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I did see something like this somewhere online recently (maybe one of the main blogs?), although my vague recollection is that they were reducing the size of the incoming class to something like 4, or maybe by half. But I wouldn't trust my memory very far.

Western actually has one of the best placement records of any Canadian program when it comes to placing graduates into MA- and PhD-granting departments (it's second after Toronto, and in the T20 overall). This is partly because it's long had a very large student body, but also because the department decided long ago that it would focus its energies on a couple of subfields, and hire and train exceptional philosophers in those areas. Solo teaching experience is hard to come by in Canada. It's good, because the PhD programs don't tend to be too exploitative (several US programs require students to teach 2-2 after their second year!), but it's bad insofar as it means that you're not going to be able to compete with other graduates on that front. Funding is also tricky; Canadian departments have a spotty record when it comes to funding their students past their fourth year (and believe me, nobody actually finishes in four; very, very few even finish in five). If you don't have a guarantee in writing, you can't count on it. Given your interests, I wonder why you're attracted to Western; it's pretty weak in applied ethics and femtheory. In Canada, Queen's is much, much stronger on those counts (McGill bioethics, too--it's a separate department). Toronto too, although I'd rate Queen's above it in those areas. I should also mention that Western has been going through something of a climate crisis these last couple years, with all kinds of unpleasantness (including assault). Talk to the female grad students before accepting an offer there, and ask some pointed questions. Or PM me when the time comes, and I can be more specific/direct you to someone in the know.

What's another MA, this time in philosophy of religion, going to do for you? What's it going to do for your CV? I suspect the answer is 'not much'. It's hard to make a case for needing to earn a third very similar degree. If you really want a PhD in one of these subjects, then I think that your best bet is to apply again, and more broadly.

The Theory market in PoliSci is not very good at all these days, although it's probably still better than the philosophy market (even in continental/continental SocPot). From what I gather, it's pretty rough out there (in the US market) for PoliSci PhDs who don't have a strong background in quant. FWIW, I've seen several philosophers move into political science/theory departments (I'm not saying it's easy or likely, just that it's done), but I've not seen the reverse move; I suspect it's practically impossible, due to disciplinary prestige issues (viz., philosophers have little respect for theorists from other disciplines). I don't think a philosophy MA would be any kind of obstacle to pursuing a PhD in polisci afterwards. If anything, it would probably be an asset, but I don't know whether LMU's the place to do it. Honestly, it mostly depends on the funding. You shouldn't be taking on debt for any kind of MA (or PhD, for that matter). If it were me, I'd have a good look at Queen's (Kingston), which is a top philosophy department when it comes to political philosophy and applied ethics, and which, although primarily analytic, recently hired Lisa Guenther. If you can get funding there, you might also gain access to training and opportunities which would be helpful for your move back to Theory, and which might be harder to come by elsewhere. I'd also have a good look at Vanderbilt, and maybe GSU or DePaul. (But I don't know!) Whatever you do, stay away from the New School. And from what I've heard and seen, if you're not white, Villanova may not be a good place for you.

Absolutely, applicants aren't in a great position to know, especially for subfields that are well-represented in a lot of departments.

Well, kinda. Very, very often--especially at the tippy-top schools, but also further down the ladder--you get hired for your "promise" rather than your actual accomplishments, and you have the chance to develop your craft and expertise as a result of having won a decent job. Being affiliated with a tippy-top department gets you all kinds of trickle-down benefits which are entirely inaccessible to those further down the pyramid, because the prestige hierarchy is so ingrained in us. It's incredibly hard to even just get an interview if you're not coming from the right school(s) and working in the right subfield(s), even if you have a stellar publication record for your career stage. Oh, it goes way further down than that. Plenty of MA-granting programs have faculty who'd not be out of place in a top PhD-granting department, as do plenty of SLACs, etc.44 You'd think that was true, and most people do seem to believe that. The reality on the ground, however, is that you need teaching experience to get a job (though not necessarily at the very top of the hierarchy), and one or two courses just doesn't cut it. The programs that exploit their students and have them solo-teach 2-2 from their second year onwards do very well at placing those students, because they come out with so much brute teaching experience. That's not especially good or desirable, however, and it causes real problems for completion rates. That said, TAing counts for nothing, no matter how much of it you've done. So if the program has less TAing but more solo-teaching available, then that's better, but it's not usually the case at programs that aren't especially exploitative. Plenty of people in philosophy believe this (I think most do, actually), but I'd be very surprised if it's true, especially at the intake level. There's probably more truth to the idea that the best students go to the schools ranked highest in their subfields, but I think even that claim is suspect (especially at the intake level, before they've benefited from 7 years of top supervision and resources). You'll find a lot of superb students and philosophers coming out of all sorts of departments, but outside the tippy top, they have access to many fewer opportunities to showcase that skill. Even leaving aside sociological factors (which exert a lot of influence), it's just easier to publish with a 2-1 or 2-2 load than with a 4-4 load. A big part of why the topmost programs are so successful, and enjoy such a reputation, is the sheer quantity of graduates they churn out. A smaller program that graduates 1-2 students (like Brown) a year is just going to have a much smaller presence on the market, on the conference circuit, in major journals, in subfield associations, etc. than a program that graduates 7-10+ a year (like Oxford or Toronto). In that respect, the age of the program also makes a big difference. Having said what I said, it's worth adding that who your advisor is makes a big difference at both the official and unofficial levels. Officially, for obvious reasons. Unofficially, because they'll be introducing you to their research networks, which is to say, they'll be introducing you to everyone in your subfield. If they're not very active in that community, then they can't introduce you, and that means that you'll have a harder time meeting people--especially senior people--in your field, and a harder time taking advantage of the opportunities that might come your way as a result (e.g. external letters, postdoc support, publication and book review invitations, editorial positions, etc.). Also, the money is a big deal, and makes a huge difference to your experience of grad school, time to completion, conference participation, etc. So: it's a perfectly good call, if that's what you decide to do.

