peterangelo

Hey there! Just thought I'd throw in my two cents being that I'm currently applying to Comp Lit programs for Fall '14 (so yeah... probably gonna be a bit Comp Lit biased). I went through a similar debacle; my native language is English, but I now speak Spanish with practically native fluency and have been living in Spain the last several years since my BA. I was an English/Spanish double major with the initial intention of getting a PhD in English, but I didn't want to leave my Spanish behind, so I researched as an early undergrad and discovered Comp Lit.
 
After having decided that I love languages (I now also speak French and Italian), I decided Comp Lit was the way to go. My BA school didn't have it as a degree offering, but there were profs who had PhD's in Comp Lit that guided me. They told me similar things as others have said above: Comp Lit is generally more competitive, and the job market is practically non-existent. At the time of that conversation I had with an English prof who was Comp Lit PhD (circa 2008-09), he told me there were at the time 300ish jobs available for English professors and 6 for Comp Lit. Whoa! He told me just to go English... and other profs supported that notion saying if I wanted to work with and teach foreign authors, there are many many ways to sneak in works in translation (ie, "Great Books" courses) and thus get my foreign fill. This is true, but there's more to it than that.
 
When that prof said 6 jobs were available that year, it's a perfect example of how statistics can be misinterpreted. In order to decide whether or not Comp Lit is for you, and before thinking about jobs, you must understand the nature of the field. I'll do my best in explaining it as I've come to understand it. It's a field that originally was based on the notion that language shouldn't be a barrier in studying literature. If you're bilingual (or tri, or quadri, etc), then doors should be open for you, not closed. Well, that sounds peachy, but there's a problem: not everyone is multilingual, nor speak the same variety of languages as their other multilingual peers. This characteristic alone has shaped the field in an interesting way: on one hand, it makes Comp Lit a very malleable degree (much like a Humanities major), but on the other, its vastly broad nature has caused it to ebb and flow over time in terms of its presence in the academic world. (For the record, these aren't wholly my words; many profs have said this to me).
 
Sticking on the positive side, that means that you can tailor the degree as you please. If you want to compare ancient Japanese religion to modern Arabic philosophy, Comp Lit is the way to go. And it's a way that will allow you to apply for jobs in, say, Religious Studies if you've trained enough in that area (there's a Harvard Comp Lit prof at my alma mater who's now the head of the Religious Studies dept). So that's one example of its malleability. Now, another aspect of it is that it often finds itself somewhat more subjected to trends in literary studies than, say, English (that's obviously a very subjective and interpretative observation; I'm sure many will have a lot to say in contradiction, but like I said, this is my two cents...). For example, in the last decade both Environmental studies and Feminist/Queer studies have been hot topics in the humanities. Since Comp Lit is an interdisciplinary field that, unlike English, doesn't have a core traditional base in terms of how it's studied, it tends to share a stronger symbiotic relationship with these trends. If you want to look at it cynically, you can say that it takes advantage of them to stay afloat as a career field (this was what one professor told me); or you can see it as a reflection of the field's versatile and open-ended nature.
 
So those are my thoughts as to the nature of the field. Now back to jobs. One way to see potential jobs is to look at the faculty that make up Comp Lit departments in different universities. You'll see all kinds of different people. Some in history departments, religion, languages, and a strong amount in English; most with dual appointments in one of those fields and in Comp Lit. In general, you'd be marketable to English and foreign language departments, with of course the chance at others depending on how you designed your PhD course of study. So, I argue that there are MORE job possibilities than if you were to go just English.
 
I hope this helps anyone who's still shaky on what Comp Lit really is. Again, these are all just my observations, but they have been carefully made and based on many conversations with knowledgeable people and lots and lots of personal research. I apologize for my long-windedness. 
 
TL;DR-- Comp Lit is a widely open field with many job opportunities in different departments and allows you to study literature from a very liberal and multilingual standpoint.

