poofysheep

That seems a little unfair.  Certainly I wasn't intending to use this as my only means of research on schools (that would be silly).  I have already identified a number of programs/people I would be interested in working with in my area (Peter Gordon at Harvard, Warren Breckman at Penn, Martin Jay at UCB, Alan Megill at UVA, Samuel Moyn at Columbia, etc.)  But it's a little scary that many of these places have only one person in my area of interest, since you never know what can happen with faculty movement, especially since some of them are nearing retirement age.  Also, since I'm coming from a BA in philosophy, I know less about how things stand in history, so I was looking to see if I could maybe learn a thing or two from people who may be more informed about the topic than I am.  This was not meant to be in replacement of actually doing my own research, but in addition to it, since there may very well be programs that I haven't heard of that do have strengths in this area, especially since most of the programs I have identified are very, very competitive.  Additionally, intellectual history is kind of an odd field even within history and is not discussed much in these boards, so I thought it couldn't hurt to bring it up.  Sorry if that was a mistake.

Any news on the IFS/History at NYU?

^ That sounds about right. There was a storm that shut down Ithaca's city government a week ago. Cornell's response? Push back 9am classes to 9:30.

Ohhh ok I had no idea the history department just signs off on the IFS decision. Fingers crossed for the both of us!

I could be wrong....but it could also be the case that people could reject their offers and they will make others...sometimes I think that is why schools don't reject some people right away after they invite their initial group to the visit day....I would look at it as a likely rejection and then hopefully, be surprised.

That's right. Even though it's joint, IFS is a separate department with its own admissions process.

Well, I guess I can forget about having a good weekend.

Well, there's the Berkeley massacre.

You haven't necessarily been waitlisted. At my (exceedingly middle-of-the-road) program, we divide the applicant pool into tranches. Last year, out of about 100 applicants, there were 70 or so who were not getting in under any circumstances--we do not admit PhD students without funding. Those letters go out immediately. Of the remainder, we select our top eight--for six funded slots--and usually make offers to those pretty quickly. Becuae we are not a top program (see above), many of those students will have accepted better offers elsewhere. A few will keep us hanging, using our offer to get a little additional consideration from their top choice (and more power to them!) We don't begin to move down the food chain to our second tier of candidates until we have heard a definitive "no" from the top choices. That can take four to six weeks--and our committee meets later than any other I'm aware of. We don't give anyone we might otherwise conceivably take a firm "no" until it's clear that we won't be making an offer because our class is made.
 
An unsolicited piece of advice, and one that I would have been constitutionally unable to take when I was in the throes of the admissions process: Don't let this be a hellish weekend. Try not to log on and check the results page every twenty minutes. If you're going to make this a career, acceptance to a PhD program is just the first, and the most low-stakes, version of a hundred weekends you'll spend. If you let it define your life, there will be agonzing time waiting for responses from comps, fellowships, grants, referees' reports, dissertation committees, hiring committees, editors' reports, promotion and tenure committees, book reviewers... it will make you insane if you allow it to. If you have done the best you can do with your application, try and let it go... the results will work themselves out. Read something. Pick up a hobby, preferably one that involves saving money.
 
This is easier advice to give than to take--I'm in the middle of a decent career here, and it is still hard to turn off the anxiety switch some days. But you will be much happier, and much more productive, if you can develop a sense of detachment on things that are out of your hands. You will be fine even if you don't get in to a doctoral program. Trust me on that.

Sleeping