Branwen daughter of Llyr

I'm actually kind of psyched now. I think my summer will be half-devoted to this part of it. Anyone want to volunteer as a reader?

YOU RULE I may be able to work through TAU (Tel Aviv University) next year, as I'm planning to take Latin there as preparation for languages (they have a decent one year course that should most definitely allow me to place straight in to third or fourth semester Latin in the US). What I'm thinking of doing is indeed expanding the Gawain paper, and inserting scholarship about the welsh / celtic "otherworld" issues that abound in the text (the beheading game, for example). Also, the repeat of 3's, the parallels between the green knight's hunting and the lady's pursuit of Gawain (already in my paper), and a bunch of other "welsh" characteristics. At the moment, I'm searching for a copy that ISN"T TRANSLATED. After all, as an aspiring medievalist, I should probably work with the original text HA! I will also take your advice and contact my alma mater. perhaps they'll let me access stuff remotely. I might be able to find some journals subscribed to online with relevant info. I'm feeling better about this already !! Many thanks to all those who answered and helped me get over my momentary freak-out. You guys are amazing

That's the problem - both papers I'm most proud of and invested the most work in were my honors papers (seminar and thesis). The seminar paper is great - 15 pp of well researched work, got an A - but has NOTHING to do with my field (it's an examination of the work of Joyce Johnson - one of Kerouac's girlfriends, and a writer in her own right - comparing her memoir to a volume of published letters between her and Kerouac) The second is the thesis. Children's lit, proud of it, indeed, worked on the damn thing for three months. However, due to a save snafu back in 2001, only the first half of it is the final version (meaning I'd have to reconstruct the second half anyway, with texts I no longer have and are VERY hard to get). And, it also has very little to do with my main field (despite the Anglo-Welsh angle), and doesn't examine a medieval text. The Gawain paper I'm also proud of (got an A on the paper, last one in my medieval lit class), but it's a 7 pager. I examine a medieval text, but at the close reading level. I don't have any real research into it, references, scholarship involved (unlike the papers above). I actually have about 3-4 medieval lit papers - but all of them are short - 6-7 pages. ARRRRRRRRRRRRRRGH!! *sigh* I'll have to think what to do. Maybe add a stronger thesis to the Gawain paper, and not rely on the close reading only.

Gawain is totally awesome. hrm. I kind of like the idea of expanding the paper (I got an A, originally). Means by betterworldbooks order should be expanded. hmmmmm. It was about undermining chivalry, but I think I can place some interesting additional stuff in there.. I have to re-read it to be sure...

The reason I'm wondering is that so many schools list "try to match your sample to the area you want to study". I HAVE medieval lit papers, but they're short. My honors thesis is primarily about children's lit (modern), while most of my future scholarship will be medieval. The main question is - to strengthen my thesis (a VERY long 45 pager, which needs tightening up and shortening to aim for the 20-25 pp limit) or write new / expand existing (e.g. my Gawain and the Green Knight paper) in the medieval field. Basically, I'm trying to hit for both - a polished, well written paper, in the field (or area of the field) I intend to study. Gawain is actually a good choice, since it's also based on the Celtic-derived stories. So basically it's a toss-up - expand (by quite a bit) and enhance an existing, or shorten (by quite a bit) an existing not quite in the field. Or - write new (not looking forward to that...) GAH.

Oh well, I'll apply to Oxford etc. for post-doc (yummy oxford. I'm such a snob. *sigh*)

This is my next hurdle after taking the subject GRE's in April. Not sure about writing a new one - but I definitely need to strengthen the current one. My honors thesis is actually very close to the field I want to remain in, and although it deals primarily with children's literature, it's Anglo-Welsh children's literature, and the concept of Welsh magic is paramount to the argument (rather than other types of magic). Since I'm a medievalist with strong Celtic interests, I was hoping to keep the writing sample - but improve upon it as much as possible with the limited resources I have here (that's the ONE thing that kills me in Israel - I just can't get my hands on the scholarship). I'll have to order some stuff from amazon and betterworldbooks.com (thank god they have cheap international shipping rates) and see what I can do on my own to make sure my writing sample is "publication-worthy" (although not necessarily published). On the other hand, I keep wondering if I SHOULD re-write the sample completely, and work on actual medieval texts, exploring the influence of Welsh magic ideals in them (i.e. Monmouth, Wace, Layamon, and Mallory). However, that's a piece of scholarship I'm wary of entering into on my own. Obviously, it's a much better "example" of my ability to read and research medieval literature, on the other hand, I have no profs, no resources, no one to help me do it. I'm pretty confident in my abilities, but I'm not cocky - it'll be a TOUGH thing to pull off with no libraries, access to journals, etc. I can get my hands on the texts themselves, and I already have an excellent translation of The Maginogi and a good collection of Celtic Myths and Legends (Peter Berresford Ellis's), but purchasing every piece of scholarship written about them will cost money that I don't really have. Let alone finding the books of "Myth Criticism" (the Jungian approach) and narrative theory that I'm hoping to apply to the subject. Hideous conundrum. Did anyone else write a sample on their own like this? Or did you guys just expand and re-vamp something from school (UG or grad)? I'd really like some advice on this...

appx every two weeks, from what I've heard (I may be wrong - but UVA got my scores in about that time from the day I took the test)

Pretty much need to get above 700 on this to compensate for being away from the field for 9 years... Anyone else registered for the April test?

