Joan Callamezzo
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Posts posted by Joan Callamezzo
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You can upload word documents into the google drive, and then open them as google docs from the drive. That way you can sort of toggle between formats. Worst case scenario you can always just manually type in your footnotes..
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If you're interested in the "socio-historical context of architecture" you should really consider an art history program. You will probably only have to take one semester/quarter of methodology course work, and if you're at one of the serious architecture programs (like Harvard or MIT) you can take your exams on architectural topics. I'm very familiar with the field, and I'm not sure that someone from one of the programs you've named would be competitive against a Harvard or MIT history of architecture PhD. The people hiring architectural historians are primarily art history departments and architecture and design schools. They like Art History PhDs.
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On 3/23/2016 at 4:58 PM, betsy303 said:
Do the MA if you don't have at least broader sense of what your research interests are. This top 5, 10, prestige game is utterly atrocious. I couldn't go to a top 5, and potentially a 10, simply because those programs do not have specialists in my area. The 2 that did - one prof is no longer accepting students and one won't for another 5-7 years. Hence, you can't always put your life on hold, take out debt, etc for something that may or may not happen. Applying to programs with faculty who could create interesting multidisciplinary thesis committee should be the top priority.
I'm sorry, but this is really bad advice. All of your posts to this forum about how allegedly terrible "top" programs are do not ring true and just make it seem like you are trying to justify your own choices/program. There is nothing "atrocious" about going to a top school. There are plenty of opportunities at Harvard, Princeton, Yale, etc to put together "interesting multidisciplinary thesis committees." Maybe in the 80s and 90s the top programs were academically conservative, but that is certainly not the case anymore.
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On 3/3/2016 at 4:25 PM, jujujudadada said:
I think this would be very helpful and would like to contribute!
Also, I have a question: Are PhD stipends taxable? If yes, how much tax is usually applied to the stipend? Does international students pay as much tax as U.S. citizens?
Yes they are taxable. The rate varies by state and residency. You need to check to see whether or not your school deducts taxes from your stipend. If they don't you will need to declare the stipend amount as "other income" when you file your taxes. There will be someone at your university who can work with you on this.
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3 hours ago, MaytheSchwartzBeWithYou said:
Ah, well. Thanks for the info. :-)
I don't want to get your hopes up, but I wouldn't totally write off Bryn Mawr yet. Maybe this year is different, but in the past they have notified really, really late and by snail mail. I applied last year and I didn't get my acceptance letter until mid March (around the 15th maybe?) and there was no admitted students day. Again, this year could be different..
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5 hours ago, betsy303 said:
I would say this list is relatively reasonable. https://web.archive.org/web/20120516074401/http://arthistorynewsletter.com/blog/?p=5204 However, as the astute poster above remarked, I would probably change the 10-20 grouping a tad. Places like UW-Madison, Michigan and Stanford, also have some fairly top notch history and English departments, PACKED with eminent scholars. For that reason (along with some newbies at some of those places), I'd place them above a place like Santa Barbara (so sad what is going on with the UC funding situation). Granted, this assumes they are willing to take on new students, participate in advising committees, etc. CUNY and Stanford also have some rockstars in 20th century. I wish there was something divided into sub-specialities-- i.e 20th century, places dealing with visual culture/visual studies, middle ages, etc.
IMO that list is pretty dated, plus Harvard is way too low and Berkeley is way too high. The fact that Berkeley always comes out on top of this lists makes me really question what kind of matrix they are using. Berkeley has great placement, but a very precarious funding situation, that is not competitive with Harvard, Yale, Columbia or IFA.
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German is relevant to essentially every field of Art History because the discipline started in Germany. It's certainly relevant to renaissance and baroque, and you will have a hard time doing historiographical work and taking your exams without it. I wouldn't worry about not having when you apply though, you can work on it during your first couple years.
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I have no personal experience, but I have a friend who was accepted and chose to attend a different school. Her main issue (which is confirmed by their website) is that they seem to place very regionally, and at fairly low-tier schools and institutions. For whatever reason the program does not much national recognition. So if you really want to stay in the south it might be a good fit - if not, I'd look elsewhere.
Looking at their website, they only offer 3-4 grad seminars a semester, which honestly is not ideal. They do seem to be heavily geared towards medieval/early modern though, so that's good for you. However - I have to give *major* side-eye to their ZERO non-western offerings. It looks like they have specialists in andean archeology and african art, but they haven't taught classes the last two years.. Medieval and early modern are rapidly becoming cross-cultural disciplines, and you will have difficulty on the job market if you can't show that you're taking part in those conversations. Ideally you'd want to be able to take classes in Islamic and transatlantic topics.
