Sparky

There is a difference between "happy" or "having fun" on one hand, and spiritual contentment/fulfillment on the other. I used to think those were more or less synonymous, then I discovered grad school. I don't know, maybe John Donne said it best.

If you thought through the process, put some effort into researching programs, paid the application fees, jumped through all the hoops, know the minuses, and still want to go to grad school--you drank the Kool-Aid.

Assistantship/fellowship-holding PhD students are a TINY minority of the graduate student population. Even within the humanities, there are *vastly* more M* students than PhD students, and just think about how frantically people are looking around for funded MA programs right now. But let's face it--(nearly) everyone on TGC is either in grad school or desperate to be thus. We drank the Kool-Aid. Willingly. We are not exactly the target audience for anything that even *questions* the value of grad school.

I'm pretty sure this is standard. I'm on a fellowship/TAship that is more or less the standard PhD funding package here, and I'm definitely required to fill it out yearly. I wouldn't worry. They're not offering you the fellowship as "need-based" aid--it's because they want you. Having a salary right now changes that not at all!

Bad idea. To apply again once you are in a PhD program, you would need LORs from people in that program. First School would have to be a bad fit in some way--advisor leaving, interests changed, etc. Presumably, one was a good fit at First School upon admission. To want to go to another program w/o a legitimate academic reason is an *instant* way to burn bridges, snub the profs in your field at First School, and so forth. In other words, exactly what you don't want to be doing to the people who will be writing your LORs!

Sort of. I tend to think of it as a subfield of history characterized less by subject matter and more by its dominant body of sources. Art--particularly, understanding how a work of art functioned in its culture at the time of its creation--requires a different set of historical tools than, say, using primarily text-based sources. Different cultures treat "the image", and the fact of visuality, in different ways, so there's a lot to juggle. Due to the highly specialized nature of the methodologies, art history remains its own discipline. Depending on what region and era you study, though, art can be a valuable source for regular ol' historians, too. And we are greatly in debt to art historians for grappling with the methodological issues first so we're able to do so semi-coherently! (I am sure that many of our efforts at analyzing art make art historians facepalm as much as literary scholars' efforts as "history" make us sob for days). Wait. You mean history is about more than just religion?

Actual conversation, February 2011: Sparky: So I'm interested in the grad student support group. Are there still spots available? Counselor: Oh, that group hasn't gotten started yet. What do you do? Sparky: History. I'm a medievalist. Counselor: The group starts next week. Here's the paperwork.

Do you mean in terms of the search string? (i.e. "art history" contains "history" so the results show up) Or do you mean why people want to study it? ...You're not a cultural historian, are you? If our goal is to understand the past, to the extent that we are able, cultural artifacts (aka the arts, broadly defined) are a vital, if colored, lens into what people (with the ability to produce enduring art, or the money to commission it) valued and what they believed. Art history is, in that sense, like studying the literature of past ages. As far as demand goes--the academic job market is the academic job market, so that's all there is to say about that, but art history is a very useful background for people who want to do museum work.

On campus (for single students, which is actually on campus) there is housing for either 490/month or 590/month, all utilities+Internet included. 590/month is easily doable on the ND PhD stipend, and is so incredibly worth the extra 100/month. (The ceiling won't drip on you in the cheaper ones, but the electricity in the bathrooms has a habit of going out while you're in the middle of a shower. Also, more bugs.) That comes with at least one roommate, though. Most of the off-campus housing immediately surrounding campus is undergrad apartments/townhouses and should be avoided at all costs. The nicer places in pseudo-walking distance* of campus tend to be 2+ bedroom houses thus more expensive (but easily doable under 450 if you find a roommate). * because of the way campus is laid out, "walking distance to campus" and "walking distance to where you're going on campus" are two very, very different things and often render walking not so practical. You will have better luck finding cheap housing if you are willing to drive a bit. Check out apartment complexes in Granger, Osceola and Elkhart (Granger is a more upscale community and will probably be more expensive, but is closest). Also, the ND security website links to past months' crime activity on a map, so you can compare various areas. Castle Point is cheap but kind of a dump. I hear good things about University Park and Regency Club, but if you want to live alone both of those are over your stated price range. Regency is cheaper but UPark is on the bus line.

