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Everything posted by maelia8
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I would actually recommend that you go for the thesis. You can always learn a language later, such as through your graduate program or an intensive summer language school, but you can't go back and choose to write an undergrad honors thesis. In addition, the thesis can serve as your writing sample when you apply for your Ph.D. and may be the best example of your undergraduate work and professional interests.
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Related question: If you do date people inside of academia, do you prefer/have you had better luck with people inside of your major/concentration, or outside of it? On the one hand, dating another historian/computer scientist/anthropologist means they know what you're going through at work and understand exactly what you do, but on the other hand, sometimes that can make it feel like your world just got a lot smaller. As a humanities major, I've generally had more luck with partners in the sciences, since it broadens my horizons and what they do isn't so similar to what I do that I feel like I'm living in a fishbowl. That being said, I'm a historian who is currently dating another historian (albeit in a completely different specialty/geographic field), and it's been working out fine. Thoughts on this?
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I like to listen to recorded conversations using new vocabulary - for me, learning the term in a vacuum doesn't help much, I have to hear or see it used in its normal context. I also really like the Anki flashcard software, since it lets me ascribe any picture or word or mnemonic device to the vocabulary and learn it with that association, rather than somebody else's association out of a textbook.
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I live in Germany, got into a Ph.D. program in California, and faced this same decision with my current bf. He is just finishing up his MA, but he wants to start his career here, not in the USA (where it would be really hard for him to get a visa and find a job), and I wasn't willing to give up my offer to stay here in Germany with him. Both of us hated the idea of long distance (we've been together for a year and a half), so we have decided to end the relationship for similar reasons to those you've listed, alwaysbeenastorm. It's been hard knowing that the planned termination of our relationship is looming in a couple of months, but we are doing our best to enjoy the time we have left and have generally been pretty successful so far. It's all about being mentally prepared and learning to let go when it's time - sometimes you just have to face the music and realize that ending the relationship will be the best thing for all parties involved, even if it doesn't feel so great right now.
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I'd recommend signing up for a dance or martial arts class outside of the university - some of my best friends in other cities are people I've met at the local martial arts studio when I was visiting. If you are into any kind of board, card, or video games, it's also easy to find clubs of people who participate in tournaments or get together to play recreationally. Another fun option can be to take a class at a local community center in some kind of craft (sewing, knitting, stained glass, metalworking, framing, etc.) - often it's a great way to meet older people and hear their stories
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@hardtack&coffee thanks so much! Every time that I see someone else has been admitted to their dream history program, it gives me a warm fuzzy feeling all over I'm so glad that so many of us are going to have our dreams fulfilled.
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You wouldn't believe the amount of crap I get when I tell people I've never tried meat. Responses range from a pitying "you don't know what you're missing!" to a defensive "you HAVE to at least try it to make an informed decision, you shouldn't let your parents brainwash you." I was never told not to eat meat, and my sibling has actually become an omnivore as an adult, but meat just really, really doesn't appeal to me at this point - not the price, not the appearance, not the source. There are some things you just don't need to try to know that they aren't for you.
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I'm trying to think of a situation where you are obligated to talk to strangers OTHER than a professional, business, or academic situation and I can't think of any … if you're at a party, I assume you have at least a couple of friends there, and if you're trying to pick someone up in a bar or fitness club, then you don't need conversation starters as much as bold pick-up lines.
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I think that based on your own admissions that you don't think you're cut out for writing a long thesis and you don't believe you'll be interested in doing a Ph.D. afterwards that you should probably go for the Public History stream. You say yourself that it could be a waste of time not to do it in the first place since you anticipate continuing in a related field. If you do find out that you love grad school, having an MA in Public History is not going to stop you from pursuing a Ph.D. in the long run.
