Sparky

For research, especially if you are doing anything that touches religion: (modern) French and German Also, a vernacular, either Middle English or Old English (Anglo-Saxon) depending on whether you are late or early medieval. It's not a bad idea to learn Old French, either. Qualifier: That's more from the religion/history angle. In English lit, I imagine it would be more important to learn Middle or Old English and modern French. I think that Latin + 1 research language is fairly standard for lit (could be wrong). History usually wants Latin, French and German (and maybe a vernacular); theology wants...all that and your firstborn child. /sigh Obviously, you can say in your SOP that you're planning to work with a tutor in the spring or take a class over the summer, but realistically, the adcomm is going to be skeptical if you say "I'm going to learn German, French, and Latin this summer!" Typically, they define "proficient in a modern language" by "able to read and understand a scholarly article with the aid of a dictionary." You can do that with French or German in a summer, probably. If you do Latin, don't expect to learn another language at the same time. Proficient in Latin means different things at different schools, to the extent that I just put "intermediate" on my CV b/c I don't know how the various places defined the other term. It would take a lot of work to be proficient in Latin in a summer, especially medieval Latin (which is a whole other ballgame...erm...jousting match?...than classical), but you *might* be able to pull it off. It's just that there is a huge gap between the practice sentences in the standard textbooks and thirteenth century hagiography. @ Nighthob: Whoever uttereth the name of Dan Brown in a way that does not insult him (you're safe, don't worry)...anathema sit.

...In a van down by the river...

Oh, go check the poli sci board--the people there have been discussing whether or not to call each other's schools, and strategies for blocking your number from showing up on the school's caller ID if you call a school to which you applied. Also, some of them have actually called/e-mailed, and have gotten answers. We humanities people are, evidently, wimps.

McAbel

Yale is in trouble, too. (NY Times article from Wed.; apologies if someone has posted it already)

Branwen, 1. Do you mean Bernard of Clairvaux? 2. If you end up taking a year off, and you haven't done this yet...LEARN LATIN. 3. Pick medieval, darn it!!!

(A) Yay! Go you! ( I vote "unofficial thread title change." ;o) (Or more like, I unilaterally declare an unofficial thread title change...)

If you want to do Eastern Europe, especially economic history, you will need Russian to be competitive, and it is a better idea to make your second language German rather than French. Also, have you thought about looking into poli sci programs, specifically poli econ and comparative politics-focused ones? Pretty much everything you've described in which you are interested in stuff we covered in my undergrad poli sci classes. Especially if you are mainly looking post-Soviet, as the 1990s are just *barely* starting to be moved from "current events" to History. I'm not trying to kick you out of history or anything--I just think you might be surprised by how much history you can do in a non-quantitative-focused poli sci program.

My theory: all the religion people who applied to top Ph.D programs last year and were rejected are now in M.*. programs that take 2-3 years, so religion admissions next year will SUCK.

Although if more schools this year are doing the "only admit as many people as we can fund, and when we hear whether they're coming, we'll pull from our waitlist" dance, late news might not be bad news...

Are you kidding? 4/5 of my schools are "early or mid-March." (And looking at last year's results, #5 could very well be March as well. /sigh)

Congratulations! (Yay, religion on the results search...but more importantly...congrats to livgreen; that's totally awesome).

So I'm fully aware this thread is about <i>popular</i>, not <i>most competitive</i>, subfields, and I'm in history and religion, so my knowledge here is secondhand. The thing you have to keep in mind about medieval, especially with respect to English lit, is that it's really two subfields--early and late medieval. I say "especially English" because, while Latin is essential for both, early medievalists need Anglo-Saxon (Old English) and late medievalists need Middle English, which are...rather different. There are also differences in general themes and such, of course, but the language issue is the real deal-breaker for most people. The big problem with medieval, of course, is that of the people who are qualified--meaning they (we) have put in the time and effort to learn Latin and 1+ vernaculars--nearly everyone is really qualified. But again...secondhand.

