Tybalt

Some tips for y'all--mostly made up of things I really wish that people had told me back when I was applying:
 
1 - Admissions committees often look to admit applicants who match up with their own interests or with the interests of faculty who have openings for new advisees.  Don't just look at who you want to work with.  Try and find out if they even take advisees.  Are they half a semester away from retirement?  Do they already have 15 advisees?  Are they the dept oddball who gets hidden during visit weekend?  Look at recent commencement info.  Most schools will indicate recent graduates and their advisors.  Those advisors may well have an opening.  So much of this is based on logistics as much as and even more so than pure talent on paper.
 
2 - People will tell you to apply to a range of schools.  I used to be one of those people.  You need to be thinking about your future job well before you even apply to grad school.  Do you want to get a TT job with a teaching load of 3-2 or less?  You need to limit your applications to top 10 programs. Yeah, there are outliers, but that's exactly what they are. Are you pretty sure that you want to go alt-ac after the degree?  Most top programs have NO experience in doing that, so much of the training they offer in that area will be woefully inept (I've even heard--refreshingly--a DGS at an R1 say that she's not remotely qualified to offer advice on pivoting out of academia).  You can't really change your institutional pedigree, so if you start at a mid-ranked school and then decide that you want to teach at an R1 or a SLAC, you have just given yourself absurdly lower odds of ever achieving that goal.
 
3 - Don't get all twisted up about the SoP.  Use it to give a clear sense of what you aim to do and why the people/resources at that school make it a good fit for your work.  Ask 15 people for advice on the "correct" format for an SoP, you'll get 20 different responses.  I went narrative in my first version.  A prof at my MA school told me that nobody cares about that stuff, and that "you are your project and nothing more."  So I revised to make it sound more Vulcan-esque.  My application cycle?  An admit and a pair of wait lists using the narrative SoP and an admit and a pair of wait lists using the Vulcan SoP. You can't predict how adcoms will react to things like style.  A style that generated acceptances one year might lead to rejections a year later under that year's different admissions committee.  Beyond making sure that you are conveying the info clearly (see 2nd sentence above), the rest is unpredictable and not worth stressing over. This goes double for the GRE, which most schools don't give a flying fart about.  
 
4 - The thing that IS worth stressing over? The writing sample.  Good writing is the universal greeting for grad school.  Someone earlier mentioned including an abstract.  That's excellent advice.  Other good advice--avoid the "biggies."  Are you a medievalist?  I guarantee you they don't want to see ANOTHER writing sample on the Canterbury Tales.  Find something interesting to say about a text.  Look to the top journals in your field for models to emulate.  Spend the lion's share of your time on that document. Spend even more on the first two and last two pages.  They may well be the only pages that get read, so make them perfect and make sure that your argument, methodology, and the stakes are stated clearly in those pages.
 
5 -  I was non-traditional (31 when admitted to PhD program).  If you are non-traditional, don't try to hide it, but don't shine a spotlight on it either.  People will say that emphasizing it will show all the things you've gained from those years of experience.  Your CV will do that.  There are schools who seem generally welcoming to non-traditionals (Indiana has a long track record in this area).  But the reality is that again--it's less about the school and more about the attitudes of the profs on each admissions committee.  If a school has one member of an adcom who is predisposed to toss non-traditional applicants in the bin, you likely aren't getting in there if your app makes that too obvious.  My own advisor, who was the head of the adcom the year I was admitted, had no idea how old I was.  In most cases, they aren't Googling you--they don't put THAT much time into each applicant.  Your age will never be the thing that gets you in, but it COULD be the thing that gets you tossed.  Don't emphasize it and don't apologize for it. TL/DR: Own your accomplishments.  They will be what gets you in. 
 
6 - Wait lists are WONDERFUL things.  Getting in off a wait list doesn't make you a lesser candidate.  Out of an initial cohort of 8, I was the only one admitted off the wait list.  I'm also one of the three who finished the degree (two are still dissertating), and only two of us ended up with tenure-track jobs (both with a heavy teaching emphasis).  Anecdotally, I've noticed that wait-list applicants in my old program tend to do better in the long run, possibly due to that anxiety that they weren't a "first choice."  That brings us to...
 