Pratchett kicks ass . As does Farscape.

Adding congrats !! Stanford has a great overall program (my mom was impressed with it, as was I), and to those who got in - enjoy every minute of it!! (It's been dropped from my list - not enough medieval)

I'm sure that it also helped that I was reading (for pleasure) The Medieval World by Friedrich Heer. LOTS of big words that ETS loves. After that, I moved on to Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond (many big words, and Pulitzer prize winner). I can't emphasize how important the reading part is when studying vocab. Yes. I'm a certified nerd. *sigh*

I can't recommend any courses, but I raised my verbal score (of paramount importance for an English PhD app) from 600 to 720 with the following: Cracking the GRE 2010 edition - Princeton review. Familiarizes you with the test quite well. Barron's 800 Essential GRE words - very very very good. a lot of vocab and root exercises. Kaplan's Advanced Verbal GRE - Also very very good. An additional list of words + lots of very hard exercises. I actually started acing analogies after using this one. Vocaboly - very nice piece of software for improving vocabulary. Includes multiple choice tests, study cards, memory games, and has a LOT of vocab you'll very likely encounter on the test. Reading The Economist and Scientific American articles, dictionary at hand for those words I wasn't sure about. I crammed vocab for about 3 hours a day, for 4 weeks, with an extra push the last weekend before the exam. Good luck!!

I haven't heard from any of my 4. And 3 of them have started sending out acceptances. My cigarette consumption is reaching new heights (between this, job hunting, and translating freelance at odd hours of the night). @Ticklemepink - I'm sure that when I do this again next year I'll be even more of a nervous wreck. After all, I'm fairly sure I'm NOT getting in this year, and I'm still biting my nails waiting for those damn rejections already. Next year, when I'll really be hoping for acceptances, I'm sure I'll be in a much worse state. I will, however, also be much better prepared!! (and possibly more confident...)

:lol: I don't think you denigrated adcoms, nor ivy graduates. And it's not that I don't recognize that it exists (of course it does). I just refuse to give up in advance because of it, and hate to see other people doing so. And truth be told, in a world-wide comparison, all of us, here, are privileged. We are literate. We hold a BA or above. We own a computer. And although may eat ramen noodles quite often (if still in college or immediately post-college), but we eat them three times a day . We are ALL privileged by being able to pursue a PhD. I'm even privileged enough to feed two cats and a dog (and plan to take them with me cross-Atlantic to grad school). Just... keep your chin up, ok?? At the end of the day, we can do what we can do to follow our dreams

The hysterical comment wasn't aimed particularly at you, TC3 . Look - there is an understanding that - yes - adcoms are stressed during apps time. no doubt. and i'm sure that this does occur here or there. But I've been doing a lot of research these past few weeks regarding profs I'd like to work with and where I want to apply for 2011, and some of the most interesting profs got their BA's at state schools, and then went on to top-tier, and one prof at Yale got her PhD from WashU (A great school, mind you, but it's definitely not Ivy). I think my main point here, is don't get discouraged because of the privilege issue. Don't decide to not apply to certain schools because of it. and if you do feel at a disadvantage because of it - work against it! Contact the prof you want to work with, ask questions, show interest, read up on scholarly journals, do what ever you can so that your name is remembered not just as one of the pile. Come fall, I'll be emailing a whole bunch of profs before i send out apps, go to the states and visit the schools and meet with whomever I can. I'm aware that I didn't graduate from an UG Ivy or top-tier. But I refuse to believe that it's going to stop me from going to a fantastic grad school that I have a good fit with, despite the "easy choice" of taking ppl who have graduated from UVA rather than myself. I had terrific profs in undergrad, and the next year will be spent in making my app a hell of a lot more appealing, including taking Latin classes, re-writing my honors thesis, and trying to get my hand on any piece of scholarship in my field I can, while still not in the US or a student (a difficult task). I'm definitely NOT going to give up in advance due to "privilege" nor, do I think, should you or anyone else. After all, if my favorite professor from Undergrad could manage to get into Yale for her PhD in medieval lit in the 60's, being black and from Alabama, I think the rest of us can at least make an effort to try to follow our dreams.