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Has Anyone Else Gotten Problematically Lazy Since Being Accepted?
maelia8 replied to PhDerp's topic in Officially Grads
I am two years out of undergrad and currently work a job with extremely minimal and flexible hours, so right now I have plenty of time to read all those books on my Goodreads checklist and watch all of those series on my Netflix playlist without guilt Not sure how difficult the change back to intense round-the-clock academic work is going to be, but I'm all about enjoying this time of guilt-free indulgence while I've got it! -
Graduation Gifts to self for a job well done (completing a PhD)
maelia8 replied to Miro's topic in Officially Grads
This might seem simplistic, but I'm thinking I might like to reward myself with whatever new piece of technology I'll have been hankering after which I know would distract me from my studies, such as a sound system, a tv, a tablet, etc. After completing my Ph.D. I might finally have the time to enjoy using a new tech toy -
What surprised you the most going through this whole process?
maelia8 replied to budgie's topic in 2010-2015 Archive
I was surprised by the fact that the only school that accepted me (not counting wait lists) was the top-ranked program on the list. Not that the other programs I applied to were easy to get into (they were all top 10 in my field), but it was literally the program I didn't even dare to hope of getting accepted by that accepted me. At all of the others where I actually thought I had a slightly better chance, I was rejected or put on the wait list. The two schools where I was wait listed were actually the NEXT two highest-ranked schools on my list, so I guess what I learned from this was … everything will happen the opposite of how you expect, so don't have any expectations? -
Honestly I think it's fine if you write the same email and insert the proper names in. An offer rejection email is not of the same level of importance as, say, an SOP, and the professors and grad department secretaries all have seen every possible formulation in the book - they've been doing this for years. Make it short, polite, and friendly, but don't worry overly about describing why you are rejecting their offer - the more detail you go into, the more condescending it can start to seem to the reader. I wrote just three lines to both of the schools I was on the wait list at, something like "I'm so grateful to have been considered and was incredibly happy to make your small cut, but unfortunately I have decided to attend another institution this Fall. Thanks so much for your friendly communication throughout this process." On another note - every one of the schools I wrote these emails to wrote me back, sometimes quite curtly, to say that they wanted to know where I was going instead, "for their records." Am I obligated to tell them? Anyone know what they use this information for?
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I'll be moving back from Germany to my hometown in Oregon on June 30th, fingers crossed that I can find a place in Berkeley and get moved in by August 20th Finally hoping to get all of my lingering ephemera out of my parents' house, so here's a toast to that!
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Structuralism, which for historians refers to theoretical frameworks that emphasize any broad, powerful, wide-reaching, and hard to change intangible structure (for example Marxism or Capitalism) that can serve as a driving force in human history above and beyond the acts of human individuals. Nope, it's got nothing to do with buildings or how they affected the course of history (face palm).
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From what you've said, it really sounds like you have a lot of doubts about unknown school, and few concerning fancy school. In this case I'd go with my gut, which from what you've written seems to be leading you towards fancy school
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Sure am, have you decided definitively on Berkeley? If you have, send me a private message and maybe we could look together
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Maybe this is less common, but is there anyone else out there who tends to lose weight and forget to eat when they are going through periods of stress? Normally I eat quite generous amounts of food, but when I'm working on a thesis or a big paper or doing a lot of research, I sometimes forget to cook/eat and end up living on a diet more common to birds, squirrels, or rabbits - basically dried fruit and nuts as snacks or raw fruit and vegetable slices as "meals." When I was going through a period of great stress a couple of years ago, I lost about 12 pounds over a period of two months (I am 5'9" and my healthy weight is around 125 pounds, so that is a rather large amount of weight for me to lose). When I am going through stress I have to make more of an effort to remember to eat so that I don't end up in that unhealthy place again. Even though I am a vegetarian and a fairly fit person, I sometimes forget to listen to my body and give it what it needs when the going gets tough.