7 - Getting into a program is step one.  It's the starting line.  From that point forward, it is ALL about the hustle.  Build a network.  Start filling out your CV.  Don't look at seminar papers as "coursework"--look at them as first drafts of articles aimed NOT at your professor but at a particular journal.  Don't go to EVERY conference, but pick two (one regional and one national) to go to regularly.  Talk to people when you are there.  Get involved in committees and such.  We used to joke that you had to have the dossier of someone coming up for tenure just to get an interview for a TT job.  The job market was that bad.  It's about to get much worse.  You need to be ready to start the hustle from day one.  If you DON'T feel ready to do things like major conferences, networking, publishing, etc, then think about doing an MA first.  I did, for exactly those reasons.
 
8 - As PART of that hustle, build your CV in a way that shows you can wear more than one hat.  Teach/present outside of your main specialty in some way.  Do your thing and theory. Your thing and Digital Humanities. Your thing and Film. Your thing and one of its adjacent fields.  As schools get fewer and fewer tenure lines, departments are going to continue searching for candidates who can cover more than one area.  Build your CV with that kind of hybridity in mind.
 
9 - No matter HOW much you want that tenure track job, it might not happen, and it won't be because you did anything wrong.  The numbers are absurdly stacked against you.  I missed out on a job last year that was PERFECT for me.  It went to an Ivy candidate who was three years out from his PhD, had two prestigious VAPs, several journal articles and a book already published at a major press.  I would have hired him over me as well. I ended up with a TT position because I hustled from day one and I got absurdly lucky (a school that posted a position looking for my primary field with "preferred secondary interests" in literally everything else I do). Before that offer came in, I was already preparing to reach out to my alt-ac network. There will come a time on the job market where many of you will need to make a choice--toil as an adjunct for year after year, or walk away and refuse to be exploited in that way.  That's a very personal choice for most folks.  I recommend setting a set time frame (ala: 2 or 3 application cycles post degree conferral).  Set it, and then stick to it.
 
Insomnia has apparently inspired me to write a small novel here.  Apologies for the length and for any sense of doom and gloom.  For what it's worth, even if this job hadn't come through, I wouldn't change my decision to do the PhD.  I found my time in the program personally and intellectually rewarding and I met some of the best friends I've ever had, both in and out of the program.  I'm not saying "don't do a PhD because the job market is scary."  I'm saying "do a PhD with your eyes wide open." 
 
Best of luck, everyone.  And always remember to support each other.  Academia is (or rather should be) a community, not a blood-sport.  Don't aspire to grow up to be Reviewer #2.  
 

Some tips for y'all--mostly made up of things I really wish that people had told me back when I was applying:
 
1 - Admissions committees often look to admit applicants who match up with their own interests or with the interests of faculty who have openings for new advisees.  Don't just look at who you want to work with.  Try and find out if they even take advisees.  Are they half a semester away from retirement?  Do they already have 15 advisees?  Are they the dept oddball who gets hidden during visit weekend?  Look at recent commencement info.  Most schools will indicate recent graduates and their advisors.  Those advisors may well have an opening.  So much of this is based on logistics as much as and even more so than pure talent on paper.
 
2 - People will tell you to apply to a range of schools.  I used to be one of those people.  You need to be thinking about your future job well before you even apply to grad school.  Do you want to get a TT job with a teaching load of 3-2 or less?  You need to limit your applications to top 10 programs. Yeah, there are outliers, but that's exactly what they are. Are you pretty sure that you want to go alt-ac after the degree?  Most top programs have NO experience in doing that, so much of the training they offer in that area will be woefully inept (I've even heard--refreshingly--a DGS at an R1 say that she's not remotely qualified to offer advice on pivoting out of academia).  You can't really change your institutional pedigree, so if you start at a mid-ranked school and then decide that you want to teach at an R1 or a SLAC, you have just given yourself absurdly lower odds of ever achieving that goal.
 