I think 8-12 is reasonable, and more than that is too many. There aren't that many programs for which one is a good fit, and which one should attend. That said, for the last decade it's been entirely normal for students to apply to 20 or more. I'd guess the average number is probably 16-18. That's just the way it is, now. FWIW I applied to 5 and was accepted to the three good fits, and rejected from the two bad fits. I'd aim for 8 if I was trying again (but then, the number of good places for my subfield is pretty low).

Search committee members often admit to doing this in hiring decisions, where the stakes are much higher. Check out just about any thread on the subject on one of the blogs--Leiter, DN, Cocoon, Philosophy Smoker. I have, in the past, seen admissions committee members say the same thing, although it was years ago, and I couldn't point you to it now. It's more common for programs to have long waitlists (or large admissions pools) instead, on the assumption that most of the students they admit outright will turn them down. But it does sometimes happen the other way, too. In both cases, it strikes me as a bad decision (though it's especially out of touch with the realities of the job market, where anybody is lucky to get even a single offer). But there it is.

Some of the more major continental programs do, but that's it. Almost no programs do, overall.

Depends on the university. Amsterdam, yes. Louvain, yes. Munich and Berlin, yes. ENS, yes. That's hardly an exhaustive list, but there are several with a good halo that don't incur any kind of penalty in perception for being "foreign". (There is, of course, also Canada, which lies outside the US and Britain and has excellent MA programs, many of them much more competitive than the UK's. In fact, quite a few are as good as/better than the top US MAs.)

From my rejection letters these last several years. To be fair, the higher numbers are for Open/Open jobs. But other jobs still get 300+ regularly, and the bulk of the jobs you apply to are open/open, pretty much no matter your AOS.

You will have zero control over where you live for the rest of your life. That's because for every job to which you apply--and you'll be lucky to apply to apply to about 50 TT jobs and 50 non-TT jobs worldwide each year--you will be competing against 650-1200 or so other applicants (although sometimes it's as low as 300, or even just 100 if it's a job that requires you to teach in a language other than English). Unfortunately, you probably won't get a TT job at all. Instead, you'll be working for peanuts and no benefits and teaching way too many classes as a visiting assistant professor or adjunct until you decide that enough is enough, and you want a job outside the academy. IIRC the average pay per-course for adjuncts in the US is about $1700 (and remember, adjuncts end up having to teach at several different institutions to get their ten+ courses a year). VAPs are paid much more, but it's still pretty low--from what I've seen, it's about 30k-40kish, for teaching loads that are usually 3-3 or so. The trouble is that those contracts end after a couple of years, and then you have to move again. That's the obligatory "don't go into academic philosophy" speech. There's nothing wrong with getting a PhD in philosophy (provided it's funded), as long as you're aware of the job prospects. If you decide to do a PhD, just remember that (1) you're not special (you really, really aren't; everyone you're competing against for jobs is more or less every bit as good as you are--that's the tragedy), and (2) you should start planning your exit strategy ASAP. Enjoy your time in grad school, but use it to acquire skills and experiences that are marketable and useful outside university settings.

Sometimes. Sometimes what happens, though, is that you can take the language classes offered by classics/the modern languages department for free, but they cap the number of grad students able to take those classes, so you end up having to take classes somewhere else (and unfunded) instead.

