Indecisive Poet

For articles – yes, absolutely. Every academic I've emailed for a copy of an article (that I didn't already have access to through my institution's library) has responded almost immediately with great enthusiasm. For books, I don't think so. They'll likely want you to buy the book instead (despite the fact that prices of academic books are extortionate) and may even find the request insulting.

I don't know anything about their Comp Lit department, but UC Irvine's English department is very well known for its strength in critical theory, and both Derrida and J. Hillis Miller worked there at one point. It could be worth a perusal.

How is everyone handling citations/footnotes for things you're quoting in your SoPs? I want to paraphrase or allude wherever possible, but I think I'll inevitably end up with at least one or two short quoted words/phrases. I'm not sure if footnotes or citations are expected – all of the examples that I've looked at don't include them, but that's not to say they didn't omit their works cited page/footnotes when they sent me their statements.

@Warelin – you sent me a few programs like this in a PM a while back. Any chance you could weigh in? I would also be interested in hearing any more that you know of that were like this when you applied, @Bumblebea!

Thanks both! ?

Thanks all! Upon further inspection, there are pointers on Oregon's website toward what their funding will look like. I've been getting thrown off by terms like "most students" and "are available" in place of language that states definitively that x fellowship or x GEship is guaranteed. My guess is that the $13,500 written on the funding spreadsheet was added by a student who was offered one of various first-year fellowships in varying amounts.

Oh dear, I wish I knew what this hashtag means! The page you've linked me to appears to be a list of all the fellowships that the general graduate school of Oregon offers. Does this suggest that full funding isn't guaranteed to English PhD students and that students are instead available for any number of (very low) minor scholarships listed on this page?

or is that frowned upon? I'm wondering about Oregon in particular – it's a great fit for me, but on the spreadsheet that @Warelin kindly shares with us, their stipend is supposedly $13,500 a year, which would definitely knock them out of the running for me.

Is anyone familiar with Oregon's funding package? The $13,750 per year listed on the spreadsheet seems INCREDIBLY low. @MeginAK – are you attending?

Woah. Thanks for sharing – I was seriously considering Buffalo this fall... that's definitely out now!

Would I email the DGS about something like this? The program in question lists an email address for the DGS and for a "graduate program administrator."

The information in the PR book is, in general, out of date – it's what I used, but I wouldn't recommend it. It also claims that most of the questions on the exam are veiled identification questions when, in reality, they're mostly comprehension questions.

This is helpful because it suggests that it won't be a huge deal if I have to combine a chapter and a half, offering a summary of what the rest of the other chapter does – although I'm hesitant to do this because the other two chapters of my dissertation are not very good, IMO. Did you also write a summary of what your dissertation as a whole does? i.e. where your sample fits into your larger argument?

The programs I'm planning to apply to ask for writing samples that vary between 10 pages and 25 pages, and several of these ask for no more than the lower end, while others ask for no less than the upper end. This means I'll need to prepare different writing samples for most programs, with some coming in around 10 pages and others at 25. How have other people dealt with this in the past? The longest seminar paper I have from my MA is 12 pages and each chapter of my dissertation comes in between 12–15 pages. I can shorten a chapter if needed, but I am not sure how to handle the programs that ask for 20–30 pages. I don't have any single, standalone piece of work that is that long at my disposal, so I think I would need to submit a chapter of my dissertation plus the introduction, or a chapter of my dissertation plus half of another chapter. Neither seems ideal, especially because some of these programs ask for a "single, sustained piece of work." I don't think I have the time to write an additional 10 pages of new material that won't read as if I'm tacking it on to something that was already polished.

I've been trying to get a sense for departments that are more formalist-oriented in general and these seem to be the ivies, for the most part. But I think I'll have to expand my definition of fit, as you suggest, in order to expand my range a bit.

Urg. Venting here. I am trying to narrow down my list and the more I research and re-research, the more it becomes clear that there is a group of programs all in the top ten that are all perfect fits for my interests. Outside of the top ten? Eh, there are a few that I could make work, but it's a stretch (i.e. there are people working in my period, which can be said of every university, but there is no overlap at all in interest or methodology). This is really frustrating because I do not want to apply to this many uber-competitive programs.

Posting a related question here: as a student who is really interested in literature but whose interests veer into grammar and linguistics (as they relate to my period of literature), would I be correct in assuming that literature is the better fit for me? Is it worth mentioning faculty/tracks in rhet/comp if I'm applying to literature? At a few of the programs I've looked at, there are faculty members who work in both departments with appealing interests.

You can get a sense of this by looking through graduate student profiles online at the programs you're interested in. Granted, there's no way of knowing what the rest of these students' applications were like, but I've found that loads of students at every program I'm interested in (all top 50, with many in the top 20) are from undergraduate and MA institutions with very little name recognition or prestige. Some of these institutions I've never even heard of.

