Dr. Old Bill

Interesting! I'd teach if I couldn't research. In fact, it was only about a year ago that I officially decided to go the distance and get my Ph.D., rather than stop at an M.A. and try to find work at a community college or something. I really love research, and getting lost in a project and having brilliant conversations with other well-read and interesting people is extremely appealing to me. However, my core impulse is to pass on knowledge, kind of like a perpetual "pay it forward" scenario. It doesn't mean that I don't want to write great papers and books and be a guest lecturer in the future, but if I had a gun to my head telling me to choose between teaching and researching, I'm pretty sure I'd choose the former (if I couldn't manage to spring Bond-like into action and wrench the gun from that lunatic's hands, of course).

Yeah, I think finding ways to rebut the views of other critics is an important skillset for a future academic. In fact, my WS rebuffs a POI at one of the places I'm applying to...twice! I shouldn't be framed like "Dr. Inglehoffer is an idiot for thinking that [insert idiotic supposition here]," of course. I tend to frame my rebuttals in a "credit-where-credit-is-due...but" way, like: "While [critic] is correct in assuming that [some factoid about some literary work], his work does not consider the possibility that [some new and exciting factoid of your own]." One of my favorite papers took a claim by a certain highly regarded, oft-cited literary critic from the sixties that one of Shakespeare's sonnets was like a particular Horatian ode, and I turned it on its head, pointing out a bunch of reasons the sonnet is not, in fact, like that Horatian ode. The key is making sure your tone is not remotely snide, and completely scholarly...otherwise it comes across as if you think you know better than an esteemed critic, rather than pointing out a flaw in an otherwise consistent assertion. Most arguments have flaws, and it typically makes for a fine paper indeed if you can find and rebut those flaws.

I bet those sentences were full of big words, like "The juxtaposition of the integration of the secular and the sacrosanct coincides with the obsequious perspicacity of the assorted monastic colloquia of which the latter is comprised and the former eschews." You know, the more instances I hear like this, the better I feel...even though I already know that the GRE isn't a big factor. It still looms large, no matter how much one tries to reason it away, so hearing "meh GRE, good admittance" examples is somewhat soul-assuaging.

I feel like that little asthmatic kid who watches through the chain-link fence as all the cool kids play baseball. Yep, in my world, Medieval studies is a game of baseball with friends, and Poetics is an asthma inhaler.

Unraed, you're making me want to become a Medievalist!

If it's any consolation, my proposed specialization is poetry and poetics, yet looking at some of the questions on practice exams makes my blood run cold, even though I've studied a lot of major works (all of Shakespeare's sonnets, all of Paradise Lost, a large chunk of Canterbury Tales etc.) and have a healthy knowledge of a large swath of shorter works and one-offs. Seriously, if you know half of the answers on the test, and make educated (hell, even uneducated) guesses on the rest, you're probably going to do well enough. And as others have pointed out elsewhere, you can see some old GC threads where people say they bombed the GRE lit test (I distinctly remember one forum member saying she was in 18th percentile) and still got into Princeton or another top-tier school (I know I've seen this at least twice in old threads, so a quick search might not be a bad idea). The goal is to do the best you can, of course, so study hard...but don't stress too much, because a lot of it is just plain out of your control, and it might not have a major impact on you either way.

