TMP

I'm sending you a PM.

SToF is right. you don't really need a MA to enter in the PhD program. Remember, the MA is there to help you fill in the gaps like more coursework in a new area of interest, languages, research... Look at your 25 page "thesis" as a potential journal article. Most journal articles have to run less than 10,000 words (about 30 pages). You can use discursive footnotes (lit review in the notes rather than the body). My MA program required a thesis of no longer than 40-60 pages because there's an expectation of cutting it down to make it a publishable article. A good lit review in a regular thesis can run up to 12 pages anyway. So in other words, a "highly polished" 25 page paper is a very tight form of a regular thesis. If you're that concerned, let your LOR writers speak for you- they have room in their LORs, you have little room in your SOP. Definitely discuss your concerns with your adviser and see what s/he says.

Stick it out. First semester is always, always the hardest. And, seriously, don't be afraid to complain/white/annoy your adviser if s/he seems like a reasonable, kind person. A good adviser will help you sort things out because, well, everyone's gone through this crap. And definitely express your concerns about your adviser being on leave- will she able to keep in touch with you via e-mail and Skype? In any case, you will need to start finding a couple of faculty members who can serve as mentors. There will be times when your adviser is too insanely busy to pay attention to you when you need it or when you don't feel comfortable talking about X just yet and want a perspective. So when your adviser is on leave, you have those faculty members to turn to. And you do learn to "read between the lines" in academic texts. It takes a lot of time and practice. A member posted a fabulous post on how to read in CHE forums. Use the search function in the Grad School Life subforum.

Just drop her an e-mail and say, "I'm just starting and I'm interested in studying ancient art and theory. I would love to have a chat with you sometimes to discuss our interests and ideas of where I can go going forward." Something like that. Honestly, NBD.

From what I've seen from H-Net Job Guide, not a lot of jobs compared to other fields. I'd subscribe to that if I were you so you can see how many positions are being advertised for this year and next.

Be open to having a Plan B. I have to be upfront about this because rejections will happen. I'm just starting my first weeks of the PhD program and already know at least 3 people who have been rejected across the board (plus me) in their first (and second) cycles. I'm actually hardly envious of people came straight through from their undergraduate (though taking time off was certainly not by choice- I lived in a limbo for 2 years) has been a tremendous asset to helping me prepare for the PhD. But it's not say that you can't think about a PhD in History now. I did. I started thinking about in the fall of my junior year. I will confess that my research interests now (6 years later!) have changed significantly because of more coursework and informal exposure through campus lectures and travels. So be open. Programs don't need another person doing 20th century American history these days. My cohort only has ONE this year and he's doing gender and political. Our Latin Americanist had wanted to apply to be a mod US historian but her professors told her to go for Latin America because she had Spanish and she ended up getting offers while her peer, a mod US historian, got nothing. That said, consider themes that you're interested in. Is it possible that you can explore those themes in another geographical context? You could gain a broader view of these themes. Don't worry about your GPA- it's fine. Your writing sample and ability to conduct archival research and write well matter much more. Consider your aspiration to enter in academia to be a marathon. The PhD application process itself is only the first mile out of 26.2 miles that you have to run to be a tenure-track professor (if these positions are available years from now). And doing your undergraduate coursework is only the first 1/2 mile. I'll stop here.

I agree with NEN. It really depends on the program. My program is full of wonderfulness but not without drama (as in anywhere else). But people are cooperative and happy to share resources and materials. I've already acquired a shorter version of my reading list for my major field from another student. So it's quite nice. You just take what you can and offer what you can give. I do love my program- the students are fun to be around and the professors are crazy smart and dedicated. Right now, I'm just over my head with my independent study course in my major field with my adviser. I am now realizing that i'm paying a huge price for skipping the undergrad survey course and am doing a lot of cramming!

LOL I cannot take this one. This is totally a troll based on the OP's last point. i'm done here.

I should add that one of the toughest things about going to graduate school is.... learning to hear the word "no" AND accepting it. When your adviser tells you "no" it's often for a VERY good reason. So if you can't accept our "no" and your professors' "no" then you haven't accepted the reality.

Just have to say.... Ouch. OSU mostly certainly is not in the same ranks as Texas A&M. You really have not done your research to make that ignorant generalization. Stipends generally range from $10k to $23k, depending on the school's resources and cost of living in the area. Thwre is mo correlation between the presitge of the program and level of stipend Students in high cost of living areas, even in very respectable programs, are actually struggling. You'd need a second BA if you really want that PhD. At this point your time is better spent making moolah in the non-academic world. You can always read books in your spare time.

No. If it's a visiting position, she's only there on a temporary basis. She *could* get a permanent position but it's not in her contract at the moment. If it's a regular faculty, i'd find it very weird and I'd be on the caution side. You don't want to get caught in departmental politics if you really want this person to be your dissertation adviser. This person may also be too insecure to take on graduate students.

So true. I had one book that deeply disappointed me. I thought the overview was great but then I looked to the back to see what archives the author used. It missed a couple of critical archives. Next thing I did was to put that book down.

Exactly. Case in point: I fell in love with my MA adviser's books, published in early 1990s and mid-2000s. When I arrived, she was working on a topic entirely different from those two books that shaped my research (especially the early 1990s one). And it's precisely one of the top reasons why I chose not to apply to work with her for my PhD. I don't give a care about her current book project (though it's a nice topic). You want to work with someone whose current project really excites you because you're likely to do some research for him/her as part of the program. Funny enough, it's exactly what she told me while I was deciding, "Go with X, you're obviously excited about her current book project. The two of you are asking the SAME research questions! The other guy? You'd do well but he's NOT working on a topic that you're interested in for your dissertation." Basically, you'll go further with someone who is currently engaged with the same research questions than someone who's already done it and is now asking different questions.