If you want to do a PhD in religion/theology, go to the best (most prestigious/best reputation/best professors to write LORs) M* school you can.

This might very well be a personal thing, but FWIW, I have found that there is a galaxy of difference between sharing a bedroom/dorm room, and sharing apartment space but having a private bedroom. If you are in a very "college" area, it might actually be *difficult* to find a good one-bedroom place--that is definitely the case here. (Actually, back on the pets line--it is more accurately the case that you can find good one-bedrooms that don't allow pets, or good 2+ bedroom places that do).

Interviews, especially on-campus ones, often serve a double function of interviewing the candidate, and letting the candidate interview the school. In other words, it may very well be that your particular department does interviews instead of participating in the recruitment weekend. My dept does an on-campus interview weekend and does not fly students back to campus for recruitment weekend. What would be the point?

This is a myth. The "oversupply" of PhDs is a function of the massive, catastrophic loss of tenured teaching positions and the growing adjunctization of American colleges. Many adjuncts have PhDs/the terminal degree in their field; a very sizable number don't. To fix the "oversupply," the quickest way would be for U.S. News to factor in "percentage of undergraduate classroom hours taught by terminal-degree holding faculty" and "percentage of undergraduate classroom hours taught by tenured faculty" to their college rankings. ("classroom hours" to attempt to distinguish btwn, say, a class where the IOR lectures 2x and there's a TA-led discussion section, and a class where the IOR is teaching in name only and adjuncts/TAs handle the whole thing).

To add more weight to the previous posters: When you look at the people here who applied once, got shut out, and revamped their applications for a second or third successful round, the key changes are: 1. Better SOP 2. More careful choice of programs 3. Improved writing sample 4. Luck This is not to discourage more language work--the more you do now, the easier time you'll have once you're in a program, trust me--but you have a decent foundation already. It's probably not what is garnering the rejections.

The rules are different for graduate students (usually). My landlord for next year actually has a separate, much stricter lease that he gives to undergrads vis-a-vis grad students (and faculty/staff) tenants. Since you won't actually be paying rent until August, is there any way you could put the deposit down now and reserve a place? I agree that you need to act *now* if you want decently close, quiet, and reasonably priced housing. Around here, I know undergrads start reserving housing for their senior year in the spring--of their sophomore year. As far as grad housing goes, many/most first-year students here end up either pretty far from campus in nice places, or close by in one of a couple of quiet dumps. :/ I am sure the landlords in the area have a good amount of experience with this. Start looking anyway. See what you can negotiate in terms of not having a financial aid letter yet. Especially if you have good references from previous tenancies, you can probably luck out.

At both my MA and PhD school, the DGS of my particular dept has been on the adcom. I don't think that they have had any special pull--I heard from another prof on the adcom at my old school that the DGS had fought *hard* to get me funding for the PhD but was overruled by a vocal faction who wanted the dept to go in a particular direction. But I would assume it's very dependent on particular programs.

If anything, having an English PhD will make you more marketable. "Cultural Studies" and pretty much all other interdisciplinary fields do not generally have their own departments in the traditional sense, with a separate Cultural Studies faculty. Rather, profs from English, history, anthro, etc teach cross-listed classes. They might be associates of the interdisciplinary dept, or however it works at a particular school, but there are not profs who are solely Cultural Studies. That's the point of interdisciplinary--students get exposure to profs from multiple disciplines. I would also point out that English "literature" has pretty much become cultural studies in a lot of cases and subfields. There is, after all, only so much one can say about imagery in Shakespeare. (See also: biblical studies). Many schools incorporate film studies into their English dept. This is not to say that there are jobs in English, either, but you will likely be a more attractive candidate than with a Cultural Studies degree. Also, cheer up--the chances of actually finishing the program and getting a PhD in any humanities field are about 50%. The chances of getting a tenure track job in English after that are even lower. You will, mathematically, mostly likely not be teaching English forever regardless.

I generally find that people (as long as they like animals and are not allergic) *like* having a roommate with a pet. That way they get all the advantages of having a pet without having to pay for food or vet bills. If what you really meant is that you don't want a roommate because, ugh, roommate--well, guess what living frugally actually looks like.

