Hi! I'm also in at UT & will be there in March. I focus on 20th century queer & feminist global literatures, and theory: queer/disability studies, and posthumanism. I'm glad the funding info stressed other people out as well; I had no idea what I was reading, lmao.
By the looks of it I applied to much fewer schools than most people did, and I've already heard back from the two I really wanted. So at this point in time I am 90% sure I'm going to Rice, but I'm going to wait to visit both before officially deciding! There is a Big Name in disability studies at UT now, and I'm pretty excited about that, tbh.