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16 hours ago, betsy303 said:
I'm going to echo what has been said here. The job market that requires PhDs in the art historical is fierce. More so than the name of your institution, is the word of your advisor. He/She will be the one who helps you find a job in your area and provide you with support throughout the program. If he/she can't support you now, why would he/she be able to support you during the program or when you look for a job? A famous advisor is great! However, not if it comes with someone who won't routinely support, or worse, someone who is antagonistic. I have heard many stories about these advisers who for whatever reasons have actually gone and written "negative" letters. The last thing you need is someone who isn't 100% supportive or only pulls through for you at the last minute....
Disagree here. There is no reason an advisor needs to be "supporting" you during the application process. The odds of each applicant who reaches out to a POI actually attending the program are low - most applicants won't be accepted into the program, and of those who are accepted many will choose to attend other programs. It doesn't make sense for advisors to get overly invested, even if they really do like an applicant and want to work with them. You can't expect an advisor to court you - maybe some people have this experience after they've been accepted and are deciding between multiple offers, but not as a perspective applicant.
I am a little surprised at some of these comments. What OP has described is a normal to above-average level of response from a POI. As someone said above, just apply to the school, visit if you are accepted and make your decision then. It is not possible to get a good idea of someone's personality or character from these types of communications. When I was applying to PhD programs it was actually the prof who was the most receptive and welcoming to me that turned out to be a HUGE asshole, while my current advisor (who didn't even respond to my inquiry) is the greatest mentor I could ever ask for.
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Heh. To be honest this sounds like typical senior faculty behavior. A lot of amazing profs get to where they are by being greedy with their time and generally not paying attention to anything/one they can get away with ignoring. Sure there are some amazing, hands-on professors who genuinely love working with students, but they seem to be the exception rather than the rule. The fact that he would even agree to email you back - let alone *speak* to you - is actually a pretty good sign. I'm not sure what your undergrad background was like, but a lot of students (myself included) are given a rude awakening when they realize that PhD advisors are not like liberal arts school advisors. A lot of them just really cannot and will not be bothered. And you will learn that it actually isn't bad, and you'll become more independent and grateful of the attention that you do receive from your advisor. I can barely get my advisor to respond to my emails, but I wouldn't trade him for the world, because he is an incredible scholar and always comes through for me when I need him. If you want to work with a big name professor you are more than likely going to have to put up with a big ego.
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Is that from the Art History website or the grad school website? Those are very, almost arbitrarily high cut offs. I'm actually pretty shocked. Especially the AWA score, considering that part of the test is an absolute farce. I wouldn't really worry too much about it. I didn't apply to Columbia, but I scored lower than you and still got into multiple ivy/top 10 programs. The GRE can make or break you when it comes to qualifying for university wide funding at schools that don't guaranteed fellowships, but otherwise it means almost nothing.
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Where did you get this list? I don't think its accurate at all. I don't think a single Art History faculty member would say that Princeton is the top program. I'm not even sure if Princeton would say they are the top program (they are having a LOT of problems lately). The top ten is right more or less, but I would disagree on the order. I also think Penn and especially Stanford should be much higher, and Wisconsin much lower. WashU has great placement, but its such a different sort of program that I'm not even sure you can rank it with traditional AH depts.
Long story short - it's weird list. I wouldn't let this have any sort of real bearing on how you make your program choices.
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Wisconsin, Delaware, SMU, Syracuse, Tufts, UC Riverside, Washington and Oregon are a few that come to mind. I highly doubt they fully fund *all* students, but I know these schools have at least 1 or 2 funded MA spots.
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13 hours ago, drugazi said:
The three CC profs I named all make well in excess of $100k. Since they're public employees, feel free to look them up. (http://transparentcalifornia.com/salaries/cerritos-college/). And I'm not sure why you think they're poor profs just because they're at CCs? I named these people, because I work for them... which was my point as to why I know about CGU.
That is not how I was using the word "poor." For someone posting on a forum about attending graduate school in literature your reading comprehension leaves something to be desired.
- dr. t and ExponentialDecay
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On 11/29/2015 at 11:22 AM, drugazi said:
I didn't name any adjuncts
Maybe not "adjuncts," but the first three on your list work at CCs (that was as far as I went). Also - a classy and collegial move on your part to associate these poor profs' names with the weird point you are trying to prove on the internet.
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19th century American art is not as "common" as say contemporary or early modern, but it's still a huge field, especially in the US. As far as the 18th/19th century goes, you will find the most professors specializing in French, the fewest in British, and American falling somewhere in between. American art is a pretty popular and well-funded field, I'd be curious to see where you're looking and turning up empty handed, because I can think of several programs just off the top of my head (and it isn't even my field).