Your grades and GRE scores are fine. But, as Glasperlenspieler says, they're the least important part of your application. Do what you can, and move on. Enjoy your time in grad school, and don't expect academic employment afterwards (that's a recipe for misery).

Yeah, the transcript. If it seems especially important, then you can mention it on the cover letter. But otherwise, the transcript is the place for it. They do skim those.

The only thing about your PhD that matters is that it's done and was approved. Virtually nobody will bother to look at it again, especially when they could just go and read the chapters you've published instead. You will need letters from your supervisor (and maybe your external), but (1) if they're going to be negative, it sounds like they would have been negative anyway, (2) they're more likely to talk about the quality of your work and the importance of your results than your defense (besides: it looks awful for them if they tell the world you suck and shouldn't have passed, but they passed you anyway), and (3) you'll have the postdoc PI letter too, and (ideally) letters from people not affiliated to you and your success. So: forget about it. It's over. That said, FWIW I don't really understand this part: Why did you wait until the very end of the process before writing things up? It seems to me--and bear in mind that I obviously don't know the details of your situation!--this is all work that you could have done beforehand (and you did, for at least some chapters), without your advisor's say-so. He'd have had to look it over before submission, of course, but I don't see why it was necessary to wait until three days before the defense (how can you even defend without submitting? Different university/discipline and process, I guess). (Also: it can't have been literally impossible, since you did it! It just wasn't pleasant or desirable.) EDIT: Also, what about corrections? Normally, after you defend, there's a period of a few months before you have to submit your final draft. Can't you use that time to improve the parts that seem rushed? I'd expect that if they expressed such serious reservations about your writing, they'd have given you a pass with corrections anyway...

A few departments are indeed like this (at least at one school I know, faculty actively encourage this kind of "sorting" and train students to reproduce it wherever they end up). But it's not like that at most departments. Most departments have very supportive and healthy graduate student communities. That said, it doesn't take much to poison a graduate student community for a long time. A single sexual harasser can easily destroy a grad student community that's 30-strong, and it takes years after his departure to fix the damage he's wrought (I know from experience). Similarly, a single cutthroat cohort can do a lot to change the department's atmosphere (and encourage subsequent cutthroat cohorts).

There are a few disciplines in which what matters most are the conference presentations (because they tend to get published in conference proceedings, which are the discipline's main outlet). In almost every field, however, it's the pubs that matter most. As HK38 says, however, the two aren't mutually exclusive: conferencing is important and a useful step in the publication process. But given a forced choice, you should opt for publication over presentation every time (unless you're in one of the fields I mentioned at the outset).

That's pretty much my attitude as well. I knew going in to my PhD that I'd probably not find a job (even if I didn't wholly believe it, or understand quite how bad the situation has become). So I didn't really approach the PhD as a means to some other end, and just did it for its own sake/for myself. That may not be enough to get you all the way, but it takes you a good chunk of it, and helps to avoid bitterness. I don't regret any part of my PhD (well, apart from not reporting my harasser sooner). I did my PhD at a ranked Canadian institution that's tops in my subfield, but at the bottom of the international PGR. I'm sure that's not helped on the job front, but I still think it was the right decision for me. There are three things that get me down: (1) the attitude some (many, actually) job seekers and former job seekers adopt as a result of their own difficulties, which is downright nasty and seeks to allot blame for their situation, (2) the total lack of interviews (like, you can send out 100+ applications around the world, and get zero interviews), and (3) all the people (especially in my subfield) I've seen leaving philosophy despite their tremendous talent, because they can't really afford a gap year (financially, or professionally). I may leave the profession after this year, unless I manage to get some kind of employment (I might also tough it out a cycle; we'll see). It's too bad, because it turns out that I'm very good at the research portion of the job, and I think I'm a decent teacher, too. I'm totally killing it, professionally. But the only reason I'm doing so well is because I got a cushy two-year postdoc that gave me the resources, space, and time to develop and publish the things I'd been working on, and to plump up the rest of my CV. I had zero interviews for 100+ applications in 17 countries the year I got my postdoc (and one VAP interview for the same stats the year before). That same year, several excellent new scholars in my subfield--people who are straight-up better than me--also got zero interviews. But they had to leave the profession, because there was no postdoc waiting for them. And I know so many others who are so, so good, but who are ground down by their part-time teaching loads and can't get any of their own work done and out there. I've been incredibly lucky. If I've learned anything from my postdoc, it's how much of a difference teaching-free and no-strings-attached research time (post-PhD) can make. And it makes me sad that most people never get any.

