Vincenzo Salvatore

Nowadays non-Spanish languages are a little bit underepresented (here as in universities). Ok, first thing you have to consider is that online biographies are not exhaustive at all, lol. Last year David offered an undergraduate course called "Indochina and the Power of Loss", you can find here the synopsis: http://www.lsa.umich.edu/cg/cg_detail.aspx?content=1920FRENCH350001&termArray=f_13_1960,w_13_1920,f_12_1910,w_12_1870,f_11_1860 As I told you, they are longing for good students with innovative projects (trust me, I am in the Graduate Committee of the RLL department ), so they would love your request of informations. Basically, write him the same thing you wrote here. Or even better, you can write a mail to Peggy McCracken, she is the Director of Graduate Studies and a professor of French: she will solve every doubt you have. You can also tell her you spoke with me, for what it is worth... but, really, just write them.

UMich has 45.000 students. You get pretty much every type on the planet. There are proably more non-WASP than everywhere else in the Midwest (and my guess is that there are more non-WASP than WASP, period). As an European white male, I can say I was pretty surprised by the social and ethnic variety of the university. And obviously this diversity is even higher among graduate students.

Why are you looking for an MA? Are you not sure about pursuing a PhD-track right after your BA? All MA in Italian are going to disappear because they are pretty much useless, and only PhD will remain. If you want to go for Italian on its own, I mean if you already know that you want to teach Italian, you should consider a strong PhD program in Italian right now: University of Michigan, Ohio State, UCLA, Berkeley, all the Ivies, Stanford, Chicago, Duke, Chaper Hill... All them are keen to accept students right from their BA (well, some more than other at least). In any case I suggest you to apply to a place which offers at least both MA and PhD, because the program would be way stronger. Obviously, if that university has Department of Italian (like the Ivies) it is even better. CompLit is a completely different matter: here you could consider an MA to improve your skills, maybe learning a third language and then apply to a top school. But consider that it will be really difficult for a non native speaker to get a job in Italian studies, so you will be probably be a teacher of English or CompLit with interests in Italian literature and something else. About your selections, you have to consider that most of those universities you named do not offer funded MA (or they do not fund it anymore, because of budget cut). It is absolutely meaningless to pursue an MA in humanities without funding. Above all, it depends also on what your interests are. Do you have an idea about what would you like to study? Which period or field? The choice is connected also e mainly to the place where you can pursue your interests with a good professor.

Ann Arbor has a great program in French Studies where you could pursue your French/Asian interest with Prof. David Caron. They do not require GRE anymore, offer full funding to every accepted student and are really pushing their search for interdisciplinary and innovative projects. I strongly suggest you to contact him.

Received. Unluckily, I was not admitted, but perhaps it is better, because next year I will be able to try for the funded application within the Graduate School.

Thank you, and do not be sorry. It is actually a relief, because I have already decides where to go and it was my top choice.

What about Notre Dame Literature?

And I really thank you for it!

Quoting from Wikipedia.de, "Komparatistik: http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Komparatistik#Institute_f.C3.BCr_Komparatistik_in_Deutschland This is the website of the Deutsche Gesellschaft fuer Allgemeine und Vergleichende Literaturwissenschaft: http://www.dgavl.de/DGAVL_Portrait.htm And this article commented Spivak's and Eagleton's provocations from a German point of view: http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/comparative_critical_studies/v003/3.1lubrich.html Quoting from Note 45:

Mmm interesting. Why you say so? I mean, I really want to know it (I am Italian, so I am not so familiar with "minor" American cities like Minneapolis).

I got admitted into a UMN Program too (Comp Lit though). Well, surely UMN is not Caltech or Berkeley, nevertheless it is always in the top 50 (especially in Engineer-related fields) and since 2001 it is in Greenes' list of Public Ivy just like Berkeley. Whereas IMHO Caltech is a unique case (being private and so small and elitist), Berkeley is more comparable with UMN. I think UMN is an excellent state university, obviously less competitive and bigger than Berkeley, with a complete different human and social environment. What concerns me it is more its financial status (ie the possibility to support graduate students with scholarship instead of only TA), but I think it is also a matter of departments. Surely Engineer has not the same problems of Comp Lit ahahahaha.

As I said in the other topic, I received the admission notification from University of Minnesota (Program in Comparative Studies in Discourse and Society). So I assume that the Program in Comparative Literatures made the offers too.