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Try and use your contacts to get a feel for what your POIs respond best/worst to. Even better if you have a professor or colleague who can "introduce" you over email.
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Well 99% of professors (or at least it seems) wait until the absolute last second to write/submit letters, so I would not worry too much about it. This is a busy time of year, and while it isn't ideal to ask for an LOR 3 wks in advance, it's really not so bad. My mom is a professor and she gets requests all the time to write letters less than a week in advance. Just be very courteous and make sure to give them an out in case they really can't do it.
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What would be your end game with a Visual Studies degree? It's such a niche field with virtually no job prospects. It would be more prudent to choose a field within "art history" proper and then focus on visual studies within that discipline. I wouldn't worry too much about not having a formal art history background. Plenty of students in top art history programs were not AH majors.
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You will definitely want to look into the Aga Khan program at both Harvard and MIT. I think they are the best/only places to study modern/contemporary middle east arch.
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8 hours ago, knp said:
re: Joan Callamezzo
Do you advise all prospective graduate school applicants that they should get an MA before applying to PhDs? I'm happy to investigate them if I strike out on PhDs this cycle. I can see how the post you just quoted could be interpreted to sound like I would never consider one, but that isn't true. There is no master's program I would choose next year over keeping my job and paying down my existing student debts, but I'm open to the possibility if I do another round of applications and one of them offers me funding.
This is all with the possible exception of Washington, because of its weird structure, but I seem to go back and forth on that one every week. But thank you for the information! I guess it's time to send off another round of emails to my contacts there, since my first set must have gotten lost in a sea of inbox junk somewhere.
I mean this is just my personal opinion (so it may be totally worthless!!) but I think everyone should get a *funded* (or budget friendly) MA before they do the PhD. Sure there are some people who finish their ivy league undergrad Phi Beta Kappa and fluency in 4 languages, but most of us still need to build our CVs after graduation. An MA is the perfect opportunity to pick up a language or two, present at conferences, build up a network of contacts and develop a much more focused and advanced writing sample. It might also be the difference between getting into a top 25 school and getting into your first choice, top 5 school.
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On 10/18/2015, 7:40:31, knp said:
Hello! Time to ask a question of the collective wisdom. Do you know of any historians who work on colonial language issues? Any region of the world is fine. I'm looking to expand my list of applications by one or two, so I'm searching for history professors who study colonial language. If I then research the department and find someone else who works on my region, that's a strong case for adding it to my currently too-short list of programs.
Unfortunately, the only program I know of that fits this two-person relevance model is Washington. Vicente Rafael's books are the sort of thing I'm talking about, and they have interesting professors in my region, too! Problem: Washington requires an MA for admittance to the PhD, and I do not have an MA. Nor do I want one. I guess I'm open to considering that path if I strike out on PhDs this cycle, but for now, that requirement's a problem.
Thanks in advance!
Kind of a late reply to your question... but I have a family member who went to the UW and I am all too familiar with their admissions policies. They require an MA to be admitted to the PhD program, but will admit you into the MA program with only a BA. Admittance to the MA does not mean you will be accepted into the PhD, some professors let their students straight into the PhD, but others will make you reapply to the program with the first time applicants. You will still have to do the PhD coursework once you have finished the MA. Some advisors also make their students wait to apply to the PhD after they have completed the MA, resulting in a gap year between the programs. It's a confusing and inconsistent system.
You should also rethink why it is that you do not want to get an MA. It will only make you a better, more prepared scholar.
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With the exception of the professors I spoke with over email or the phone, I did not read anyone's research that I mentioned in my SoP. Really, if a professor reads your SoP and denies you because you mentioned him in an outdated context ("The audacity of this applicant: I haven't published about Milton in 20 years!"), that professor probably isn't great advisor material.
Think of it this way: naming professors is one method of showing fit, and within that method, there are different approaches. Unless you commit a grievous error, I can't see naming a professor as being the criteria that keeps you out or gets you in. Do what works with your application and the narrative you're putting forth in your SoP.
Glad this worked out for you and that you were able to find a program that you are happy at, but I don't think this is good advice. How can you know if a professor is a good fit for you if you don't read their research? I don't think I would be comfortable basically signing away the next 4-8 years of my life to work with a person whose work I don't know. I also think it could convey a lack of preparedness on the part of the applicant.
- EmmaJava and random_grad
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I use zotero because its free and easy to use, but I find it can be pretty buggy in MS Word.