vanishingpoint

WUSTL for me! Congratulations, everyone, and thanks for sharing this journey.

Any admitted students want to talk about the program at Brown? They were so long in notifying that I had almost written them off, but now I guess they're flying us out early next week? I'm very interested in the Population Studies Training Center, but I'm a little concerned that the professors whose work interests me the most are pre-tenure junior faculty.

I'm so happy that you got your first acceptance! Indiana is a great program, and Bloomington is utterly charming. Nice work.

To those already mentioned, I would add UC Santa Cruz and the Folklore and Public Culture track of the anthro program at Texas.

Yeses today from Michigan and Rice! Rice sent the decision via snail mail, the first one I've received that way, while my POI at Michigan sent me an e-mail to congratulate me and let me know that the official letter will be coming. He made it sound like Michigan will be offering five-year funding packages to all of its admits this year, at least on the sociocultural side. Which is AMAZING news--I had heard that funding was quite uneven at Michigan, and that this created an awkwardly competitive dynamic within the graduate cohort. Interesting to hear that they're moving away from that model. Very, very happy tonight. Tough decisions ahead. Hang in there, everyone!

3-4 weeks?! Argh! How are they going to coordinate a visit weekend if they don't notify anyone until late March?

Drip. Drip. What's that? Oh, it's just the sound of Alfred Kroeber filling up his inkwell.

As all of us play the waiting game, I've been thinking about the future of higher education and some of the books that have been published on this topic lately: Marc Bousquet's How The University Works: Higher Education and the Low Wage Nation and, more recently, Louis Menand's The Marketplace of Ideas: Reform and Reaction in the American University. I haven't read either one yet, but I've certainly heard a lot of buzz about them. Anyway, Social Anthropology has just put out a special issue on the theme of "anthropologies of university reform." And, believe it or not, full-text access to it is free, which is exciting for those of us who are currently unaffiliated with a major university library. Here's the link: http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/journal/118488932/home?CRETRY=1&SRETRY=0 The issue revolves around four articles examining university settings in New Zealand, Italy, Serbia and South Africa. There's also a debate section (which isn't really much of a debate, per se), with Elizabeth Rata and the brilliant Dominic Boyer, who teaches at Rice. I'll just post an excerpt from Boyer's piece: I'd be curious to hear other aspiring anthropologists weigh in on this, both in terms of your own career and in terms of sustaining the possibility of higher education as a space of liberation.

denim_pocket: Yes, I did. The results board makes it sound like sociology and history applicants received the same message. Gigsed: Yes, I think I'll try to make the trip out to Irvine, although I won't be traveling from anywhere near the distance that you will. My reservations about the program mostly revolve around whether or not I could see myself living in Orange County, California, and so I figure that it makes sense to go out there and see for myself. Would Irvine be one of your first choices?

Mine as well. Gigsed, are you planning on attending the visit weekend?

A yes from UC Irvine! Huzzah!

Texas and Minnesota, so far. And it's SivaramakrishNAN, you imperialist!

Congratulations, far_to_go! You're one of the ones who I've been specifically rooting for. I don't know if Kath Weston's work is up your alley, but she is someone who it will be fun to get to know. I'm disappointed about Yale too, but trying to stay positive about the couple of acceptances that I've landed so far. I'm glad that UVA swooped you up, and I hope that there are other acceptances to follow.

Congratulations on landing the HASTS interview, papayadance! I decided not to apply to the program, because it just seemed so insanely competitive; even their website made me feel inadequate. But they obviously like what you have to say, so go in there and show them what's what.