3 - Don't get all twisted up about the SoP.  Use it to give a clear sense of what you aim to do and why the people/resources at that school make it a good fit for your work.  Ask 15 people for advice on the "correct" format for an SoP, you'll get 20 different responses.  I went narrative in my first version.  A prof at my MA school told me that nobody cares about that stuff, and that "you are your project and nothing more."  So I revised to make it sound more Vulcan-esque.  My application cycle?  An admit and a pair of wait lists using the narrative SoP and an admit and a pair of wait lists using the Vulcan SoP. You can't predict how adcoms will react to things like style.  A style that generated acceptances one year might lead to rejections a year later under that year's different admissions committee.  Beyond making sure that you are conveying the info clearly (see 2nd sentence above), the rest is unpredictable and not worth stressing over. This goes double for the GRE, which most schools don't give a flying fart about.  
 
4 - The thing that IS worth stressing over? The writing sample.  Good writing is the universal greeting for grad school.  Someone earlier mentioned including an abstract.  That's excellent advice.  Other good advice--avoid the "biggies."  Are you a medievalist?  I guarantee you they don't want to see ANOTHER writing sample on the Canterbury Tales.  Find something interesting to say about a text.  Look to the top journals in your field for models to emulate.  Spend the lion's share of your time on that document. Spend even more on the first two and last two pages.  They may well be the only pages that get read, so make them perfect and make sure that your argument, methodology, and the stakes are stated clearly in those pages.
 
5 -  I was non-traditional (31 when admitted to PhD program).  If you are non-traditional, don't try to hide it, but don't shine a spotlight on it either.  People will say that emphasizing it will show all the things you've gained from those years of experience.  Your CV will do that.  There are schools who seem generally welcoming to non-traditionals (Indiana has a long track record in this area).  But the reality is that again--it's less about the school and more about the attitudes of the profs on each admissions committee.  If a school has one member of an adcom who is predisposed to toss non-traditional applicants in the bin, you likely aren't getting in there if your app makes that too obvious.  My own advisor, who was the head of the adcom the year I was admitted, had no idea how old I was.  In most cases, they aren't Googling you--they don't put THAT much time into each applicant.  Your age will never be the thing that gets you in, but it COULD be the thing that gets you tossed.  Don't emphasize it and don't apologize for it. TL/DR: Own your accomplishments.  They will be what gets you in. 
 
6 - Wait lists are WONDERFUL things.  Getting in off a wait list doesn't make you a lesser candidate.  Out of an initial cohort of 8, I was the only one admitted off the wait list.  I'm also one of the three who finished the degree (two are still dissertating), and only two of us ended up with tenure-track jobs (both with a heavy teaching emphasis).  Anecdotally, I've noticed that wait-list applicants in my old program tend to do better in the long run, possibly due to that anxiety that they weren't a "first choice."  That brings us to...
 
7 - Getting into a program is step one.  It's the starting line.  From that point forward, it is ALL about the hustle.  Build a network.  Start filling out your CV.  Don't look at seminar papers as "coursework"--look at them as first drafts of articles aimed NOT at your professor but at a particular journal.  Don't go to EVERY conference, but pick two (one regional and one national) to go to regularly.  Talk to people when you are there.  Get involved in committees and such.  We used to joke that you had to have the dossier of someone coming up for tenure just to get an interview for a TT job.  The job market was that bad.  It's about to get much worse.  You need to be ready to start the hustle from day one.  If you DON'T feel ready to do things like major conferences, networking, publishing, etc, then think about doing an MA first.  I did, for exactly those reasons.
 
8 - As PART of that hustle, build your CV in a way that shows you can wear more than one hat.  Teach/present outside of your main specialty in some way.  Do your thing and theory. Your thing and Digital Humanities. Your thing and Film. Your thing and one of its adjacent fields.  As schools get fewer and fewer tenure lines, departments are going to continue searching for candidates who can cover more than one area.  Build your CV with that kind of hybridity in mind.
 
