ochawan

So far, I only had an interview with Stanford among the universities I applied to. Some of the programs seem to admit students without an interview but I'm not too sure what it's like generally for our field. My current stats: Accepted at Stanford (notified on February 5), rejected at Chicago (January 31) and Rice (February 14), and still waiting for the results of the remaining 7 applications.

Hi, nope, radio silence on my end.

Honestly, I think it's gotta do with luck a lot too. I reached out to POIs for every program I had my eyes on and all of them specifically mentioned they were pretty impressed with my CV so far: Studied abroad for my BA degree in China, wrote my BA thesis in Mandarin, got several comprehensive scholarships for both BA and MA studies, got invited for important and famous international film workshops, comprehensive film criticism/curation and NGO experience, 1 peer-reviewed article, 5 conference presentations, JLPT N1 certificate, and some more... Among the universities I applied to, I was sure I had an incredible chance of being accepted at UChicago and UC Santa Barbara. I had very positive exchanges with my UChicago POI and they even noted that they were pretty hopeful for my application. The result? Rejected. Not even a place on the waitlist. As for UC Santa Barbara, I talked with POIs at both the film department and the EAS department, pretty positive emails once again. Yet, I haven't even been contacted for an interview even though so many people logged their interviews throughout January, so I'll most likely get rejected from there as well. I learned later on that, for example, UChicago tends to admit students on the theme/topic of the year, creating a cohort with similar topics essentially. I also remember seeing on Reddit before how it took someone 4 application cycles to get admitted. My point is that we might have the perfect experience and knowledge for the program, and even an insane match with the faculty, but the process is still so opaque for us humanities scholars that it becomes like an lottery in the end, even though I think it shouldn't be this way at all.

Hey all! I also applied to some film programs, I'm researching Japanese film/media: Yale (EALL and FMS combined PhD program), UC Santa Barbara (Film/Media), Northwestern (Screen Cultures), and Pittsburgh (Film/Media). Has anyone heard back from any of these programs? Any interviews? Radio silence on my end...

Hey everyone! I didn't see an active thread for those of us applying to PhD programs in East Asian Studies (or other humanities programs focusing on East Asia) for Fall 2025, so I decided to start one. I'm researching Japanese film and media, so I applied to EAS or Film/Media Studies programs at several US universities: Stanford (EALC), Harvard (EALC), Yale (EALL/FMS), Columbia (EALC), UC Santa Barbara (Film/Media), Chicago (EALC), Rice (Art History), Northwestern (Screen Cultures), Pittsburgh (Film/Media), and NYU (EAS). I'll be interviewing with Stanford this week, no updates from others so far.