dr. t

He did! I had forgotten he was still kicking! ? I think non-historians have some influence, but I've actually spoken a lot in my recent work (on medieval constructions of race) about how historians have this idea of themselves as the deans of medieval studies, and how that's creating some rather large problems for the discipline. A quick browse of my bookshelf would suggest that about a quarter to a third of the books I own are by people who hold PhDs in things other than history, but I can also tell you that my fields lists were almost exclusively works by trained historians. YMMV.

As @Sigaba suggested, I think it's a bit... shortsighted... to only look at publications as the sole criterium for what makes one a "great" medievalist. Bisson and Jordan are the last two direct Strayer students, and as such wield immense influence within the American academy. And I would, in general, caution against conflating a scholar's influence on you with their influence on the field. I think it's fair to say that if you're not particularly interested in the French court in the 13th century, Jordan's scholarship has had little direct impact on you, but that doesn't mean he himself has not. A bad (or even apathetic) book review from Jordan will tank your career in a very particular way, for example. You can see this insofar as he's the only person on my list to be Doktorvater to another on the list (Nirenberg). As someone who often uses the presence or absence of German material as a gauge of the quality of a piece of scholarship, I agree that the lack of German scholars is troubling. I think it has a great deal to do with 1) the reluctance of American academics to learn German and 2) the particularly esoteric nature of German historiography vs. the more integrated (that is, trying to talk outside of sub-disciplines) approaches popular in the American tradition. I am well aware of what Mike assigns in his seminars, having taken all of them and having worked with the man for going on seven years now. I would nevertheless maintain that it is more than a bit simplistic to give Ladurie credit for something that was a core component of the Annaliste project from the beginning, and I would suspect that he agrees. But there are a lot of important scholars who I've omitted from my list. Miller, Harper, J.H. Smith, Rapp, Schorr, Wood, Squatriti, Clanchy, Warren Brown, Kosto, Little, Gillett, Curta, Whittaker, Ganz, Rothman, Rustow, Barthélemy, Farmer, Tolan, Lester, Buc, Newman, MacEvitt, Ellenblum, and Malegam, to name but a few, all have written books that are vitally important for medievalists to read, but haven't made the list. Your focus on Ladurie is curious.

Montaillou was fairly decisively ripped apart, environmental history falls firmly at Braudel's feet, I think, and what has he done since 1980?

Not going to rank but: Bynum, Constable, McKitterick, McCormick, Jordan, Wickham, Nirenberg, Moore, Vauchez, Bisson, Freedman. A lot of men on that list... Putting Brown on a list of medievalists kinda devalues his entire life's work.

David is a weird choice, though, isn't he?

There may be a very small amount of merit in the idea that you can boost your app by increasing your GRE for applying to state schools, since the better (and competitive) stipend packages there are awarded more or less purely on quantifiables. But in terms of places you should be putting your effort, this is not one of them. I've said this elsewhere, but it's a hard lesson for undergrads to learn that not everything in life is fixable. Your ugrad GPA will forever be your ugrad GPA. It's a bit low, not catastrophically so (I'm at an Ivy with a 3.06 ugrad GPA), but it may close some doors for you. That's just life. But instead of trying to accumulate more quantifiables to somehow make up that ground (you can't) spend your time working on the actual skills you will need in life.

GRE scores don't make you competitive for history programs. Just a bar to hop over.

Feeling anxious is definitely a (new?) normal after your undergraduate. Depending on your particular life circumstances, post-bac is when many people are first confronted with the realization that their past actions limit their future choices, and that there's nothing they can really do about that. You can mitigate your 2.8, but you can't erase it, and there's a very real possibility that you're not (or at least shouldn't) go to graduate school because of it. But that's not failure. Or, it's only a failure if you make it one, and the way you make it a failure is if you limit your future to one objective (e.g. graduate school).

This is... not correct. Remember, as always, that the goal isn't to get into graduate school. The goal is to get a job when you get out of graduate school. Only apply to top-tier programs with good hiring records (redundant).

Having seen this "rule" in action, I am 99% sure it is actually a way to nicely tell a student that they don't want to work with them.

...No? It sounds like an MA program followed by a PhD program, which isn't the same thing - it's an extra two years, for starters. No one is dissertating in a year. @Physicalimp Yes, four years of coursework sounds absurdly excessive, and I would have severe doubts about your ability to finish a dissertation within five years of your start date.

I agree with both of you! It's definitely a question that shouldn't be asked. But it still will be asked. Coming up with a short, tactful (?), and persuasive answer can only help in professional engagements.

Tell your adviser.

Yale has always been a rather incestuous place on a number of levels ?

Well, I'm a straight white dude, but I have a couple of POC friends who are also medievalists and... yeah. "Why don't you work on your history" is a question they get asked a lot.

If this was a joke, it fell very flat. Go sit in the corner and think about what you've done. Like kicking a rotten log.

Brand new account. Vaguely worded post clearly designed to spark an argument. Replies worded specifically to keep the argument going. This is certainly the way a lot of men in STEM (and elsewhere!) think. It's still absolutely a troll.

Of course. But feeding the troll doesn't really seem to be a useful (or even cathartic) way of addressing that.

Guys, have you... been on the internet before?

You summoned me, so... This is a pretty decent package for this tier school, actually. I like that 6th year funding is becoming a standard. Some questions: Quals are at then end of year 4? That seems very late. What is the actual teaching load? Will you be IOR? What's going on with year 1? How much are you actually expected to pay for insurance? Is dental covered? Your archive is in Europe. How will you get there? I'm not sure what you would gain from an MA, particularly not from an MA at any of the particular universities to which you've been admitted. So yeah, take it.

Your cohort is not your only source of friends. Join a club, pick up a sport that's not on campus, go out.

'The only way to atone for being occasionally a little over-dressed is by being always absolutely over-educated.' - Oscar Wilde

Not that this is exclusive to grad school. I feel like much of my adult life has been on the swing between feeling bored, trivial, and useless and competent, respected, and motivated.

Davis, easy decision.