9 - No matter HOW much you want that tenure track job, it might not happen, and it won't be because you did anything wrong.  The numbers are absurdly stacked against you.  I missed out on a job last year that was PERFECT for me.  It went to an Ivy candidate who was three years out from his PhD, had two prestigious VAPs, several journal articles and a book already published at a major press.  I would have hired him over me as well. I ended up with a TT position because I hustled from day one and I got absurdly lucky (a school that posted a position looking for my primary field with "preferred secondary interests" in literally everything else I do). Before that offer came in, I was already preparing to reach out to my alt-ac network. There will come a time on the job market where many of you will need to make a choice--toil as an adjunct for year after year, or walk away and refuse to be exploited in that way.  That's a very personal choice for most folks.  I recommend setting a set time frame (ala: 2 or 3 application cycles post degree conferral).  Set it, and then stick to it.
 
Insomnia has apparently inspired me to write a small novel here.  Apologies for the length and for any sense of doom and gloom.  For what it's worth, even if this job hadn't come through, I wouldn't change my decision to do the PhD.  I found my time in the program personally and intellectually rewarding and I met some of the best friends I've ever had, both in and out of the program.  I'm not saying "don't do a PhD because the job market is scary."  I'm saying "do a PhD with your eyes wide open." 
 
Best of luck, everyone.  And always remember to support each other.  Academia is (or rather should be) a community, not a blood-sport.  Don't aspire to grow up to be Reviewer #2.  
 

Some tips for y'all--mostly made up of things I really wish that people had told me back when I was applying:
 
1 - Admissions committees often look to admit applicants who match up with their own interests or with the interests of faculty who have openings for new advisees.  Don't just look at who you want to work with.  Try and find out if they even take advisees.  Are they half a semester away from retirement?  Do they already have 15 advisees?  Are they the dept oddball who gets hidden during visit weekend?  Look at recent commencement info.  Most schools will indicate recent graduates and their advisors.  Those advisors may well have an opening.  So much of this is based on logistics as much as and even more so than pure talent on paper.
 
2 - People will tell you to apply to a range of schools.  I used to be one of those people.  You need to be thinking about your future job well before you even apply to grad school.  Do you want to get a TT job with a teaching load of 3-2 or less?  You need to limit your applications to top 10 programs. Yeah, there are outliers, but that's exactly what they are. Are you pretty sure that you want to go alt-ac after the degree?  Most top programs have NO experience in doing that, so much of the training they offer in that area will be woefully inept (I've even heard--refreshingly--a DGS at an R1 say that she's not remotely qualified to offer advice on pivoting out of academia).  You can't really change your institutional pedigree, so if you start at a mid-ranked school and then decide that you want to teach at an R1 or a SLAC, you have just given yourself absurdly lower odds of ever achieving that goal.
 
3 - Don't get all twisted up about the SoP.  Use it to give a clear sense of what you aim to do and why the people/resources at that school make it a good fit for your work.  Ask 15 people for advice on the "correct" format for an SoP, you'll get 20 different responses.  I went narrative in my first version.  A prof at my MA school told me that nobody cares about that stuff, and that "you are your project and nothing more."  So I revised to make it sound more Vulcan-esque.  My application cycle?  An admit and a pair of wait lists using the narrative SoP and an admit and a pair of wait lists using the Vulcan SoP. You can't predict how adcoms will react to things like style.  A style that generated acceptances one year might lead to rejections a year later under that year's different admissions committee.  Beyond making sure that you are conveying the info clearly (see 2nd sentence above), the rest is unpredictable and not worth stressing over. This goes double for the GRE, which most schools don't give a flying fart about.  
 
4 - The thing that IS worth stressing over? The writing sample.  Good writing is the universal greeting for grad school.  Someone earlier mentioned including an abstract.  That's excellent advice.  Other good advice--avoid the "biggies."  Are you a medievalist?  I guarantee you they don't want to see ANOTHER writing sample on the Canterbury Tales.  Find something interesting to say about a text.  Look to the top journals in your field for models to emulate.  Spend the lion's share of your time on that document. Spend even more on the first two and last two pages.  They may well be the only pages that get read, so make them perfect and make sure that your argument, methodology, and the stakes are stated clearly in those pages.
 