Well, this thread has been up and reply-less for over 24 hours, so I'll chime in. For what it's worth, I'm not sure memorization will be all that helpful for the GRE lit test. A lot of folks here (Lyonessrampant in particular) have commented at length about effective study techniques, as well as the Vade Mecum and Hapax Legomena sites and their flashcards etc. And when it comes to poetry, memorization of individual poems strikes me as well-intentioned, but misguided. Out of 230 questions that could be derived from literally thousands of works of literature and poetry, trying to memorize even a large chunk of poems is still in needle-in-the-haystack territory. What might be more helpful is making note of stylistic differences. If you know that Donne uses conceits, and is quite haphazard with his poetic meter, then when you come across lines talking about a face reflected in a teardrop, or love being like a compass, you can safely fill in that particular bubble. You don't have to know the poems themselves to make an educated guess -- you just have to know that Donne was weird like that. Likewise, if you see a sonnet with a rhyme scheme of ABABCDCDEFEFGG and it seems to be dealing with a young man, disreputable lady, or has various flower / canker analogies in it, then dollars to donuts, it's Shakespeare. And when it comes to interpretations of words or lines, memorization simply won't help you. In short, it's best to get the gist of how certain poems write -- if they're closely associated with a particular form or meter (i.e., know your Spenserian stanzas, know what the two main sonnet forms look like, know how certain poets like to indent their lines etc.), then get a sense of that. And if the oft-mentioned "Cracking the GRE" book is any guide, be sure you can at least eliminate one candidate from the five options so that you can made a somewhat educated guess. As for a Greek Mythology website...I'm actually not sure. There are probably many out there, though I don't believe Greek Mythology plays a significant role in the GRE lit test. I've taken several classics courses myself, and am quite well acquainted with a lot of Greek myths personally, but I haven't come across a lot in my study as yet (though a practice question did allude to Cerberus). But I wouldn't sweat it too much.

Ah, I'm glad you chimed in, Cloudofunknowing. I was starting to wonder if I was speaking gibberish. Perhaps I should have avoided using the word "pedagogy" and just used the more pedestrian "teaching" instead. Yes, you address exactly what I am getting at, really. There are a few institutions (I won't name names) that I have quietly taken off my list because they clearly devalue the teaching aspect of graduate school. I want to avoid programs that make it seem as though teaching is a chore, or penance, or even just the "downside" of attending a particular institution. I am exceptionally eager to do the kind of research that I want to do. I can't emphasize that enough. But honestly, when I first started down this path a few years ago, my guiding instinct was that I wanted to teach. Along the way, I've realized that my scholarly interests have evolved to the point where they are almost as considerable as my pedagogical interests...but not quite. I'm looking forward to the first day I get to stand in front of a class and get to know the various students, and eventually get to know their minds, and how they write. Anyhow, I'm just interested in the various perspectives on this here.

Well, I tried to explain what I mean in the first post, though admittedly most folks will just see the poll question and vote based on that. What I'm looking for here is simply whether there is a stronger leaning toward the teaching side of scholarship or the research side -- both during grad school, and beyond. The two, of course, go hand in hand, but I'm trying to establish if current GCers prefer the prospect of teaching, or the prospect of spending lots of time doing research. As mentioned above, I enjoy research a great deal, but I'm probably even more excited about the prospect of teaching in my second or third year.

Yeah. Seriously. I'm not joking when I say how amazed I am by this information. It really blows my mind, and I have to wonder if adcomms know. If so, that could be why I've heard (albeit apocryphally) that the AW score isn't really considered. As mentioned above, I thought my first AW attempt was leaps and bounds better than my second AW attempt, yet both wound up with the same score. It's probably because my ratio of "big words" remained consistent. Perhaps if I'd focused more on using bloated words rather than creating readable essays, I would have done better. O brave new world that has such [computers] in 't!

Hey folks, One thing I've noticed while looking through both old and recent Grad Cafe threads is that a lot of graduate school hopefuls (comp/rhet track excluded, of course) seem to value research opportunities over teaching opportunities. I wonder if this is truly the case. Personally, I'm far more interested in teaching down the road, with research being a by-product (an enjoyable by-product, but not my primary interest). I suspect a lot of you are more oriented toward research first, with teaching being a by-product (enjoyable or otherwise). Is this the case?

I have nothing to add really, other than to say that I have also had pangs of "imposter syndrome," and until this thread, assumed it was just me. It's not that I don't think I'm capable of working at the same scholarly level as others, but more a case of constantly realizing that as much as I've already learned, there's so much left to learn...and some of what's left to learn has already been learned by others in a similar situation as me. Fortunately, knowledge is an almost infinite fount, which means that even the people who have learned the things you haven't learned probably have gaps when it comes to things you have learned that they haven't. All-in-all, it's really like golf. You can't really concern yourself with others, as you can only control the things that are in your own power. And if you're writing interesting material, and have moderately interesting research objectives, you're certainly not an imposter, regardless of the occasional pangs.