I'm finishing a 1-year MA program in the UK and I'm happy with my decision to have done it, but for two me-specific reasons: (1) I was lucky enough to be able to do the program without going into debt, and (2) I was wildly underprepared for applying to PhD programs as an undergrad and absolutely needed to complete a terminal MA before applying to PhDs. As others have mentioned, a funded US PhD or a funded 2-year MA degree in the US will almost always be better options – because they're paying you to be there instead of the other way round, because they are generally more well respected by PhD adcoms in the US, and because you are spending more time with the faculty members who will be writing your letters of recommendation (I also understand that British letters don't read as well as American ones). It all worked out well for me in the end and I think my program is a very good one as far as UK programs go, but I would've done a US MA instead had I known that they existed when I was applying. I have to say, though, that this is because I think the US program would have looked better on paper and I would have gotten stronger letters, and because I wouldn't have had to work part time during the program. In terms of what I've personally gotten out of the program, I'm really, really pleased, feel completely prepared to apply to PhD programs now and I don't think I would have gotten anything more out of a US program than I did out of this one. Re choosing where to apply – I think you'd go about this the same way you would anywhere else. UK MA programs are almost always in a specific period of literature (which I really like) or in some cases in things like critical theory, so you would want to look for programs that are in your area of interest and then take a look at the faculty members working there. "Fit" is way less important to getting into these programs but it'll be important to you (so you have access to the expertise you need and so that you enjoy your classes) when you're in the program. In most cases you should be able to take a look at the classes that will be available to you as well. Your statement of purpose can be the same as it would for a US PhD program. The only real difference is that these are weighted way, way less heavily in UK MA applications. To be very frank: my understanding is that almost all qualified applicants will get into UK MA programs – especially international applicants because we pay more. If you have a solid GPA and can write competently, you will get in. The upside of this is that it becomes not very difficult to distinguish yourself amongst your peers in the eyes of the faculty members you're working with. The best piece of advice I can give you is to not stress too much about these applications if you already have good materials written for your PhD apps. The program I'm completing at Edinburgh is in 18th century, Romantic and Victorian literature – if you have any program-specific questions, I'm happy to answer via PM.

Stanford and Ohio State have also dropped all GRE requirements ?

FWIW, I took it twice and the same thing happened to me both times, even though I thought I had budgeted my time really well the second time. I still scored in the 83rd percentile, which I'm happy with.

UC Irvine is a program I'm strongly considering applying to – I'd love to PM you with a couple of questions, if you don't mind! ?

Nope. I've read a lot of posts on here from successful applicants who didn't contact any POIs and I've talked to enough equally successful people in person that I've decided not to do it. I think it makes sense and works for some, but it's not something I feel comfortable doing as I don't see any real need to contact them in my case and I think it would feel (and come across as) forced. The only exception is that there's a POI at a program I'm planning to apply to who I emailed a couple months ago to ask for an article that my university library didn't have access to. Since looking into the program more, I've become confused about whether faculty members on different campuses of that university (of which he is one) can work with the English grad students. I plan to respond to our previous email thread to ask him how this works. I seem to recall that Stanford's website says something about suggesting applicants contact potential supervisors in advance. And, of course, most British programs suggest this as well. But barring explicit instruction to do this on department websites, I think it's unnecessary and makes no difference in whether or not you're accepted.

Greetings! I'm excited to have a thread for this and to see it grow over the coming half a year. Thanks for posting! I think it's never too early to start thinking about PhD applications and if you're already working on your SoP and WS, you're in great shape. I'm finishing up my MA thesis, which is due mid-August, and while I've certainly had applications on my mind (pretty much all of the time, making it difficult to focus on my thesis...), I'm not planning on hitting my SoP seriously or revising my WS until August 15th, when I'm finished with my MA. I don't even have a definite list of programs yet, although I've thoroughly researched all the ones I'm interested in and hope to have things completely narrowed down and decided by the end of August. I'm a Romanticist (British) with interests in poetry/poetics, grammar/linguistics and lit theory. My thesis is on the theory of the lyric and the forms/functions of repetition in Keats's odes, with some deconstructive stuff thrown in there. I'm nervous about how all this will translate to statements but I'm already really looking forward to working on materials.

This is really helpful! Since reading this and looking some more through the curriculum, I've been thinking that maybe the Poetics program isn't a great fit for me right now but the general PhD might be. I could see myself writing a similar sort of statement for this program. Do you know if you're able to take any of the classes on offer in the poetics program? Or, for example, I see that there's a class in Poetics listed in the general graduate courses document for Fall 2019. Would you be able to take something like that as a general English student? I'm not sure if this is something you can speak to, but my only (but major) concern with applying to this program is that Buffalo seems to have only one Romanticist on its faculty (Susan Eilenberg) and she hasn't published anything since 2004 (!!!) which is a huge red flag. I do want to branch out to 20th/21st century poetry/poetics, but if I'm applying as an established Romanticist who does want to continue that interest in some way, I'm not sure the program makes sense for me. Do you know anything I don't here!? ?