Between Fields

You might consider a Small Group Instructional Diagnosis (sometimes called a Midterm Chat). Here's an example of a format from my institution: http://ctlt.illinoisstate.edu/consultation/midterm.shtml You can do this without a dedicated SOTL center, if you can get colleagues to help you. The difference between this an evaluation is that the facilitator helps students get to consensus on what they need from you to do better and what they themselves can do to improve their performance.

From what I've seen, Digital Humanities and Film Studies are often only tangentially related--leading digital humanists actually tend to specialize in the 16th, 17th, 18th and 19th centuries or earlier, as that's the material that's currently in vogue to make available online. Largely, digital humanists are self-taught, in terms of coding and digitization techniques, because there aren't agreed-upon best practices in the field (which is a catch-22 because many of them are self-taught). They're content area experts who have learned DH to take that content to a wider audience. I had one class in digitization of archival materials in my English PhD coursework, and it was a lot of fun. Think about it in terms of what you'll want to teach after your PhD and what department you'd see yourself in. With the English PhD you're getting a lot of experience in composition and have generalist English positions available to you. With a Film Studies PhD, you're limiting the number of positions you could reasonably apply for.

I just got back from presenting at Lavender Languages & Linguistics in DC. It was a lot of fun, even given the record coldness of the city itself and spending 6 hours waiting in ORD. I'm also going to present at CCCC in Houston, which should hopefully be a little warmer.

I think your best bet would to check the minimum scores required at each of the institutions you're looking at (not the department). If you have to, ask the graduate school. A bad GRE score could keep you out of the university on a technicality, when the department might not really care. Even if they like you, someone would have to stick their neck out for you to override the university's minimum requirement, and in some cases that's not even possible. From a department-specific standpoint, though, it doesn't really matter if your other qualifications are good.

I had a funded MA at an either unranked or low enough that it didn't matter (at least for graduate school) university, and got into a funded PhD program. There's hope.

I mentioned two professor's names in my SOP. I'm in the middle of my second year and haven't ever worked with either of them. I'm friendly with one for department governance stuff. I haven't met the other one, because she has been on a leave of absence for family reasons since before I even applied. With that being said, I still have a great research fit with the department and am getting to do exactly what I said I wanted to do.

We're doing phenomenology (sigh) in my literature seminar right now. She's having us read Martin Heidegger, Jean-Uale Sartre, Jacques Derrida, Emmanuel levinas, Julia Kristeva, and Maurice Merleau-Ponty, and Wilhelm Dilthey and Paul Recoeur, though those last two are interested more in hermeneutics.

Not to put too fine a point on it, but perhaps your ignorance of the landscape of academia is what led you to pursue a half-funded PhD in the first place. No one should pay out of pocket for a PhD in any subject.

I have a basic signature for most replies and a more elaborate signature for specific audiences, or when I'm talking more as my administrative role or my student government role. I also use the larger signature with students to cut the "Where is your office?" email out of the chain. I do include my email address because some of the ways that my emails get to students use a no reply email address. I also do a fair bit of emailing to people outside the university, and I think the more formal signature is expected more in the business world. I definitely agree that your student role should be emphasized, as it's the most important. I have seen many, many graduate students (mostly master's students, doctoral students seem to get it better) put the degree they're going for after their name. It irks me. I've also seen graduate students being creative with their titles "Graduate Instructor" instead of "Graduate Assistant," which also irks me. Internal: Name Doctoral Student & Graduate Assistant Department of X External: Name Doctoral Student & Graduate Assistant Coordinator Title Here Graduate Student Government Title Here Department of X | University of X email@email.edu | Office: Office Number | Phone: (XXX) XXX-XXXX Pithy, Inspirational Latin Phrase

That's not totally true--I'm going to a family wedding in September and have to pay for my room a week out, but, yes, most online booking services only require a partial deposit or no cash up front.

So, there is a graduate student conference in my field, in my sub-area at a university and department that I was admitted to and didn't attend. Would it be awkward to submit a paper? Has anyone ever had the experience of being on a campus you declined, in the context of presenting? I'm pretty confident I could write a passable abstract, but is the vita line worth possible side eye?

It's worth considering, though, that in this case "standard" doesn't mean that "A" is the minimum grade assigned for graduate courses, it means that work less than "A" quality just isn't acceptable at the graduate level. By not meeting the standard, you're sending a red flag to whomever's looking at your transcript. A "B" definitely signals extreme displeasure with a graduate student's work. Perhaps it's slightly different when schools have the A- and B+ available to them--my university uses straight grades.

I don't think having both an MA and an MAT would look bad (prima facie), but an MAT isn't likely to help you in PhD admissions in English if you're not intending to make Secondary English Education your concentration of study. None of the people in my PhD program in that track have an MAT or MAE; they all have MAs. You did mention that it's an online program, though, and that might raise a flag or two, unless it's from a reputable university. In a lot of ways an MAT, MAE, or MEd is kind of a terminal professional degree for teachers. The preparation you'd be getting in a program like that would not naturally lead to a PhD in English. Having worked with HS English teachers, I can definitely say that it's not the sort of job you can do as a fallback. You have to be really committed to it or it's going to eat you alive, with all of the standardized testing and other administrative hoops that you'll have to tolerate in the public education system. If your goal is to teach college, apply for PhD programs. Like I said, the MAT won't hurt you, but it probably won't help you, especially if it's an online program where you're not really going to be able to cultivate new references. Is your British MA taught or researched?

Programs in WGST/GS/Women's Studies don't do subject-based research, for the most part. The work these departments do is just like in an English department, and most of the faculty will probably be housed in that field. Rhetoric does do more human subject research, but it's rare to do that before the master's level. None of the fields you mentioned do "lab" work. You'll be fine on that end. The evidence of "research" you would present would be conferences you've presented at. Writing papers for courses wouldn't be evidence of independent research, but you could use that in your writing sample.

The NAS is a conservative think tank, so I'd take any article from them with a considerable amount of salt. (There are threads in this very sub-forum that I would take with similar amounts of salt, if you're thinking about rhet/comp.) I don't know of specifically-cognitivist departments, but you're likely to find at least one or two professors in any department offering rhet/comp who might identify that way. Most compositionists study things from several different perspectives. I generally see myself as something between an expressivist and cognitivist and attend Illinois State. I was also pleased with the faculty at Bowling Green State University when I got in there. The U of Arizona and Miami of Ohio programs are also really good.