Ho lee crap. Mind: blown. Seriously, this disturbs, nauseates, and even slightly angers me...yet also shouldn't really surprise me, given that ETS is pretty much soulless anyhow. I'm willing to bet that anyone who strings together a bunch of highfalutin' vocab words and manages to type out nine or ten paragraphs per AW section will wind up getting at least a 4, if not a 5 (or a 6, if the ETS human decides to flick the "autopilot" switch).

Well, don't forget that both Hapax Legomena and Vade Mecum can help with that too! Good luck either way. I'm still slacking on my GRE lit prep, which concerns me a bit with my next semester starting next Thursday...

That's great, Eyepod, and I truly agree with the "you can't study for the verbal" sentiment to some degree. I know others disagree, and it is all relative (i.e., you can always improve the breadth of your vocabulary at least, which helps), but the wide variance in practice test scores seems to bear out the difficulty, at least, of studying for the verbal. I've mentioned it elsewhere, but the first time I took the GRE, I didn't study much, and got a 162 verbal. Pretty good...not excellent, but probably good enough for most, if not all institutions to at least let the rest of my application be considered (i.e., probably wouldn't keep me out of any "first cull" system). But I wanted to take it again for various reasons (specifically because I thought I could improve my AW as well as my verbal score). I studied quite a bit for the second sitting, and was getting 168 and 167 scores on the practice tests, so I figured I could at least pull off a 164 or so on the real test. Nope. 159. There's not much I can say as to why. I had a rough start to the day which kind of set me off on the wrong foot, but in terms of preparation, I was far more prepared than the first time around, yet wound up doing slightly worse on the V and the Q, and equal on the AW. Even though this is a "small sample size," so to speak, I nevertheless deduce that while studying probably helps overall, it's just not a good enough analog for the real test to make it worth a huge chunk of your time. In fact, there's a small part of me that is tempted to go back yet again -- completely without advance studying -- to give it a third shot. I'm not going to, since there are money and distance factors, and since my scores probably pass enough muster to keep me in the running for all of my applications...but since I do have a very large vocabulary, and use many, if not most of those "GRE words" in papers and conversation on a regular basis, it's tempting... That's very interesting. I hadn't heard that before. Do you mind sharing where you learned that?

Sure thing, Boomah. Here's a screenshot of my combined syllabi spreadsheet from my Spring semester. I typically "bolded and blued" the assignments on their due dates (though I see I forgot to do that for the essay on March 20th. Oops.) Awesome! I'll drop you a PM.

Ha! Yes indeed! It may have been slightly more prudent to wait awhile longer, but I'm happy with both my SOP and WS, and neither institution needed the GRE subject test...so I went ahead and did it! Yale and Cornell's admissions sites are technically open as well, so I've done all I can with those...but they require the subject test, so I'm not going to officially apply until I can plug those scores into the appropriate boxes. I emailed an admin person at Yale about whether or not I should submit and just skip filling out the scores, since they'll receive them anyhow, but she (rightly) pointed out that the application window is open for four more months, so I might as well just wait to avoid any technicalities. And don't think a tiny, overzealous part of me didn't think about hitting "submit" anyhow....

Sure...here you go. The picture shows the Psychology test, but all the information refers to the English Lit test...go figure.

Jhefflol has some great advice there. Just a few thoughts to add... First, you've identified four areas for improvement, and indeed, those are four areas you need to improve. As Jhefflol says, writing papers the night before can be done (some people work best with an imminent deadline), but results may vary. This leads into the one big thing that simply isn't stressed enough in undergrad: TIME MANAGEMENT. Right from the first day of classes (and preferably before), you should be assembling your syllabi / reading lists and forming a plan for the semester. As an undergrad, I've always taken all of my syllabi and created a master spreadsheet with deadlines for all papers and readings for each of my clases by date. It takes a couple of hours or so to assemble the spreadsheet, and things change throughout the semester, but having everyting on one or two sheets of paper (virtual or otherwise) is extremely helpful. I'm a particularly slow reader, I think. Close-reading something like Coriolanus or a book of Paradise Lost can take me the bulk of a day. Yet I've never not done the reading, no matter how many courses I'm enrolled in or daunting the material is. This is because I'm constantly looking at what needs to be done weeks in advance, and forming a plan of attack. It doesn't take as much time to form such a plan as you might expect. It's just a case of being aware of what's on the horizon and not having the little "oh s***t!" moments when you realize that some big reading is due the next day. And one final general comment. Be mature, and be an adult about things. This, too, seems to be an underrated -- yet essential -- element of students entering grad school. In undergrad, professors generally expect that there are some frathouse shenanigans going on, with many students having the freedom to fool around and straddle the boundaries between responsibility and irresponsibility. But when you're a graduate student, there's not a lot of leeway for that sort of behavior. You're expected to be professional, and ultimately a scholar-in-training, if not a scholar in fact. This advice might not be specific to the field of literature, but it is no less important for that.

