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saramsarang

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  1. Hi, I'm applying this cycle, so I personally can't offer any opinion on this, but I did find this blog post where people discussed Columbia vs NYU for the MFA creative writing. Hopefully, it's helpful! https://creative-writing-mfa-handbook.blogspot.com/2008/03/columbia-vs-nyu-plus-calarts.html
  2. Hello everyone, this post might be too long. I apologise because this is my first time here, so I'm not even sure if this is the right way to go about this but I have been way over in my head about all this and would like to hear from other people before I make my final decisions. I hope it's okay. For some background information, I come from a family where I'm the first to have ventured into the Humanities for my education, so I've not been able to find any guidance or support from them. Technically, I'm not really Humanities either since I'm wrapping up my final year of my bachelor's in Economics and Finance, but I will graduate with an English minor, so that should count for something towards my postgraduate interest. Additionally, I live in the East with little knowledge regarding postgraduate programs in the West. I have been talking to a lot of people including professors, and college seniors who applied abroad and got into programs of their choice, but the MFA is a new route altogether and no one seems to be able to give me concrete answers. I have been writing for most of my life and love writing to the point that I want to make a career out of it. Unwise, I know, but I've come to terms with the lifestyle it will offer. I prioritised an MFA in Creative Writing for my postgraduate because there is a novel I've been desperately working on for the last five years but due to the lack of time and heavy school workload, I have not been able to properly write it. I need the MFA for time, to be surrounded by people who are also writers and also networking. I know there's no guarantee my book will be published etc. But I need to finish writing the book at least. However, I've been told repeatedly that simply having a list of MFA programs is a bad idea since the acceptance rate is incredibly low and I'm unlikely to get in. So I've been asked to apply for back-up options that can act as safety nets. I understand this reasoning completely, but the problem is that I don't have any specialized interests I want to focus on for my master's specifically. I have considered Comparative Literature since I am extremely interested in the intersections of language, culture and literature. So far I have worked on one paper regarding feminism in contemporary Korean literature which I will be presenting in about a month at a conference and I will be continuing the research with a follow-up paper on feminism in Japanese literature. However, I used English-translated versions to conduct my research and am not proficient in the language. For this reason, I'm worried that I don't have any language specialisations for Comparative Lit since many colleges list languages on their websites as a requirement/eligibility for Master's programs. The ones usually belonging to my country listed on the website are Hindi and Urudu, neither of which I am proficient in since I come from a different part of the country with different regional languages. I haven't considered MA Writing programs since they don't have a creative dissertation and I am not interested in getting a theoretical degree in writing. Also, MA programs are not fully funded or at best offer very little funding. As of now, I have around 10-12 MFA programs on my list. All of them are in the USA and are fully funded because I simply do not have the financial means to fund any sort of postgraduate degree outside my country and my parents have also refused to pay for English-related postgraduate programs within the country. It is also not viable for me to take a gap year or stay at home. I really want to write and I absolutely am not able to let go of the idea/dream, it's haunting me. One of my professors suggested applying to PhD writing programs since some of them do have creative dissertations as opposed to a more academic dissertation. But the reason I'm drawn towards an MFA is that it's a 2 or 3-year terminal degree with more freedom than a PhD which is a 4 to 6-year time commitment. I simply do not think I have the bandwidth to jump into a direct PhD integrated type program directly from my undergraduate. I do think I'm more academically inclined to explore something like cultural studies or comparative literature as an MA or PhD program rather than creative writing. But I think I'd only be able to pursue that after I finish the MFA first. Ultimately I've boxed myself into the MFA and if I get into none of them, I have to go to a corporate job that is finance-oriented since that's what I got my bachelor's in, but I absolutely hate my degree and I am not qualified enough compared to my classmates since I spent all my time working on writing and English related things, so my resume for a finance job is also super weak and I'm really at a dead end here. I don't think I have the energy to wait another year and reapply next cycle either, so I'm terrified. For some more clarity, I will be applying this year for the 2024 intake and even though I haven't narrowed down my schools completely, these are the ones I have on my list so far: Cornell, Johns Hopkins, Brown, Northwestern, University of Iowa, University of Arizona, University of Michigan, University of Minnesota, NYU, Vanderbilt, University of Houston, University of Texas in Austin, Syracuse and Rutgers. Having said all of this, what advice would you offer? Are there better alternatives to an MFA for creative writing? Are there some other universities I should consider for the MFA? How do I sort through all of this?
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