Ok - let me qualify this some: I graduated from a tier-3 school. not terrific, not bad, a HUGE state school, but with a small English dept. However - my 3 LOR writers, profs at the department and whom I worked closely with are well respected scholars in the field - 1 with a PhD from Stanford, 1 with a PhD from WashU, and 1 with a PhD from Northwestern. All of them publish extensively and do interesting research. Graduates from my department HAVE gotten in to several top-tier English PhDs, and although I was encouraged by my LOR writers to "broaden the pool of applications" (which I'm doing next year), none of them stated or even hinted that graduating from my Alma Mater would in any way hurt my chances of getting into Yale, etc. (and they were brutally honest about everything else, including how hard it is to get in anywhere, so apply to quite a few places, job prospects after, I should do it only if I really love it, etc.). I can't imagine that adcoms are SO backwards that they don't look at the total application rather than just where you graduated from. If your LOR writers (even from a less prestigious university) are respected scholars in the field, have good PhD's themselves, research and publish and go to conferences (and there are PLENTY U's that have a terrific English department for undergrad, with great profs), I think that should compensate quite a lot for the Alma mater NOT being a tier-1. Let's not get too hysterical about it, shall we?

The name is from a Welsh legend, yes - one of the four branches of the Mabinogi. (I, however, am not Welsh. Just an aspiring medievalist with strong Celtic tendencies).

I think that if you went back to school and took a bunch of upper level english courses (with great grades and excellent writing samples), got the profs from those classes to write you glowing LORs, then aced the subject and general verbal GRE, wrote a strong, focused SOP, I don't see why they wouldn't take you seriously. If you put in the work to get what you need to apply, they'll see that as dedication. At least I think so. But you'd probably have to take a year or two to prep for it between all the stuff you should prepare. I mean... not EVERYONE knows they want an English PhD while in college - and if you put in the work and effort, it should pay off somewhere. However, i'm not on any adcom anywhere . I do know that most programs accept a few non-English-majors once in a while, if they can prove they're serious about the switch. And if you do the work, and perform well, you're basically doing just that.

I know exactly what you mean. It happens a lot in Israel, as well - "what will you do with a PhD in ENGLISH??" etc. when I say "teach, research, and write" they look at me somewhat goggle eyed. some ppl really can't understand that it takes a whole lot of different folks, passionate about various things, to make up the world. If we didn't pursue our passions, the whole world would be filled with robotic people with no individuality, all aiming to out-do each other in exactly the same things (what ever is considered practical that year, i suppose). After all, without ppl like us, who would teach Shakespeare? Critical reading? Writing excellent compositions?

I've had some genuine questions about it (like the one above - I didn't feel like it was a de-legitimizing question, just a curious person who has no knowledge of the field), but also some silly ones. I try to be patient with both. Anyhow, the silly questioners get scared off and blank expressions with glazed eyes when I start REALLY getting into my research ideas (or blathering on about a specific passage in The Merchant of Venice or some other text). Genuinely interested people may actually enjoy it. But hey - they asked?? I'll ANSWER.

Hey Shepherd, There are a few paths - certificate programs (there are a few decent ones online), applying to ALL jobs that don't require too much experience except "good English writing skills" (I was lucky - that's how I got into the field - got hired as a translator for specification papers, and then remained to continue documenting the software), and there are also a few tech writing degrees out there (I'd say they were pretty unnecessary, others may not agree with me). Of course - make sure that you have a GOOD vibe with techie stuff. I used to be a network admin a few years ago, so I had the background. But you have to understand technical terminology and how to write it. Read a lot of Microsoft's help books. Technical writing has a certain style, or art to it. create a GREAT writing sample. Take a piece of software, and write a User Manual for a particular module / operation. Create a good template, insert screenshots, tips, etc. Get someone to proofread it, and use it to sell your writing when applying for jobs (hope this helped - I'm a tech writer in Israel, so I know the market here - also not many fluent english writers here - I know a BIT about tech writer's in the states, but not a whole lot)

There is plenty left to explore. I incorporated theory not necessarily related to "Celtic medieval" to explain how welsh magic enables protagonists to change their subject positions. I used a mish-mash of medieval-related theory, carnival related theory, and children's lit theory to write my honors thesis - I was also lucky to have an amazing advisor who was VERY familiar with all of the above. There wasn't a lot of scholarship for my particular field, so I had to stretch and find correlations that weren't specific to children's lit and / or medieval Celtic. It was a blast, and I loved it so much, that I'll probably end up staying on the same track in grad

oh my oh my oh my. Congrats Yale acceptances!! I'm envious as all hell, and hope to see you in 2011!! (no need to share stats, but sub-fields could be nice....)

Dude, they know how old you are from your applications. I wrote my date of birth on each and every one. I would be only be concerned about the facebook thing if you posted drunk photos of yourself or spend your time insulting other ppl, writing profanity, or generally having a jerry-springer-type profile. If the profile represents you as a balanced human being with a variety of interests, you should be fine.