Now that is a good question. You might want to frame it like this: "While I was researching the program at [institution x] and your own research specifically, I happened to notice that you referenced an article of mine in one of your courses. As it happens, I have been continuing my research on [topic x], and am currently at the point of looking at graduate schools -- including [institution x] to take this research to the next level." Or something like that. That's how I would do it, at least. There's always a fine line between coming across as obsequious and coming across as an interested prospective colleague, but so long as you keep the email geared primarily toward your research and scholarship, then it's going to be in line with what most of this professor's current colleagues send her. I think POIs see through fawning emails where a candidate goes on and on about how "I'd really love to work with you because your article on blah blah blah changed my life!" In simplest terms, don't come across as a fan, but rather someone who is on your way to becoming an equal. And ultimately, write with confidence. You're not on her level yet, but you're at least on the path to being on her level. Her path has probably been somewhat similar, and so all but the most stuffy and pretentious of professors will scoff and find it unworthy of their time to communicate with a "lowly M.A. student." I really don't think that will be the case with this POI of yours. Completely for what it's worth, I contacted a POI at a well-regarded institution about a month ago, primarily because no other graduate students or faculty members were working on anything close to his -- and my -- research interests, so I wanted to feel out the fit of the program in general. His response was long and thorough, commending me for reaching out to him, and even going so far as to ask me to let him know when I submit my application so that he can flag it for the DGS. That was obviously far more than I had hoped or expected for when I sent the email -- I literally just wanted to get his thoughts on the department! -- but it means that for whatever it may be worth (and it may not be much), there's someone at that institution who is "in my corner," so to speak. It will probably amount to nothing, yet being noticed for one's mutual research interests certainly can't hurt. And the same will undoubtedly be true for you as well.

First of all...welcome! Second of all...wow, that's fantastic! And third of all...yes, I would definitely reach out to that professor. Since you're already on her map to some degree, it shouldn't be all that awkward, so long as you actually have something to ask her. For instance, a good reason to contact a professor would be to get an opinion on how supported her research is at the institution, and whether or not there are others in the department who would be amenable to your research interests...then go on to talk a bit about what your focus would be if you were admitted to that school. Professors can be hit or miss about getting back to you (and you should never take it personally if they simply don't get back to you), but if you have demonstrated that you are writing at such a level that an active professor is citing/using your work, I certainly can't see the harm, while the upside is...well...potentially huge! Not huge enough to count on getting admitted to that program, but big enough to warrant maybe a little more hope than you might have had otherwise. Either way, this is a great opportunity to utilize your past scholarship to make a viable connection...which is what you'll be doing for the rest of your career, if all goes according to plan. Good luck, and be sure to let us know if and how she responds!

Bumping this thread up for this year's crop of applicants, since the second post is amazing and invaluable for those concerned about funding packages for various institutions. I was surprised to see some solid funding packages for a few of the smaller U of C schools, and also surprised at a few numbers (high and low) for other programs.