Yeah, I like her a lot.

Ah! That makes a lot of sense! Yeah, sure. But even then, Acosta is not really part of the aesthetics community, so she can't exactly help you with that network (nor has she published in any aesthetics journals). That's not to say her work isn't great; it's just to say that she's not really involved in that area. There are plenty of 19th c. folks who are, however (e.g. Guyer, Shapshay, Gjesdal, Ostaric, Goehr, Zuckert, etc.), and I think one would be better served by having them as advisors.

Unfortunately, I wouldn't count DePaul. It's a fantastic continental department, but one of those pretend ghosts when it comes to aesthetics/philosophy of art.

Nope. This is the subforum for it. Sacralicious is asking about a subfield of philosophy. This is a move you need to make with your eyes wide open--way more wide open than for getting a PhD in philosophy in the first place. You absolutely need to know that the job prospects in aesthetics are just about the worst of any subfield of philosophy. Most years, there's one job in the AOS; often, there are none. Occasionally you get bumper crops of 3+, but that's rare. You have to expect one job a year, max. And you have to realize that it's a subfield that's widely (and unjustly) looked down upon. Things are better among continentalists, but still not good. So you have to plan your trajectory accordingly. The result is that anybody working in aesthetics has to specialize in something else, too. And that's not a bad thing, since aesthetics gives you the opportunity to bring philosophical work from elsewhere into conversation with human culture, and that makes for really interesting stuff. But from the practical and research standpoints, you absolutely have to master some other aspect of the philosophical literature. Even then, that's not enough for the job market (you'll still get discounted as not the real deal). On the plus side, there's much less legitimate competition for that one job a year. And the main aesthetics associations--the ASA and the BSA--are great, very friendly, and do a lot of work to promote aesthetics, and to help students (e.g. student travel to the conferences is funded, they fund lots of grants, they have editorial opportunities for students, and the ASA is going to start sponsoring a postdoc). These are relatively large organizations (especially the ASA), and so there are lots of conferences every year--4 for the ASA, 1 BSA, 1 CSA, and 1 ESA, plus a few other regular events. That all means that networking and getting conference experience is a lot easier in this subfield than in others. With those warnings out of the way, I suppose it needs to be said that the state of graduate education in aesthetics in North America (if that's where you're looking) is not great. A lot of programs have people who claim aesthetics as an AOS, but most of those aren't affiliated with the ASA/BSA/CSA/ESA, and don't publish in the relevant journals (if they publish in aesthetics at all). So you have to be careful. You absolutely need a supervisor who is active in the subfield, because you can't afford not to have a vocal advocate. To my mind, the best ranked departments in North America for the study of aesthetics are (in alphabetical order) CUNY, McGill, NYU, and UBC. Among the unranked departments, I'd say it's Illinois-Chicago, Oklahoma, and Vanderbilt (since they hired Taylor). I may have forgotten a department, but at any rate I'd say that these are currently the best places to do that kind of work. You'll have noticed, though, that some of these departments aren't necessarily the best places for a continental specialization. For that, I'd give much closer consideration to Columbia, Oklahoma, UIC, and Vanderbilt. (McGill is continental-friendly, but their main aesthetician is wholly analytic.)

That's weird. It's entirely appropriate to email and ask. In my field, a conference paper is usually about 3000 words long, and one aims to present it for about 20 minutes. Things are definitely different for different fields, but you can get a decent sense of what's expected by perusing the instructions on other conference CFPs.

The first thing to know is that the direction of the brain drain is from these other countries to the US, not the other way around. That means it's going to be an uphill struggle for you--especially, I suspect, coming from a program that isn't much of an international name-brand (unless it is in comms?). The other thing to know is the number of jobs in your field in those countries every year. For English Canada and Australasia, it's going to be a couple. Maybe one or two more if we count French Canada, but you'll obviously need French for those. For western Europe, it'll probably be a handful or two in the UK, and a trickle in France, Germany, Spain, etc. (almost all of which will require knowledge of the local language). It's also worth noting that many of these places have preferential hiring for their own citizens, graduates, or holders of work permits, just as the US does. Having said these things, the thing to do is to start looking at job ads in these countries to figure out what they're generally looking for, and to start looking at the CVs of new American hires in these countries, to see what their profiles are like. You'll need the PhD, of course, but also as many pubs as you can get, a solid portfolio of courses under your belt, perhaps even a large set of conference presentations, the best letters of rec you can find, etc.. These things will vary a little by discipline, and I'm not in comms, so I may be a little off. But those are the general pre-reqs for academic jobs.