Sales. Possibly marketing. In pharma people often flow back and forth between the two departments over the course of their career. But seriously, what you just described is SO much more like sales than academia. It's hard to be "externally social" when you spend 10 hours a day reading and just plain thinking!

Find roommates (that's a huge one, especially since you'll be splitting not just rent but also utilities and Internet). Have just a cell phone. Sell your TV if you have one and only pay for cable Internet; you can watch *almost* everything on line for free or very cheap. Join Netflix, Hulu+ or Amazon Prime, depending on which other shows you're looking for (you can find almost every show on someone or other's instant watch service, honestly). Share your NF/H+ account with friends. Give up soda. Brew your own coffee/tea. Figure out what foods and OTC medications/products you can tolerate the generic brand and where it's worth the splurge (ketchup, Oreos. Especially ketchup). Help with cleanup at school events--you can usually walk away with several meals' worth of food. Get a CrockPot, make a bunch at once and eat leftovers for a long time. Giant batches of tofu stir fry and bean burritos also make healthy and low cost meals. Produce is usually cheaper and sometimes fresher at ethnic grocery stores than the main ones. Sell your current one or don't buy a car. That way you can drive your stuff out to Cali in a U-Haul and not have to worry about it. Plus you won't pay for gas, parking, car payments (if applicable), or car insurance. Use birthdays and other applicable gift-receiving holidays to ask for clothing/shoes, especially big purchases like a winter coat, a suit, or fancy running shoes.

I live on campus right now (not at Harvard, BTW), and all of the grad student housing here is multiple people in one house/apartment, with private bedrooms. As for off-campus--it varies. The best quiet housing around here, especially relatively close to campus but not notoriously undergrad-dominated, tends to be rented *houses* rather than apartments (and there aren't all that many 2-bedroom houses, which surprised me), so it is not unusual, here, for unpartnered grad students to have roommates. Even among apartment complexes here most of the nicer ones are largely 2-bedroom! On the other hand, I did my MA in a place that pretends it is a city, and very few unpartnered grads that I knew of had roommates. So maybe it's a function of the local housing market? FWIW, I like having a roommate, as in one. Since we're both up at crazy hours working, when one of us just has to vent for two minutes we can do this and then get right back to reading. There are times during the end of the semester when that is my primary social contact. . But I have also lived in a larger unit, and it really is tough sharing one refrigerator (and worse, one freezer) among four adults!

Thanks, Dorinda and Behavioral! Y'all are the best! And Dorinda--there are some really great bike shops here, I'm lucky. My plan is basically to walk into the one that comes with the highest recommendations and say, "Help." But it makes me feel more comfortable to have an idea of minimum requirements in advance, so I can do useful things like not expect "bike fenders" to be some awesome hybrid between a motorcycle and an electric guitar.

Safferz (and anyone, really), if you are wanting to find a roommate so you can share an apartment or whatnot, one thing to do is to contact your future department, and maybe even related departments. Say you're looking for a roommate, preferably another PhD student/same gender/different gender (basically any absolutely essential criteria) and ask if they'll forward the e-mail to people likely falling into said pool. My dept always circulates a handful of these e-mails each spring, along with flyers for off-campus housing possibilities.

Teaching. Teaching happens. The point of comps is to prove that one can teach more than just one's tiny little subsubspecialty. In some cases, the preparation also forces you to helps you acquire skills necessary to keep up with research in your field (e.g. the ability to read a 500 page secondary work in two hours and still get out of it everything you need. Especially important for people whose interests are interdisciplinary in one or more ways).

So I am moving to a place where I can bike to campus 9 months of the year, and I would very much prefer to do so. Can any of you commuter (urban/suburban) bikers out there suggest what is useful/necessary for such a bike? I'm looking less for specific recommendations on a brand-model than general features, as I'm sure I'll end up with whatever one of the local bike shops has in its used stock. Mostly I want not to feel like a COMPLETE loser when I go into the store (only half of one ). I do know that I would like to be able to mount a basket on the rear to hold my laptop bag/change of clothing/etc. Also it needs to handle decently in yucky weather--I gather you can buy 'snow tires' or some such for the winter? Thanks, peoples!