"Gee, Im so pathetic that i make up lotz and lotz of fake resultz for programz whoos deadlinez havent passed and post them on the resultz search.. Sumtimz I even make up a gre score and gpa. But my real gpa, and gre totaly suck!!!11! Also, my LORz will all reflect my imatchurity." :P (Authentic insecurity of the moment: I have at least one late LOR at 3/5 schools--my top three choices, in fact. School #1 was almost a month late. /sigh Also, I'm really, really regretting not applying to more schools). @ Blazer12, I didn't major in the field of three of the programs I'm applying to, either--in fact, I have barely any coursework in the subject (also history, though not US). For those schools, everything hinges on how convincing my LORs are that I know what I'm talking about. Fortunately, they all said the writing sample didn't have to be a history paper, just something vaguely related (e.g. era/place), so I'm guessing we have some leeway here.

In some subfields Duke, Vanderbilt, WashU (I think) and Emory do interviews. Usually it would say somewhere on the website if the specific program does interviews for finalists.

slavery => Arab trader argument

The object of the game is to get as drunk as possible so you don't really care once the rejection e-mails start to roll in. Take a drink every time... A science program shows up, and you remember that you are in the humanities. Someone posts an "Other" about a mass e-mail. ...two drinks if you received that e-mail as well. A school that you have applied to shows up, and even though it's not your program your heart skips a beat. A school that you have applied to shows up, and even though it's not your program you check your e-mail/voice mail on reflex. A school that you have applied to shows up, and even though it's not your program you run to your mailbox to check for snail mail. ...two drinks if it's Sunday. A program that you have applied to shows up as a rejection, you have no new e-mails, and you just get even more nervous. A program that you have applied to shows up as an acceptance, you have no new e-mails, and you want to die inside. You bookmarked the RSS feed for just the programs you applied to. You bookmarked the RSS feed for programs you wish you had applied to, so you can torture yourself if you Would Have Known earlier. Someone posts a rejection with a note expressing bitterness. ...Two drinks if it's, "Their loss." Someone posts that they received a notification a program is accepting only one applicant this year. Someone posts a result from a program without rolling admissions whose deadline has not yet passed. There is a forum post asking, "Who posted this result?" There is a results search listing that asks, "Who posted this result?" ...Two drinks if it asks for GRE and GPA. You are waitlisted at a program, and someone posts they were accepted there but are turning it down. Someone posts a result for a subject you have never heard of. Someone posts a result for a subject you are fairly sure does not actually exist.

Given that I've started to picture all adcomm members as the Great Old Ones, I'm just hoping they don't, like, have my application as brunch.

pants

12-step program

If you Google my first and last names, you get 10+ pages of results of high school athletics--a runner in Michigan and a swimmer in Missouri, one of whom was me. However, I usually go by my middle name, and if you Google my middle and last names, you get a pile of letters to the editor and a few other testaments to my more incendiary social justice activities and opinions. My middle name is not on any of my applications. The Catholic schools don't even get my middle initial.

My field is Christianity in the Middle Ages, and I've applied to programs in a variety of departments. The history and history-esque departments have told me they look at the applications this way: (GPA, GRE for screening) 1. Do you know Latin (or, as at least one prof at EVERY school has put it, "You're applying for medieval, so I assume you know Latin") 2. Writing sample 3. SOP; fit 4. LORs Religion/religion-esque departments put it in this order: (GPA, GRE for screening) (in religion, having an Mx degree is also pretty much a prerequisite) 1. Do you know Latin 2. SOP; fit 3. What about other languages? 4. LORs 5. Writing sample Languages tend to be a big deal in religion in general; I think for history the emphasis on Latin is era-specific.

Really? It seems* like UW usually accepts a good chunk of the applicants (insofar as less than 25% can be construed as 'a good chunk'), and given that GradCafe attracts the higher end of the applicant pool, ~10 doesn't seem that surprising. I think y'all are being modest. * All I know about Wisconsin is what I've heard from you all this thread. Period.

Ah, yes, I tend to forget that cogsci encompasses other subjects, because the pop cogsci I read deals almost entirely with AI (personal choice; I'm quite interested in robotics/AI). "Human Factors", on the other hand, sounds like a name for a rock band.

See, this says to me, "ROBOTS!" Yet for 'program,' you have listed "Human Factors." Does not compute.