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I am a few years out of undergrad and I actually still prefer living with roommates. I've lived in everything from a double dorm room shared with another person, a single room in a dorm with a community kitchen and bathrooms, student apartments with 1-3 other roommates, and private housing with 1-3 other roommates, and I've had overwhelmingly positive experiences. I have had just one bad roommate situation, which occurred because the roommate was my landlord (BAD IDEA, try to avoid this!). I also lived alone once in a one-room apartment, and I actually did not enjoy it - I felt lonely a lot of the time, and I found it harder to make an effort to go out and make friends in a new place or keep the apartment clean/decorated because I felt like it didn't matter since no one was going to see it. Even though I don't believe your roommate has to be your best friend, it's nice sometimes to know that someone else is breathing in the next room and that you could turn to them in the case of an emergency Maybe it's because I'm a deep sleeper and don't care much about others' sleeping/sexual time schedules, as well as being a very tidy, clean person who doesn't care as much if my roommates are as well. I'll be moving to an extremely expensive area in the Fall, and I will definitely be looking for a roommate or co-op situation to live in when I move there.
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@Veilside79, thanks fork your input into the process. I was not too upset to be rejected by Chapel Hill - I had been expecting it for a while and had plenty of time to come to terms with it - but it's nice to know some of the the reasoning behind their mysterious notification system. At the end of the day, efforts to get at the "why" of the admissions/rejections timeline are probably a waste of time anyway
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1) Are you the first in your family to pursue graduate education? Are you the first to pursue higher education in general? My mother only has a high school diploma, and she was the first child born in the USA to working-class immigrant parents. They were far too poor and ignorant of the possibilities to set my mother on the track to college, and she ended up trying it on her own for a couple of semesters of community college but dropped out due to financial difficulties and got married. My father went to a state school without much enthusiasm and graduated in a field he had no interest in, and he has never once used the degree that he got (he became an entrepreneur). None of his siblings or my mother's siblings have pursued graduate education, and about half do not have a bachelor's degree (in my father's family it's much more popular to join the military). My parents were honestly surprised and curious that I always cared a lot about my grades and beefing up my extracurriculars during high school - they were both C students and always told me that grades didn't matter as long as I passed. They never understood my desire to go to a small, highly-ranked private liberal arts college (my sister went to the local state school and has zero debts), but they indulged me anyway, for which I am very thankful. 2) What struggles have you faced as a first-generation applicant? Ignorance from everyone around me about what my options were, how to apply, where to apply, etc. My parents, though kind and supportive, have always been completely in the dark - I figured out the whole college application process by myself, and had to talk my parents through paying the fees and signing the forms. I feel like I've basically blundered through the process each time and gotten lucky, since I never had any advisor, mentor, or knowledgeable person to guide me. My parents are also super independent entrepreneurial types who can't imagine ever working for someone else and can't understand why I want to get a degree where I will have a job in an office at the end. 3) What have you accomplished as a first-generation applicant? If nothing else, I've gained the knowledge necessary to advise others and help them through this process, so that future applicants (my students, my children?) won't have to go through this process blind, lonely, and doubting themselves, as I did. I really look forward to helping someone else through an application cycle in the future. 4) What has helped you to reach your educational goals? Determination, confidence, and a desire to prove myself to the world
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-I've never eaten meat or fish - ever. I'm a vegetarian raised by vegetarians and there was never any meat in our house growing up. I don't even know what animal flesh tastes like, and I've never had any desire to try it. -I've never owned or used a smartphone of any make or model. My phone doesn't even have a built-in camera, just a T-9 keypad. -I've never been anywhere in the USA East of the Rocky Mountains (IMO an airport layover doesn't count), although I have been all over Europe.
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Finally, finally got my expected rejection from Chapel Hill today. I think it was rather thoughtless of them to wait so long to inform us about rejections, since they informed admits an entire month ago that they had been accepted. Maybe they had some sort of invisible wait list, but it still smacks of bad planning. Anybody else have a similar experience with them? I hope they've finally finished notifying everybody.
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Finally, finally got my expected rejection from Chapel Hill today. I think it was rather thoughtless of them to wait so long to inform us about rejections, since they informed admits an entire month ago that they had been accepted. Maybe they had some sort of invisible wait list, but it still smacks of bad planning.