some light on how this kind of problem is seen by professors? Is this common? Reply or not, GradCafe is a great resource and I thank everyone who has ever posted here. Good luck to everyone and cheers!