Warelin

I'd like to add a small note here that a lot of programs that consider you for their master's program are unfunded ones or ones where funding is very competitive at the MA level. Several programs that come to mind are Colorado, Chicago, Carnegie Mellon, Rochester and SUNY Buffalo.
 

Some programs that come to mind:
Michigan Tech's Visual Theory Culture Program
Clemson's Rhetorics, Communication and Information Design Program
Texas Tech's Technical Communication and Rhetoric Program

North Carolina State's Communication, Rhetoric, and Digital Media Program

Florida State's Rhetoric and Composition Program
I wouldn't worry about finding programs in the same exact time period as you are as long as you can find other faculty members working in the same time period. The goal of most professors isn't to create an replica of themselves and their research.

No need to apologize. This forum was made to be used! Questions are good. 

There are some departments that would welcome a visit. However, it is my understanding that most will not entertain a visit to the department until after you've been accepted. I think the reason behind this is two-fold:

1) They want to remain as objective as they can

2) A visit from a prospective student would mean they'd have to open up the option to everyone and would disrupt the flow of the office. Professors would get bombarded with requests with students hoping to sit in on a lecture. There would need to be enough spaces to accommodate a couple of extra people each class session. Undergrads and Grads might have less access to office hours if prospective students wanted to talk to professors. There might also be concern from campus security due to the extra people and legal concerns if said persons got hurt. 
Unless the department says so on their website, I would not try to set up any appointments to visit the department. 

Programs will only accept you if they believe you can succeed. They will not accept you if they do not 100 percent believe that you would succeed in their program.

Small note here: Unless it's changed this year, PSU only grants a B10 Fee Waiver to applicants who don't have a Master's degree.

Have you found articles that you've read in class whose topic or methodology interest you? Look where that author works.  If the university has a PHD program, talk about what you find interesting about their work.

Have you looked at schools that have 2-3 Cultural Anthropologists interested in Asia or Sexuality?

What is making you interested in obtaining a PHD?

I'd also like to add that Washington University in St. Louis' English department is very interdisciplinary and has close connections to the American Culture studies program in which you can get a certificate in AC. The American Culture studies program has concentrations in Popular Culture and students in the English department have been able to propose and teach courses in multiple subjects, including Comic Studies.

The subject test is weighed differently depending on the school and what your area of interest in. A lot of schools will place less weight on it if your major area of interest isn't one that's coverered by the Subject Test. At some Public Schools, there might be additional funding available for those who receive top marks on the Subject Test. There are also some schools who are in the process of eliminating their requirement of the Subject Score. Some might glance at it but will not consider it in their final assessment.

I'm not sure if Penn State has ever offered a terminal funded MA. Penn State has a preference for students coming straight out of undergrad, and the majority of students do continue on to the PHD. They admit 1-2 PHD students outside of their program if people from their MA program decide not to continue. The Director of Graduate Studies could answer your question regarding applying for an MA only but there's also a chance that your interests may shift during the 2 years and there might be a place that better suit your interests.

I agree with you on that assessment. The term 'fully-funded' often does not mean much. There are schools in the T80 which do a much better job in terms of both funding and job placement. While it's nearly impossible to deny that T10 schools do a better job of placing at more recognized schools (partly also due to their history and their larger class sizes in the past), I think it's also important to consider that
A ) The majority of jobs available are not at R1 Institutions and sometimes these institutions fear that you're just waiting for a position to open up at a "more elite" institution.
B ) The stipend may have been cheaper to live in earlier but has skyrocketed in recent times.  Boulder, CO and Austin, TX are two cities that come in mind which have recently faced a huge increased cost in living.
C) The best fit for your research interests might be better at institutions outside the T20. The specific concentration in that field will recognize names and the type of scholars your program has produced. 
D) The stipends provided at some schools might force you to be far away from campus or you might need roommates to be able to afford rent. Since you'll spend a considerable amount of time at this location, I think it's an important one to consider.

I think this is a very excellent point. Three of the programs I was accepted at were the last three added before I finalized the list and sent them to my professors. I liked them all, but thought my chances were too low. The process is really humbling. I was rejected by colleges that I thought I had a really good chance of getting in based on scores, admission rates and interests. And accepted by schools I thought I had no chance at. I was accepted by schools that accept less than 5 percent of applicants and rejected by schools that accept more than 30 percent of their applicants.

