SilasWegg

I have to agree that this is really weird and totally stress inducing. This situation prolongs the stress of admissions season for you. Big hugs. That said, it does seem like a wonderful surprise is in your near future.

Right now I'm putting together an introductory thesis chapter with a brief review of lit so this is on my mind a lot right now. I've been looking at (in no particular order) Michael Warner's Letters of the Republic, Carolyn Karchner's Shadow Over the Promised Land, Robert Levine's Dislocating Race and Nation, Michael Paul Rogin's Subversive Genealogy, Meredith McGill's Culture of Reprinting, Russel Resing's Closure and Crisis in the American Social Text, George Dekker's American Historical Romance. Some of this might not be considered purely theoretical, especially compared to the European philosophers that dominate theoretical conversations. A lot of it is based in historical studies, textual analysis, and examinations of marketplace issues. As far as my own studies of antebellum culture, lately I've been studying prisons, reformatories, and charitable institutions in NYC in the 1840s and 1850s.

I'm so glad the Americanists on GC have united. I thought the medievalists were going to run us out of town! So, right now I'm working on Melville's stories in Putnam's Monthly. I'm trying to argue that Melville's mid-career shift to periodical writing is a result of both marketplace demands and massive changes in the mid-century social order. I spend a lot of time reading in the actual periodicals, studying correspondence between Melville and his publishers, looking at lots of social theory on antebellum culture. I'm also putting together a historical note for an autobiography written by an enslaved Virginian. Hopefully, if we can get it together, it will be published (along with a digital edition of the text) on this great web publication called British Virginia. As far as critical stuff, I'm interested in narrative theory and theory on racialization... especially IRT antebellum writing. I'm not entirely stuck in the early nineteenth-century though! I've done lots of work on the Objectivists (Louis Zukosky and George Oppen) and I'm really into Black Mountain writers, especially Robert Duncan, and that whole thing. My spanish is good and I've been working on translations of Cesar Aira and Cesar Vallejo. Though these writers are South American, I see no reason to exclude them from Americanist Studies!

Thanks for repping VCU on this thread, Emilyrose! I'm finishing up my MA there now. I don't know how well we do at placing in doctoral programs though. Of my cohort, I'm the only one who applied... And I got great offers from Rutgers, Texas A&M, Temple, and Delaware. Even though the faculty is amazing, it seems like most VCU English grad students choose not to go in to doctoral study.

I made it official. Rutgers phd English in the fall!

I'm super confused by the USN graph. Is that the number of professors who have TT jobs just in top 30 programs? If so, so what?

See u in new brunswick you friendly rutgers peeps. I RSVPd yes for the visit. Also I had a really great talk with a professor in my area last night. I might send in the official papers today.

Is it a terrible idea to accept an offer before visiting? I'm starting to see that my decision is sort of a no-brainer and I don't want to leave these other programs hanging.

Allplaid! You are awesome! I don't know how I know it but i do! Ya know... there might be multiple Americanists accepted at Rutgers. They have an incoming cohort of twelve.

Penn rejections stings. It was my top choice. I'm thrilled about going to Rutgers though.

Allplaid congrats on the wait list. Hopefully things go your way!

Much respect to the Harvard applicants. I congratulate you for trying! They don't know what they are missing. No word from Penn yet. I'm guessing the magical phone call would've happened by now. I'm moving on... Decision time!

Congrats Kingfishers! Oregon has such a good program. I withdrew the Florida app because I decided I really wanna do grad work close to friends and family. Right now its all about my options in the northeast. Basically, didn't wanna tie up an offer or a wait list spot unnecessarily.

Even weirder than declining... I just withdrew my application from Florida. I assume since I hadn't heard anything it was a rejection anyway... but I didn't want to be holding a spot on a wait-list or something.

Declining is so weird. It's like turning down dessert.

I hope that the rejections thread remains a safe place for ego shattered rants in the future.

Is it safe to say that if we haven't heard from Penn that its a rejection? I figure I will give them until the end of the week and then move on.

Accepted at Temple! Random website check. I'd like to know more. It's a great program in my favorite city. Congrats on the job Jean Luc. Time off from school can be the very best.

