misterpat

I would think that only the creme de la creme of sociologists will be involved in policy oversight, and that it will be the Quantitative-inclined types who get published in ASR. Great for you, if you fall into that category. But econ and poli sci play a much larger role in policy debates, and I would guess that way more government jobs will go to PhDs from those disciplines. I am too lazy to look anything up to verify my above statements, so I invite the optimists to gainsay anything.

Sub-question, for those capable of answering the OP's question: Anyone know of a particularly great historian of Iran? I'd like to get a "Concise History of Iran," but don't know who to look for, and I don't want to put too much faith in Amazon's recommendations.

Thanks for the response. That is reassuring. 8)

Depends. The class might give you another letter, since you probably can already get one from the prof you are doing the RA for over the summer. If you can get a new and improved WS out of the class, it might be worth it. Also, do you have any graduate classes under your belt already? Tough call.

While departments may downplay the importance of the Quant section, I'm pretty sure if you score a 300 they will think (correctly, IMO) that you have no business becoming an academic. At least get into the 500s if you don't want departments to cringe when they see your scores. Seriously, the percentile rank on a 300 has got to be less than 10th.

How are you writing your SOP if you don't know what you want to study? Also, that you "generally test well" doesn't necessarily mean you can walk into the GRE cold. You are preparing, at least a little, right?

True with a capital T.

I had at least two professors tell me that they were leaving for another department. Neither disclosed where they were going (I wonder if they're not allowed to), but it was easy to Google. I also had another tell me she would be on Research leave. I contacted a lot of professors last year. I was only admitted to two programs, and ended up on on funding wait-lists at both. One professor asked to talk to me on the phone, and we ended up hitting it off and talking for nearly an hour; this didn't end up in an offer of admission, however. I think it's worth contacting profs so that you avoid wasting application fees, but you shouldn't think of it as gaining a competitive advantage. It could probably even be detrimental if you come across as irritating, essentially sending them an electronic-handjob fawning over their academic greatness.

I am still on the wait-list for the Mizzou MA program, and they said last year extra funding showed up as late as August. So I don't know if I am going to be applying next cycle or not. Anyway, I have a question for those admitted last cycle, should any of you still be lurking around these boards: Was anyone admitted with a writing sample that was NOT in the field you intend to pursue? My area is 20th century American political culture, yet the sample I used to apply was my seminar paper on Stalinism. I know just about every department's website says that it doesn't matter, but I'm wondering if the results may prove otherwise. The sample I used was an A paper, and from a really tough grader (I may have been the only straight A and not A- in that course). I'm thinking about going with one of two shorter papers next year: one in American history, and one in French history which is probably the most interesting paper I wrote as an undergrad. But I don't want to opt for the latter option if nobody has had any success using papers from outside their field. Thanks for any replies.

Despite the fact that you will be a dirty, dirty Jayhawk, kU seems like a good place to apply. According to their website, they admit something like 1/3 of applicants. I suppose it's because nobody wants to live in Kansas, but for a top 50 department those seem like good odds.

Make your writing sample great FTW

Hoping 2 commited students get off a waitlist at a better program or suffer nervous breakdowns, so that I may take their space. Until then, reading and drinking heavily.

You're doing AS at Harvard, so my guess is that you will be fine. But I would suggest this article: http://www.personal.ceu.hu/students/06/ ... ies%20.pdf

From what I've heard, the job market in sociology is less treacherous than Poli Sci's. That might be something to consider.

Maybe you should try to get a brutally honest assessment of your WS/SOP from one of the profs who wrote you a letter. I think I'm going to do this, but my ego hasn't let me write the e-mail yet (because I think it knows what is coming).

You better start liking writing essays if you plan on being a grad student. No, you might even have an edge on some sociology majors, given that most department knows sociology isn't a very rigorous major. I'm pretty sure the ASA's website has something about how departments need to make sociology a tougher major in order to better its reputation. This is why like 1/4 of college athletes major in sociology. Mostly academia. I'm pretty sure most people at least go in planning to do academia, but then end up doing other stuff afterward. Someone on this board will probably disagree with me on this one, but they are probably the exceptions to the rule. Was this your last semester? Why don't you take a Sociology course so that you can have a Sociology writing sample? Even something in Poli Sci, Econ or History would be better than natural science (if that's what you speak of). Hmm. I suppose you could do outside reading and try to make it obvious you know what you're talking about in your statement of purpose. Read books by the faculty members of the depts you apply to.

One of my TAs from undergrad recently finished his PhD in political sociology, and I asked him if he was satisfied with the discipline or if he wishes he had done Poli Sci. He said that overall he was satisfied with soc., and that he had done some poli sci coursework as well. He warned me that some poli sci programs will try to steer you away from historical methods and more towards modeling in order to make you a more viable candidate for jobs. This probably isn't the case in every department, but just thought I'd share.

If you are considering schools outside of the t-25, I would suggest taking a look at Wayne Brekhus (http://sociology.missouri.edu/New%20Website%20WWW/Faculty%20and%20Staff/Wayne_Brekhus.html) of the University of Missouri. He does a lot of Queer Theory stuff, but he isn't a standard Gender Studies scholar at all (though Missouri does have a few of the more traditional gender studies types of which you speak). Plus he's like the nicest guy ever and genuinely cares about his students. It probably shouldn't be your first-choice department, but if you're going to apply to a bunch of schools it isn't a bad option.

Some impressive placements on that list... 2 Harvard KSG, UVA, WUSTL, 2 Oberlin (good school, but I sure wouldn't want to live there for the rest of my life).

It's kind of nice not to be in the top ten for once.

I'm surprised synthla hasn't jumped in to answer these questions, since he just made the transfer from law to academia. I think I can answer why those GRE stats are so hard to find, however. Most schools don't publish detailed stats like that (with the only exception that comes to mind being Duke). I assume that they don't provide GRE averages so that people don't get the impression that they're super important. The GRE isn't as important as the LSAT was for law school admissions. Shoot for above 90th percentile on the Verbal section, which I think is about a 650. Anything below that and you risk not having your application being taken seriously (or so I've been told).

That sort of thing is impossible to predict. We have at least one person admitted to GW: viewtopic.php?f=67&t=17880 Perhaps you can compare stats with them. Don't put all your history eggs in the GW basket, though. Spread your app around. You never know, you might be able to overcome your GPA at a school higher than GW. On the other hand, GW might not even take you with that GPA. Honestly, I have almost a 3.6 and felt like I had to apologize for my grades in e-mails to professors. You're competing with a lot of 3.8-4.0s for any doctoral program. Luckily, grades aren't everything; but they are an easy way to weed applicants out of the "maybe" pile.

GW is mid-level. American could arguably be called that, too. But UNC-G isn't even top 100. You'd be totally, totally fucked with a PhD from there, unless you're a history wunderkind, in which case why would you be attending UNC-G? I imagine an MA from there might be a nice stepping stone. But they don't provide placement info on their dept's site, which makes one think that their placement isn't worth talking about.