5 -  I was non-traditional (31 when admitted to PhD program).  If you are non-traditional, don't try to hide it, but don't shine a spotlight on it either.  People will say that emphasizing it will show all the things you've gained from those years of experience.  Your CV will do that.  There are schools who seem generally welcoming to non-traditionals (Indiana has a long track record in this area).  But the reality is that again--it's less about the school and more about the attitudes of the profs on each admissions committee.  If a school has one member of an adcom who is predisposed to toss non-traditional applicants in the bin, you likely aren't getting in there if your app makes that too obvious.  My own advisor, who was the head of the adcom the year I was admitted, had no idea how old I was.  In most cases, they aren't Googling you--they don't put THAT much time into each applicant.  Your age will never be the thing that gets you in, but it COULD be the thing that gets you tossed.  Don't emphasize it and don't apologize for it. TL/DR: Own your accomplishments.  They will be what gets you in. 
 
6 - Wait lists are WONDERFUL things.  Getting in off a wait list doesn't make you a lesser candidate.  Out of an initial cohort of 8, I was the only one admitted off the wait list.  I'm also one of the three who finished the degree (two are still dissertating), and only two of us ended up with tenure-track jobs (both with a heavy teaching emphasis).  Anecdotally, I've noticed that wait-list applicants in my old program tend to do better in the long run, possibly due to that anxiety that they weren't a "first choice."  That brings us to...
 
7 - Getting into a program is step one.  It's the starting line.  From that point forward, it is ALL about the hustle.  Build a network.  Start filling out your CV.  Don't look at seminar papers as "coursework"--look at them as first drafts of articles aimed NOT at your professor but at a particular journal.  Don't go to EVERY conference, but pick two (one regional and one national) to go to regularly.  Talk to people when you are there.  Get involved in committees and such.  We used to joke that you had to have the dossier of someone coming up for tenure just to get an interview for a TT job.  The job market was that bad.  It's about to get much worse.  You need to be ready to start the hustle from day one.  If you DON'T feel ready to do things like major conferences, networking, publishing, etc, then think about doing an MA first.  I did, for exactly those reasons.
 
8 - As PART of that hustle, build your CV in a way that shows you can wear more than one hat.  Teach/present outside of your main specialty in some way.  Do your thing and theory. Your thing and Digital Humanities. Your thing and Film. Your thing and one of its adjacent fields.  As schools get fewer and fewer tenure lines, departments are going to continue searching for candidates who can cover more than one area.  Build your CV with that kind of hybridity in mind.
 
9 - No matter HOW much you want that tenure track job, it might not happen, and it won't be because you did anything wrong.  The numbers are absurdly stacked against you.  I missed out on a job last year that was PERFECT for me.  It went to an Ivy candidate who was three years out from his PhD, had two prestigious VAPs, several journal articles and a book already published at a major press.  I would have hired him over me as well. I ended up with a TT position because I hustled from day one and I got absurdly lucky (a school that posted a position looking for my primary field with "preferred secondary interests" in literally everything else I do). Before that offer came in, I was already preparing to reach out to my alt-ac network. There will come a time on the job market where many of you will need to make a choice--toil as an adjunct for year after year, or walk away and refuse to be exploited in that way.  That's a very personal choice for most folks.  I recommend setting a set time frame (ala: 2 or 3 application cycles post degree conferral).  Set it, and then stick to it.
 
Insomnia has apparently inspired me to write a small novel here.  Apologies for the length and for any sense of doom and gloom.  For what it's worth, even if this job hadn't come through, I wouldn't change my decision to do the PhD.  I found my time in the program personally and intellectually rewarding and I met some of the best friends I've ever had, both in and out of the program.  I'm not saying "don't do a PhD because the job market is scary."  I'm saying "do a PhD with your eyes wide open." 
 