This is real talk. The mechanisms for educational debt relief are super cruel and sharky. You are right to point this out as the major risk for educational borrowing. It seems that these lending practices should be safer and better regulated. There are so many bad actors in the college loan world that borrowing can become a very dicey proposition!

Just some brief thoughts on the stigma of loan debt.... I've noticed that if you lease a brand new kick ass mercedes with a brutal interest rate and exorbitant monthly payment all your friends will love you. If you refinance your house to buy it all the better because that means you have equity. If you take out a twenty year mortgage on a new condo everybody congratulates you. These forms of debt are equated with a kind of status. Many people, including many on this board, stigmatize borrowing for education. I suppose this comes from the right place: the ideological belief that education should be free. However the cost/benefit analyses here are sort of a no-brainer. The career and social outcomes resulting from a graduate degree far exceed those of a new car or a new home, require far less capital, and have far more forgiving repayment terms. I honestly believe that many of those who decry the state of the job market in academia have never had to navigate the job market outside of academia. If they had, they would probably realize that most jobs are far more competitive than 40% placement rates and will crush your spirit and exploit you with impunity. The fact is most Americans carry some form of debt (except of course the very rich, which I am not). Even the spendiest of borrowers for education rarely top out 100k. That's a fraction of what you would take out on a mortgage. In any event, a lot of the judgment on borrowers and on programs that ask students to borrow pretty misguided to me....

I too am getting ready to turn down some offers but I think I might wait until I accept an offer formally. I know this keeps the funding situation in limbo for others but I can't help but feel cautious moving forward. In past application cycles I've been accepted to programs and then gotten a last minute mess-around on funding. Not that I think this will happen this time around, the offer is completely firm. I'm just a little gun-shy about the whole thing and sort of over-protective. Am I being overly-anxious? Is it really time to formally decline offers?

Congrats Ashley Mollified and Wilson! The board is victorious!

Yeah has anyone heard a peep from Penn? It's gotta be soon right?

I'd like to say a few words in defense of an unfunded MA. Though taking on debt is always inadvisable, for many students, a funded offer doesn't happen right away. Accepting an offer for an unfunded MA isn't quite the financial and academic kiss-of-death that everyone makes it out to be. Ideally, you won't have to relocate and you can keep your job, significant other, home, while you pursue your graduate studies. There are major savings in opportunity costs in this regard. Whats more, in-state tuition for a two-year program should be under 8 grand a semester. Compared to other graduate programs in medicine or law (which may offer better career outcomes) graduate school in the humanities is a fraction of the cost. Though the job market for tenure track teaching positions is highly competitive, students with an MA don't even seek these jobs. Instead, an MA prepares a student for high school teaching, community college teaching, editing/publishing, and other jobs in the private sector. There is no reason why a 2-year graduate degree in English wouldn't adequately prepare a student for such careers. Another thing to consider is, once you've enrolled in your program, funding opportunities may arise. A number of teaching, administrative, research, or professional opportunities may come your way and you should try to attain these. Most MAs work in some capacity while they pursue their degree. Ideally, you have a job that you like and you can keep working at it while you do your coursework. If not, keep an ear to the ground and lock down some sort of funded opportunity at your institution. Of course, this may mean looking outside the English department. You can learn just as much (if not more) as an admin in a different department as you might grading tests in a large lecture course. IF you do plan to go on to a PhD, there is no better way to prepare yourself. Getting updated LORs, developing a writing sample, conceptualizing your research, is much more difficult to do on your own. What's more, most doctoral programs are good about either transferring credit or fast-tracking MA students. Obviously, this preparation is invaluable in adjusting to the rigorous demands of graduate study. Finally, the MA is only a two-year degree and the professional outcomes are not the same as doctoral work. Thus, your work experiences while in graduate school can and should reflect a more versatile set of experiences that may include skill sets far afield from the English department. There is no reason to stigmatize this kind of graduate work nor is there anything at all "crazy" about it. Many students do a two-year MA and enter the workforce with great success!

Hi meta! It's looking like I will be attending Rutgers in the fall. What neighborhoods in New Brunswick have reasonable rent and nearby amenities? I don't have a car and don't really want to buy one.