Comp Lit: Notre Dame, WashU and Minnesota. Then Italian Studies. Michigan and Duke (both already accepted me). I am waiting only for Notre Dame response, but the deadline was today, so I suppose they will need at least a couple of weeks to get it over with all the applications.

I have just applied too. I will start my PhD in September, so I think that SCT would be a perfect preparation for it. Does anybody know how much time takes the review process? When they usually contact you if you are in?

Yesterday I received the admission notification (with a summary of the financial offer) from University of Minnesota for the Program in Comparative Studies in Discourse and Society (part of Comp Lip Dep). The mail was wonderful, I am truly satisfied. The Welcome Weekend will be probably held in March.

I am sorry, I just realized that I have written it wrong. That "aside" is referred to the following "UK solution", I have simply cut&pasted it in the wrong spot. There is obviously no comparison between Germany and any other country (Italy included) about education costs. About Comp Lit. If I am not wrong, you are studying Vergleichende Literaturen at LMU, which is just one those few universities that still offers such an MA curriculum. I searched a lot, believe me, and found about two or three places for an MA, and almost no PhD Program eminently grounded in the Comp Lit Bereich (as it is in the US, at least). Most of programs are quite general, like the Heidelberg Graduate School for Humanities and Social Science, and the similar ones in Giessen, Bielefeld, Goettingen, Kassel, Frankfurt, Koeln and Leipzig, etc, There are some PhD programs focused only on Literature (like the LMU Prolit, the FSGSoL at Freie Berlin Uni or the WWUM GSPoL), but they imply nonetheless separate paths between the various fields of research. Only the FSGS, then, offers a direct fellowship. About your experience, mine is completely opposite: I know there was an impressive and historical school of German Komparatistik in Germany (grounded in the exalted philological tradition of Humboldt, Schlegel, Curtius, Auerbach, etc.). Indeed, I know a lot of Italian professors of Comparative Literatures who studied Komparatistik in Germany at an incredible level. After the damned Bologna Process this outstanding school has been simply dismantled and absorbed by the various departments, so that now there are still many former professors of comparative literatures but no department! Anyway, since you have the privilege of studying at LMU I would welcome any kind of better "insight" you can give me (even in PM, if you prefer). Plus, as you stated the are two step: first of all, you must be admitted in a program (which is already quite difficult), THEN you can particpate to scholarship calls (DAAD, private Stiftungen or other). So, it is quite difficult to have a delineate program before starting your PhD. Indeed, a lot of friends of mine started PhD in Germany on their own, and only after about a year they suceeded in finding some sort of scholarship. I did not say "it is impossible", what I meant was that it is surely a different "system". And you have always to keep it strongly in mind, otherwise it could be quite painful.

Anyway, this is the Oxford's particular offer for comp lit studies: http://grad.mml.ox.ac.uk/comparative_lit

Alas, it is true. There many amazing literary programs in UK, but the comp lit ones comparable with the American offers are more or less just those above mentioned. Or, at least, those are the most representative.

PhD in Italian Studies at Duke and Michigan.

First of all, what are you considering taught degrees or reserach degrees? Or a combined program? There are some good schools (and often also not so expensive) and a lot of excellent professors, but the fellowships/scholarships are few and the system is completely different from the US. So far, my opion is that the best universities for comp lit are UCL, Kings College, Goldsmiths, Edinburgh, Glasgow and St. Andrews (these are the most comprehensive: universities like Mancheste, Warwick etc. offers similar courses but less "humanistic", I can elaborate this concept if you are interested). I have a strong predilection for Scotland, because the European non-English students (SIC!) have the possibility to get SAAS state scholarships for tuitions and fees. The choice depends, IMHO, from what literatures and langues do you study and which kind of project do you want to pursue: personally, I needed an American/Italian/German environment grounded in post-colonial and neo-gramscian critical theory. Well, I considered UCL, Glasgow and Edinburgh and, eventually, I applied only to Edinburgh with Prof. Davide Messina. Although I have already got admitted to a couple of American universities, I will nevertheless pursue this call http://www.ed.ac.uk/schools-departments/student-funding/pgr-application to see what it will happen. If you want, feel free to contact me via PM.

Nobody tried at Minnesota and Notre Dame? I received the results of other applications, but none from these two in comp lit programs...

Mail. Very nice and with a personalized offer attached as a pdf file. They invited me to the PhD Weekend 23-24 February too, so during the same trip I should be able to visit all the universities that accepted me.

Guys... I cannot believe it.. I just received the communication from Michigan: full package!

I received the invitation from the Romance Studies Department for the Italian Program!