I'm guessing you're interested in Kevin Boyle at OSU and Matt Lassiter at Michigan?

Don't worry about other people. Focus on YOU. The application process is all about you, not other people. Focus on your own strengths and what you can offer as a future colleague. Persons A, B, C, etc do not matter, nor should they as you think about pulling together your application. If you do this, your sanity will be greatly preserved. You can set up your SOP with a focus on thematic history in international context. It's actually what I do and just LOVE it. The way I was able to pull it off by arguing for a deep study of this particular group of people and how they responded to various environments around the world. I made sure that there weren't any begging questions from adcoms by not asking "how did these people interact with the locals?" That kind of statement will definitely prompt them to say, "Okay, do you have the language of the locals, then?!" Simply exclude the locals or limited your geographical focus (i.e. don't do ALL of Southeast Asia, focus only on areas where perhaps Hindi is spoken) and make your questions ALL about the Europeans. Be creative.

As for your SOP, click on the link below my signature- I've given some guidelines to help you think through about your interests. You do want to show that you can think broadly and demonstrate how your narrow interests fit to the larger questions in European intellectual history. It is also perfectly fine to do transnational work- it's being encouraged (slowly but surely) as long as you have most of the languages under your belt. So if you're coming in intending to study Southeast Asian colonial history, you'd certainly do well to know English (duh) and French and you'll have to suggest how you'll learn the local languages (i.e. Thai, Hindi, Malay, etc). One of the constant challenges in graduate school is thinking critically how each area of history connect with each other. You'll need to make a strong case for a relationship between 1930s German social theory and early 19th century British liberalism. How does the thread run through these areas? You have to go into this assuming that professors see things black and white. As for emails to professors, give them about 2 weeks. If nothing, you can decide how important it is to be in touch with them. Try again a little while later if you really do have questions. If nothing, then don't take it personally. You'd be surprised how many of them will get in touch with you weeks later when they get around to cleaning up their inboxes!

I agree. Just relax for the next few days. Just review what you have ALREADY done. Don't do anything new- you've done all you can. One of the things you have to learn in graduate school is setting limits for yourself and recognize when "done is good" and if attempted to do more, there will be diminishing returns.

I have to agree with NEN. Graduate Schools make the absolute final decision and they look to make sure that you meet the minimum. A B is considered as a C in a PhD program and a C+/B- would be considered as a D. So if you can't muster a 3.0 in undergraduate work, can you really do it in a graduate program? If your GPA was primarily based on, say, science courses, and you're making a change, there might be a small chance providing that you take some graduate work in history as a non-degree student. This would be a very serious uphill battle.

Here's a cheat: Look at the conference programs for AREEES.

You might want to consider finding two scholars- one in the period you're interested in in European history (doesn't matter where) and another person doing German history (modern or not). The combined expertise will be enough. But yes, it is important that you look through books that inspired you to ask those kind of questions that you have.

Unfortunately, get used to it until you're accepted into a program. Professors feel its their duty to make sure that people are entering with eyes very, VERY wide open. The least you can do is smile, be pleasant, say thank you for their thought, and be persistent. And bonus points if you can name your Plan B, erm, awareness of other things you can do with the PhD.

Don't worry about the ECs- adcoms don't care. They care more about your research and potential to be a scholar. Your languages are fantastic compared to many applicants. You are in great shape. What you do need to do at this point is to figure out what aspect of Eastern European/Russian history that you're interested in studying for the PhD. That should help you figure out which programs to apply to.

Professor Plum took the words out of my mouth. Additional advice about entering graduate school with loans as a PhD student still paying off her loans from her MA: While job hunting and trying to figure out my salary requirements, I heard that, in order to be able to pay off your loans in a timely manner, your salary should be pretty close to how much you owe in principal. So if you've got $80K in loans, that's a tall order, and extremely few tenure track positions start that high. So take time off to pay off those loans until it can come down to less than $30K. That is reasonable to have while in graduate school- assuming that you've got a decent stipend and living in a low cost city (and most schools in the Midwest fit the bill). Not to mention that while your loans are in deferment, it only allows you not to pay anything but your interest still accrues. Better to keep paying loans as much as you can as a graduate student. It was actually kind of one of the smaller reasons why I chose my current program over another offer- so I could afford to keep paying off my loans while living decently. The other program would've put me in financial squeeze if i chose to keep paying.

OP- No postdoc. Your postdoc is likely to say "no" particularly if s/he's savvy. A postdoc is just a very, very junior colleague and hasn't had much experience in evaluating students on whether or not they can make an "impact" on the field. Also, the postdoc is likely to be more concerned about building on his/her reputation such that it's a liability to write a LOR for a student who might otherwise be actually average (as judged by other LOR writers).

This is the wrong way to go about going for graduate school. I think it's time for you to sit down and reflect why you want the PhD and what will mean to you professionally and personally. Your adviser sounds like someone you shouldn't be listening to- there is plenty of very valuable information here. I've been on here since 2008 and it's quite amazing. Scary and unnverving, yes, but it's the truth. Your adviser sounds out of touch, which is fairly common at these kind of places where students don't really go off to graduate school for a degree in humanities. My undergraduate adviser was also a bit out of touch and over the years she worked hard at networking and conferencing to better understand the current landscape. Her advice has been sounder but only when she's sure. I think you might benefit from waiting until Fall 2014 to apply as this process, particularly given the situation you're in, can take a while to learn and understand, unless you simply want to go for the MA.