Yay! I'm happy to see more people introducing themselves for Comp Lit!! I'll go ahead and give my two cents about some of the thoughts/questions brought up...
 
GRE: well, on one hand, it supposedly is a less important aspect of the app, so my not-so-impressive score isn't keeping me from applying to better schools. Rose Egypt, I'm worried that taking it in November is a bit on the late side... It takes several weeks for scores to be reported and that would put you dangerously close to the early deadlines. But it still seems to be early enough.
 
Letters of Rec: tough one. My interpretation is that you want them to vouch mostly for your work, ability to complete a PhD program, why you'd be a good candidate, etc., and less on your language abilities. There are other ways. And let's be honest, we don't all learn our languages in a nice, academic way. I'll give mine as an example: English- native; Spanish- university and living in Spain (so that does work for me), Italian- university classes, but no work in it (doesn't help), French (this is the fun one)- girlfriend. Yeah, before I decided to do Comp Lit, I met a girl from France and after a while of speaking Spanish together (met in Spain), I decided to learn French. After several years of vacationing in France, I now speak it. It's not academically easy to justify, but I speak it all the same and read people like Foucault and Baudelaire in French. So there... Jumping back to letters of rec, I'm going to spread mine out the best I can: I was a double major back in California (where I'm from), English and Spanish, so two there, and one from my Master's program here in Spain. It's Spanish heavy; I wish I could get more from other areas, but heck, my aim is to show them that I'm an academic and ready for the challenge of grad school.
 
Lastly, eoyarbidem, you should PM me! I'd love to talk more things Spain related with you! Like where you live, bla bla bla...

Just to jump in on the GRE debate...
 
I feel the best way to look at it is like this: we know that the GRE scores are factor, but it's not easy to determine how much, and of course with each school differing on their views our job isn't any easier. Sadly, there is no rule of thumb, no black and white way to know what to do about our scores. It comes down to a judgment call. You know that even with low-ish scores you can get into programs, and possibly high-tier programs, and since there's no way of knowing whether or not you'd get weeded out, the only way is to just apply. 
 
I feel like if you have a good CV... as in, conference participation, publications, awards, etc., and a good WS/SoP then you should apply anyway and forget about your scores. 

Hey there! Just thought I'd throw in my two cents being that I'm currently applying to Comp Lit programs for Fall '14 (so yeah... probably gonna be a bit Comp Lit biased). I went through a similar debacle; my native language is English, but I now speak Spanish with practically native fluency and have been living in Spain the last several years since my BA. I was an English/Spanish double major with the initial intention of getting a PhD in English, but I didn't want to leave my Spanish behind, so I researched as an early undergrad and discovered Comp Lit.
 
After having decided that I love languages (I now also speak French and Italian), I decided Comp Lit was the way to go. My BA school didn't have it as a degree offering, but there were profs who had PhD's in Comp Lit that guided me. They told me similar things as others have said above: Comp Lit is generally more competitive, and the job market is practically non-existent. At the time of that conversation I had with an English prof who was Comp Lit PhD (circa 2008-09), he told me there were at the time 300ish jobs available for English professors and 6 for Comp Lit. Whoa! He told me just to go English... and other profs supported that notion saying if I wanted to work with and teach foreign authors, there are many many ways to sneak in works in translation (ie, "Great Books" courses) and thus get my foreign fill. This is true, but there's more to it than that.
 
When that prof said 6 jobs were available that year, it's a perfect example of how statistics can be misinterpreted. In order to decide whether or not Comp Lit is for you, and before thinking about jobs, you must understand the nature of the field. I'll do my best in explaining it as I've come to understand it. It's a field that originally was based on the notion that language shouldn't be a barrier in studying literature. If you're bilingual (or tri, or quadri, etc), then doors should be open for you, not closed. Well, that sounds peachy, but there's a problem: not everyone is multilingual, nor speak the same variety of languages as their other multilingual peers. This characteristic alone has shaped the field in an interesting way: on one hand, it makes Comp Lit a very malleable degree (much like a Humanities major), but on the other, its vastly broad nature has caused it to ebb and flow over time in terms of its presence in the academic world. (For the record, these aren't wholly my words; many profs have said this to me).
 