@CatBowl: Fit is indeed a very real and odd thing. You'll never know exactly what the school is looking for. If I submitted a alternate paper to each of the schools I applied to, I'd imagine my results would look different. I imagine some of the rejections would turn to acceptances and some of those acceptances would turn into rejections. I was rejected by a college that accepts more than 50 percent of its applicants and accepted by one that has a six person cohort. After attending the accepted students weekend, I realized why the school accepted me and it made sense to me why this school made more sense than others even if one of the other schools were "ranked better". Looking back at some of the schools I applied to (and rejected from), I realized that some were too expensive to live with a grad student budget without a roommate and others were in areas that I'd rather not live in for different reasons. I think it's important to be happy with creating a strong list of schools that you'd be happy to attend. After all the results are out, you'll find yourself being "pulled" towards a certain school. It may or may not be one of the schools that was your top choice prior to application season.

Word of caution here: Most programs don't guarantee summer funding. You'd be heavily restricting a lot of great choices if you do this. Of the 4 offers I received, only one had guaranteed (unofficial) summer funding.  I do, however, think it's important to research stipends and see how if it can sustain you. Sustaining means different things depending on if you're okay with roommates, have pets, etc. Look into rent prices carefully. Do the same with food prices + utility costs. Think about how close you want to be to campus or if driving to campus is okay to you. Consider the additional parking passes and gas prices.
 
If a program doesn't guarantee funding, it isn't a program I'd apply to. Places that don't offer funding usually have no teaching or research experiences required. Without those experiences, the job market is going to be nearly impossible to succeed in.
 
I disagree here. Location is important. If you're unhappy with the location, you're going to be heavily unmotivated to produce your best work. I would think of location as more generalized though: Would you feel happy working somewhere secluded? Or do you need to the city? Would you be okay with living in a college-town where it'll most likely be a ghost town during the summer? 

I think that's a good way to narrow down your list so you can get a better understanding of the dynamics in departments.

Kansas: Looks like they offer a tuition waiver + a stipend for 10 semesters. 

Brandeis: Seems to be fully covered. Seems like you'll have to pay for health insurance and might have to pay for some university fees. This is common at a fair amount of universities.

Michigan State: Sounds like the majority of their students teach in various departments or tutor at the writing center. They get to choose which classes they'd prefer to teach in later years. And a select-few are nominated and awarded fellowships.

Vanderbilt: It sounds like the competitive part they're referring to are the "top-off" awards which could be the difference from 26k to 36k.

University of Tennessee- Mentions that Tuition Waiver (including summer course work) + Stipend is guaranteed.

Indiana: First year starts with 18k fellowship. If you hold an MA (or after the first year), you get a teaching instructorship. Stipend for the instructorship was $15,750.

Small Note: Washington, Northeastern, UC San Diego, Vanderbilt and Ohio State (pop:  860k; 15th largest) are in huge cities. I'm sure you know this, but your "no big cities" comment caught my eye.

Word of caution here: Most programs don't guarantee summer funding. You'd be heavily restricting a lot of great choices if you do this. Of the 4 offers I received, only one had guaranteed (unofficial) summer funding.  I do, however, think it's important to research stipends and see how if it can sustain you. Sustaining means different things depending on if you're okay with roommates, have pets, etc. Look into rent prices carefully. Do the same with food prices + utility costs. Think about how close you want to be to campus or if driving to campus is okay to you. Consider the additional parking passes and gas prices.
 
If a program doesn't guarantee funding, it isn't a program I'd apply to. Places that don't offer funding usually have no teaching or research experiences required. Without those experiences, the job market is going to be nearly impossible to succeed in.
 
I disagree here. Location is important. If you're unhappy with the location, you're going to be heavily unmotivated to produce your best work. I would think of location as more generalized though: Would you feel happy working somewhere secluded? Or do you need to the city? Would you be okay with living in a college-town where it'll most likely be a ghost town during the summer? 

I think this is a very excellent point. Three of the programs I was accepted at were the last three added before I finalized the list and sent them to my professors. I liked them all, but thought my chances were too low. The process is really humbling. I was rejected by colleges that I thought I had a really good chance of getting in based on scores, admission rates and interests. And accepted by schools I thought I had no chance at. I was accepted by schools that accept less than 5 percent of applicants and rejected by schools that accept more than 30 percent of their applicants.

The subject test is weighed differently depending on the school and what your area of interest in. A lot of schools will place less weight on it if your major area of interest isn't one that's coverered by the Subject Test. At some Public Schools, there might be additional funding available for those who receive top marks on the Subject Test. There are also some schools who are in the process of eliminating their requirement of the Subject Score. Some might glance at it but will not consider it in their final assessment.