No worries! I took the heretofore unheard-of, self-serving approach and upvoted myself on your behalf. One thing I neglected to elaborate on is the time factor Like Francophile1 states, it truly makes it more difficult. And even when you sit here, reading those words, you don't automatically make that connection. Half an hour seems like a reasonable amount of time, but once you get in there, even if you're not the type of person who clams up under pressure (I'm not), the clock on the top right corner of the screen inexorably ticks away. There's the option of hiding it, of course, but that makes it even worse, because then half of your mind starts thinking about the time, and usually overcompensates, making you go even faster than you need to. So yes, time is key, and even when you have the time management tips of Princeton Review, Kaplan etc. in mind, there's just no way around the fact that you have to read a few paragraphs you've never read before -- one of which is riddled with logical fallacies, while the other is extremely open-ended -- and write about them at length. Sometimes they're based on science, sometimes they're based on politics, sometimes they're based on economics...but you're probably not going to luck out and get one right in your wheelhouse. So you're left with thirty minutes to read something new, analyze it, either figure out the most flaws possible or a definitive approach to a vague question (depending on the section), then write confidently about it. In other words, just to reiterate, it's not like writing a college paper, where you have the luxury of time for research, thesis development, and revision. The one thing I will say is that Queennight made a post a couple of months or so ago about her experiences with taking the GRE. She suspected that creativity went a long way in helping her perfect AW score, as she figured that the ETS staff readers must get so bored with reading all of the mini-essays that they probably just blend together...so writing something creatively might make them sit up and take notice. So if she's right, then perhaps if you're faced with a question about how a new bathroom cleanser should be used in elementary schools, talk about camel-riding space aliens and just figure out some way to tie it back to the matter at hand.

Honestly, there's not a lot you can do to prepare for this section other than read some past examples of questions and work on your critical thinking skills on the fly. The first time I took the GRE general, I got a 4.5 on the AW section, and was quite annoyed about it. I truly expected to have at least a 5, and in my heart of hearts thought I would have gotten a 6. And that 4.5 was the primary reason why I went back to retake the GRE, even though I know it's not a huge factor in decisions. Well, the second time I took it, even after reading a GRE prep book and studying a hell of a lot harder than the first time, proved even more of a challenge...especially the AW portion. I didn't wind up making a cogent argument until at least 15 minutes into the 30 minutes allotted for the first portion. I felt I probably had a 3 on that at best. The next question was a little better, but still not great. I figured I may have gotten a 4.5 on that one. So I was actually a bit surprised that my AW score was once again a combined 4.5 when I got my results back. Most of us here are surely very-good-to-excellent-writers. It's what we do. A B+ on a paper for us is like a C on a paper for others. But the AW is honestly not about "good writing." I'm serious -- it's not! It's more about coming up with as many problems with a particular chunk of text as possible (for one section), and developing a germ of an idea -- no matter how valid -- in the other. If you write well enough and make no spelling / grammatical errors, you're probably always going to get a 4.0 or above. And from what I've heard / read, the AW score, if it is even looked at, receives less weight than the verbal...which itself is often more of a "checklist" item. Bottom line: study however you can, but certainly do not fret about it. There are too many other elements of the application worth fretting over (namely the WS and SOP) to waste excessive time worrying about the AW section of the GRE, I assure you.

Well, both papers seem to match up well with your SOP and propsed course of study, so that's obviously a good thing right off the bat. To my non-adcomm, non-admitted, non-graduate eye, it strikes me that your second, paper, the one on female perspectives in early modern plays, sounds more adcomm-friendly than the other given the programs you are applying to. Theoretical approaches are like catnip to a lot of professors, and historical women's studies applied to literature is definitely the kind of subject that appeals to a large swath of professors as well. The first paper focuses on one play in particular, which might be a little too narrow. Then again, the biggest factors seem to be that it matches your stated interests, is well-written, and piques the interest of one or more adcomm members. Two of those things are wholly within your power, while the third can be largely in your power if you do enough research into POIs at the various programs you apply to. Personally, I tailor my SOP to each institution, with the third (or fourth) paragraph being almost completely dedicated to fit with the program and various professors. This seems to be what most (but not all) folks do, and it just makes sense. Ultimately you may find it more beneficial to use both writing samples in tandem, depending on which one seems to mesh most closely with a given program. Just make sure your papers are interesting (particularly the first ten pages), well-argued, well-written, and dovetail with the interests of various POIs at your chosen programs. Good luck!