Sticking on the positive side, that means that you can tailor the degree as you please. If you want to compare ancient Japanese religion to modern Arabic philosophy, Comp Lit is the way to go. And it's a way that will allow you to apply for jobs in, say, Religious Studies if you've trained enough in that area (there's a Harvard Comp Lit prof at my alma mater who's now the head of the Religious Studies dept). So that's one example of its malleability. Now, another aspect of it is that it often finds itself somewhat more subjected to trends in literary studies than, say, English (that's obviously a very subjective and interpretative observation; I'm sure many will have a lot to say in contradiction, but like I said, this is my two cents...). For example, in the last decade both Environmental studies and Feminist/Queer studies have been hot topics in the humanities. Since Comp Lit is an interdisciplinary field that, unlike English, doesn't have a core traditional base in terms of how it's studied, it tends to share a stronger symbiotic relationship with these trends. If you want to look at it cynically, you can say that it takes advantage of them to stay afloat as a career field (this was what one professor told me); or you can see it as a reflection of the field's versatile and open-ended nature.
 
So those are my thoughts as to the nature of the field. Now back to jobs. One way to see potential jobs is to look at the faculty that make up Comp Lit departments in different universities. You'll see all kinds of different people. Some in history departments, religion, languages, and a strong amount in English; most with dual appointments in one of those fields and in Comp Lit. In general, you'd be marketable to English and foreign language departments, with of course the chance at others depending on how you designed your PhD course of study. So, I argue that there are MORE job possibilities than if you were to go just English.
 
I hope this helps anyone who's still shaky on what Comp Lit really is. Again, these are all just my observations, but they have been carefully made and based on many conversations with knowledgeable people and lots and lots of personal research. I apologize for my long-windedness. 
 
TL;DR-- Comp Lit is a widely open field with many job opportunities in different departments and allows you to study literature from a very liberal and multilingual standpoint.

The idea behind these letters of rec is that these people, given their stature and understanding of the field, can vouch for you as a worthwhile candidate for your program. That generally implies they've worked with you extensively, taught you, etc., but that isn't always the case. On your part you want the strongest, most convincing letters possible. So if you've done enough work with people who haven't been your teachers, but you still feel they know enough about you to write the most convincing letter of rec, then it seems like a good option. Now of course this is all my opinion, but it's based on several years of experience gaining knowledge myself of the process, and even though my field is different (I'm humanities/literature) I believe the concepts are shared. Hopefully more people respond to your post so that you get the most global idea possible.
 
That being said, another thing that's important to understand is that every program is individual. Application committees are made up of faculty members that are individual human beings with their own preconceived notions of what is good/bad and you just have to hope that your package fits well enough with what they envision as their ideal grad student to get accepted. Again, my gut feeling is that it won't matter as long as the letter can substantially and logically vouch for you being a good fit for your program. 
 
Hope that helps! Good luck to you!

I'm in a completely different academic area, but the places where I am applying specify the type of sample I need to provide. And, while I can interpret this relatively loosely, I would not want to push it too far. What do your applications ask for? If it's just an academic writing sample, then the undergrad thesis should work.

However if you are a native english speaker (bilingual?) then I would think that the relevant pieces in Spanish might be especially impressive as they demonstrate superior language ability.

I would check with the program director for each of your applications and offer them a choice, see what they have to say. This only works if you can demonstrate that you have no issues whatsoever with English - if it is not your first language, then you need to submit something that demonstrates your ability to produce high-level academic work in the language of instruction at the place where you are applying. Sending in a sample in another language would only serve to raise concerns about your ability to work in English.

Good luck!