I'd like to add a small note here that a lot of programs that consider you for their master's program are unfunded ones or ones where funding is very competitive at the MA level. Several programs that come to mind are Colorado, Chicago, Carnegie Mellon, Rochester and SUNY Buffalo.
 

I'd like to add a small note here that a lot of programs that consider you for their master's program are unfunded ones or ones where funding is very competitive at the MA level. Several programs that come to mind are Colorado, Chicago, Carnegie Mellon, Rochester and SUNY Buffalo.
 

I think this is a very excellent point. Three of the programs I was accepted at were the last three added before I finalized the list and sent them to my professors. I liked them all, but thought my chances were too low. The process is really humbling. I was rejected by colleges that I thought I had a really good chance of getting in based on scores, admission rates and interests. And accepted by schools I thought I had no chance at. I was accepted by schools that accept less than 5 percent of applicants and rejected by schools that accept more than 30 percent of their applicants.

Admissions is often something we'll probably never understand. On the opposite end of the spectrum, I applied to approximately 16 schools and was either accepted or waitlisted at six of them. My interests were diverse. I was accepted into at least 1 program from each major field of interest.
I ended up rejecting a fellowship with higher pay at a "better ranked" school because I felt I could better achieve my goals and get the support I needed at the school I ended up choosing. I also felt there was a better connection with the faculty and staff at this school and felt that the area was one I'd feel more comfortable with. Often in times, I feel that we may not consider the location enough and the impact it has on our growth, lifestyle, and so forth. While we'll spend a considerable amount of time in the class, is the location something you'd be happy with? Some people need the city to be very bike friendly; others don't mind the need for a car. Some prefer being in the hustle of a city; others prefer to be secluded. Division 1 Sports might be huge at some schools and non-existent at others. While you may wish to not attend these events, it may impact the students you teach and how they behave on certain days. Some departments are huge; others are smaller in number. Both might impact how often you see certain members of your cohort.

Welcome, @CatBowl! 
I wanted to echo the many good suggestions here and, in particular, add my 2¢ about the number of applications you plan to submit. I, like @Warelin, applied to 16 schools. The cost of app fees, GRE, and GRE prep came out to ~ $2300. I had a job then, but it was about a month's pay (actually two month's after my student-loan bills), so the cost was not one I bore lightly. To put this amount in perspective, I was accepted to 3 out of 16 universities -- a 19% success rate -- even with having >95% GRE percentiles, SoPs that I fine tuned for about six months, letters from profs whom I knew very well (I just spoke at one of their retirement parties), and an essay that I proofread so often that I could likely recite it today by memory. Yet, I still received rejection letters from 13 schools! My point is that luck and unseen variables still play a large role in this crazy process. All things being equal, I would've been shut out had I not applied to those three schools that took a chance on me. 
But let's return to my investment for a moment. $2300 is a lot of money. If you're accepted to just one school, however, the potential ROI is astounding. Tuition waiver included, my program will be investing around $500,000 in me over six years. I know math isn't loved by many here (me included), but the return-on-investment yield is jaw-dropping:
ROI = (Gain from Investment - Cost of Investment) / Cost of Investment
ROI = (500k - 2.3k) / 2.3k = 216.4%
I agree with @Kilos that spending several thousand dollars on applications is absurd. But it's also absurd how little control you actually have over schools' decisions. We like to think that checking all the right boxes gives us a decent shot at acceptance. Who knows, maybe it does. But after reflecting on my time in the gauntlet, I've begun to severely doubt the extent to which we are the "masters of our fate." Granted, every year it seems that there's one superstar here that gets accepted to nearly all the programs they apply to. Most of us, though, seem to get into a few, at best. So, if you're steadfast in your commitment to going to grad school, and can afford to apply to 14 or more programs, I'd hedge your bets on the potential staggering ROI of >200%. I don't mean to be a Debby Downer, and I certainly wouldn't argue that hard work doesn't pay off. But, trivialism aside, you're accepted to 0% of the schools you don't apply to, and 0% is lower than even the smallest non-zero percentage of acceptance to a top-5 reach school.*
Which brings me to the GRE. I used to think that scoring in the stratosphere was necessary (but still not sufficient) for acceptance. Recently, however, I've been rethinking both the "necessary" and "sufficient" conditions. My own stats bear out the degree of score insufficiency: 167V/163Q/6.0A / 730 (97%) LGRE. According to ETS's chart (https://www.ets.org/s/gre/pdf/gre_guide_table4.pdf), of English majors, I scored higher than about 90% on the Verbal, 95% on the Quant, 93% on the AW, and 97% on the Literature subject test. These numbers aren't exact since the chart provides only ranges, but you get my point. To wit: only about 46 test-takers, out of roughly 1500, beat me on the subject test. Yet, I was rejected by 80% of the schools on my list! In my case, at least, high numbers didn't seem do me any magical favors across the board. 
On the other hand, another frequent poster here (whom I won't call out by name) scored lower than I did in all categories and will nonetheless be spending the next five or six years in Cambridge at Harvard, which, coincidentally, sent me a very nice rejection letter a few months ago. In the end, a school will likely accept somebody they want (for fit, personality, style, etc.) over somebody they don't want who happens to have "better" GRE scores. That calculus might sound self-evident, but it should really give you pause before you stress out too much about these silly tests. To use a hyperbolic example, if you scored 130/130/1.0, then, by all means, you should retake it. If in the more likely event you scored at or higher than 160V/145Q/5.0A, I'd focus instead on researching particular schools that need your subspecialty** and crafting a red-hot SoP and glowing WS that leave schools no choice but to accept you. You are SOOOOOOOOOOOOOO*** much more than the sum of your test scores, both as a person and as an applicant. And remember, the university has to live with you for six years, which, I think, matters a lot. Thus, submitting an SoP that displays intelligence, curiosity, resolve, modesty, and kindness will go infinitely farther in gauging your sufferability than the percent of English majors you beat on a test nobody truly cares about. 
I wish you good luck, and may the admissions odds ever be in your favor! Also, if Stanford crops up on your list, feel free to PM me if you want to learn more about their program (which, by the way, is killing it in 19th-c. and post-war American lit!).  
* although the notion of reach schools may be irrelevant when most cohorts comprise ~10 spots.
** this isn't necessarily synonymous with "fit." If I could change one thing about my app cycle, I would've emailed profs and dept. assistants about which subspecialties they need. I have no idea whether they'd even respond, let alone divulge info like that, but it could go a long way toward helping cull your list. At the end of the day, a program that has met its quota on 19th-c. Americanists is almost sure to reject another aspiring Whitmanist, irrespective of astronomical scores or BAMF SoP. Also, "fit" isn't easy -- or sometimes even possible -- to gauge. I thought I'd fit in real well at UVA since two of their Victorianists are researching the exact topic of my WS. But, alas, no dice there. So beware of reading too much into that vague qualification. 
*** the Internet doesn't have enough bandwidth to support the infinite Os that ought to follow the S in that word. 
 

