derphilosoph

I tend to agree that it may be daunting to try to find people that were influenced by Foucault (as surely he is to the history profession what Camus/Sartre are to philosophy or perhaps Chomsky to linguistics. Not all scholars may agree with their ideas, but most recognize their influence.) I suggest looking around for some general Historiographical, Intro to History, Intro to the Study of History syllabi online. Most of these syllabi will have an array of intellectuals who have critically assessed the historical discipline through their works on power (as Foucault), but also other important "themes" that historians should know: Just a non-exhaustive list in no particular order: E.P. Thompson, The Making of the English Working Class (class consciousness) E.P. Thompson, Customs in Common Eric Hobsbawm and Terence Ranger, eds., The Invention of Tradition (really every article in this edited book is worth reading) Eric Hobsbawm, the four-party long-19th century series Margaret L. Andersen and Patricia Hill Collins, eds., Race, Class, and Gender: An Anthology Dennis Dworkin, Cultural Marxism in Postwar Britain: History, the New Left, and the Origin of Cultural Studies Historians of gender: Lyndal Roper, Isabel Hull, Natalie Zemon Davis, Elizabeth Heineman, Bonnie G. Smith Historians of postcolonialism: Dipesh Chakrabarty, Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, Gyan Prakash, Partha Chatterjee

Would anyone have any general tips for trying to be a Research Assistant while in your second or third year? Essentially, I'm looking to see who might be on my future dissertation committee and I want to nurture good relations early on. I was also considering reaching out to people not in my department.

I believe more history PhDs should really consider working in the private sector. Many historians think that the main alternatives to academia are either government or NGOs. While both of those are perfectly good career choices, the private sector also has many jobs for which historians might be qualified. Anecdotally speaking, after undergrad, I worked for a year at a technology firm in the Bay Area. There are many departments at these types of companies in which historians could try to work: marketing, risk, operations, strategy, sales. Within my operations department, there were people with a variety of backgrounds including math, political science, and economics. Granted history is a bit more difficult to "sell" to tech firms, they were still willing to hire me, an undergrad history major. At one point, I asked them why they chose to hire me, and they said that my interviewer thought it was interesting how my resume was different from the standard ones they usually received. I legitimately enjoyed working there and am considering going back after finishing my PhD program, which starts this fall. I recommend historians begin to look at industries in the private sector in addition to working in government or at NGOs.

Many schools appear to have partnerships or exchange programs with other schools. For example, the IvyPlus program allows students to "study and work with faculty" at another school. What exactly is the purpose of these programs? Would it be to take a class with a professor in the hopes of trying to get them on as an external reader? Or is it more beneficial to take it after passing quals, as one contributor mentioned here? Perhaps I'm reading too much into this program, but I'd be interested to learn about others' views on how to take full advantage of this and other exchange programs. https://gsas.yale.edu/academics/exchanges/exchange-scholar-program-ivyplus-exchange Do let me know if this question has already been answered. Thank you very much!

Similar to a previous post about the top economic historians in economics departments, would we be able to make a list of top economic historians in history departments)? Feel free to add to the list below: Harvard: Sven Beckert Northwestern: Joel Mokyr Chicago: Jonathan Levy Penn: Walter Licht

Yes, since I don't have that many contacts of people who are currently in grad school, I just cold-emailed students. I first started while I was in undergrad and had informal chats/grabbing coffee with my TAs (after the course ended, so it didn't seem like I was trying to buy my grade). Of course, when you email students, don't get discouraged if they don't reply. But overall I think I had a pretty good response rate. I found them by usually Googling a POI's name + "graduate student"/"PhD candidate". Otherwise, I would just pick anyone with whom I had similar research interests on the website. Most seemed very happy to talk to a prospective student and willing to Skype. If you feel you have outstanding questions about the program, the POI, or graduate school in general, I would say yes reach out. It helped me a lot get a feel for what I was getting into. However, I would not really recommend asking them questions about admissions just cause they might not have all the insights into what made them stand out.

I hesitate to name specific schools. But a handful of PhD students I talked to got MAs from, say, non-top-20 schools and occasionally from the same school where they got their BA. If you're looking for educational experiences, you could try googling "PhD [insert university] MA History site:linkedin.com" and starting a search from there.

Perhaps I’m in the minority but for history I always viewed Michigan and Princeton as relatively similar in terms of quality? At my undergraduate we had professors from both schools and they were all fantastic. Given that, I’d say pick the school which aligns more with your interests, which seems to be Michigan. In my opinion, location isn’t really that big of an issue since archives can always be visited. The hour-long bus ride from Princeton to NYC doesn’t seem that much different from the 1.5 hour flight from Detroit to NYC (at least not enough to change a decision on a school). Granted you still have to go through airports and all that, but it's not like you'd be going to the archives every week? Only you can decide based on your preferences, but I would lean towards Michigan in this case.

I can't seem to find anything on applyweb where one could withdraw an application. It seems like some schools on applyweb require an email/something in writing that says you are withdrawing: https://gradadmissions.stanford.edu/admitted-students/financing-graduate-study/sources-financial-support/receipt-aid-stanford http://www.rackham.umich.edu/admissions/respond-to-the-offer

I definitely believe that funding is one of the most important factors in choosing a Master's program. This may be too anecdotal, but when I tried learning more about graduate schools, I reached out to current grad students. I wanted to conduct these "informational interviews" and get a feel for what they used in their application that would help me. I found that most of the PhD students at top schools had Master's degrees from solid programs, but not necessarily the Yales and Stanfords of their disciplines. They seemed to think that the Master's degree showed a commitment to the field, a willingness to go into the discipline full time, and overall believed that the Master's, from whichever school, had significantly helped them. The prestige/name of that Master's school never really seemed to count against them--at least based on what I noticed from my 4-5 chats.

Hey everyone, I'm new to this forum so looking forward to learning from everyone! I have to echo previous sentiments in support of NYU. Given that two of the universities are in NYC, and one is in a relatively expensive location in CA, the financials are definitely better at NYU. I imagine they have even more opportunities for funding for travel/conferences. With Berenson, Shovlin, and Chapman, you've got plenty of opportunities to work with leading scholars. And having no professor fit exactly fit your research profile sounds like an ideal situation. Or do you think that your interests in French history are too different from those professors?