Admissions is often something we'll probably never understand. On the opposite end of the spectrum, I applied to approximately 16 schools and was either accepted or waitlisted at six of them. My interests were diverse. I was accepted into at least 1 program from each major field of interest.
I ended up rejecting a fellowship with higher pay at a "better ranked" school because I felt I could better achieve my goals and get the support I needed at the school I ended up choosing. I also felt there was a better connection with the faculty and staff at this school and felt that the area was one I'd feel more comfortable with. Often in times, I feel that we may not consider the location enough and the impact it has on our growth, lifestyle, and so forth. While we'll spend a considerable amount of time in the class, is the location something you'd be happy with? Some people need the city to be very bike friendly; others don't mind the need for a car. Some prefer being in the hustle of a city; others prefer to be secluded. Division 1 Sports might be huge at some schools and non-existent at others. While you may wish to not attend these events, it may impact the students you teach and how they behave on certain days. Some departments are huge; others are smaller in number. Both might impact how often you see certain members of your cohort.

+1 for good info!
And, although I think the University of Oregon is a bit lower at around top 50~ish in the rankings, they don't guarantee first year funding either. It's a weird situation where they don't give classroom teaching appointments to PhD students straight out of a B.A. program if they don't have college teaching experience... and then, because you can't teach the first year, you have to compete for a "limited number" of "non-classroom" graduate teaching fellowships (essentially working as a writing tutor). This was why I ended up not applying though it was one of my top-choice programs. I couldn't risk moving across the country for a spot in a program that had a possibly unfunded first year. Too risky.
I think most people would be really surprised if they knew just how many of these patchwork funding situations exist out there. Also, keep in mind that a lot of these stipends are so low that you simply can't live off of them. I grew up near Eugene, Oregon (where the UofO is), and I guarantee that you can't live in Eugene on the stipend they offer (12k for 0.40 FTE). Guarantee. So you're gonna have to work a significant number of hours on the side. I'd posit that this same situation exists across the country. I wouldn't call a program "fully funded" if you can't eke out a living on the stipend. That's just my opinion.