Best of luck, everyone.  And always remember to support each other.  Academia is (or rather should be) a community, not a blood-sport.  Don't aspire to grow up to be Reviewer #2.  
 

I think you're fine, we've all done work in multiple fields and reasonably have interests beyond the artificially-delimitated fields we ultimately work/market ourselves in, so committees are aware of this. You can make connections between them if you think it will help your cause but otherwise you can just talk about the work you want to do.

So, I have debated whether to weigh in here. I see a lot of merit to both sides of the debate here ... but my own perspective is very much colored by my own experience. In terms of these debates, I can never come down on one side or the other. Tl;dr: People need to just do what's best for them.
Long version:
I am one of the few people who made it through a lower-ranked program, spent a gazillion horrible years on the job market while a VAP, secured a tenure-track job ... only to lose that TT job when the pandemic began and my university had to make "significant cuts." Last hired, first fired, all that jazz. And I'm not the only one I know who lost a TT job last spring. You can make it all the way and grasp the brass ring only to have it taken away because universities are currently in love with austerity measures and out-of-love with the humanities.
I currently have a nonacademic job doing something else entirely. I don't call this an "alt-ac" job. In fact, I don't really see any merit to calling it anything other than what it is. It's a job. It pays the bills. In fact, it pays me far, far better than anything in academia ever did and--get this--gives me more time to write. I actually have more time to write now, while making more money, than I ever did as a professor. 
I have a feeling that I'm very lucky in that sense, though. I was lucky to land this kind of job in the middle of a pandemic. While I might have been extremely UNLUCKY on the job market, I lucked out in other ways. 
To give more of a rundown:
I come from a working-class background. I didn't go to grad school right out of college. Instead, I worked. I worked at the kind of "soul-sucking" jobs I see that other posters have already described here. I HATED these jobs. Going to grad school was my escape hatch and something I really idealized. I felt that my talents were being wasted in the ordinary working world, and they were--but so are everyone else's. 
I struggled just to get into grad school, and it took me a couple years. I had very few mentors to guide me along the way. My undergrad institutions did not open doors at the best programs. But once I got in, I thrived. I LOVED grad school--all of it. Most of all, I loved the research/writing aspects, which are highly important. 
I think part of what made me successful in grad school was the memory of the "soul sucking" work I'd done beforehand. I didn't want to end up back in that kind of job. Whenever grad school got bad--like my prospectus got shot down for the fifth time, or I got humiliated at a conference--I reminded myself that my life was so much better than the alternative I'd already experienced.
Other than going to a school that wasn't well ranked, I did everything "right" in grad school. I published. I won paper prizes at conferences and from journals. I got research fellowships, etc. etc. But for me, the job market was a brick wall. I came in second or third a few times, often losing to someone who was better pedigreed or younger or had an "Mst" from Oxford or was just a better "fit" or whatever ... In any case, I spent way too long on the job market, and those were the worst years of my life.
After being laid off my academic job, I discovered that finding a nonacademic job was surprisingly easy. This goes against what a lot of others have said here, and obviously YMMV, but I got a lot of interest in my resume and had many job interviews (even in the pandemic!) sometimes because of my PhD. Now, to be clear, part of that, I think, was because I had previous work experience. I'd already demonstrated that I knew how to show up to a job and work five days a week. I had other skills. I'd been successful in the workplace.
So that's one of my biggest recommendations: If you're considering a PhD, get work experience first. Any kind of "professional" type work experience will do. Your future self will thank you. A lot of people here are talking about doing internships during their grad school summers--that wouldn't have worked for me. I needed every ounce of energy to write my dissertation and finish my program while I was still funded. Many of you will also find the same thing is true. Getting a PhD is extremely grueling and takes everything you have. And teaching takes a huge bite of whatever energy you have left.
A couple other pieces of advice:
The job market is never coming back. It's just not. I went to grad school at the beginning of the Recession, and everyone talked about how it would turn around in a few years. It sort of did ... for a year. But not really. What happened was that universities discovered they could get by on less, pay professors less, and exploit people more. Even when the economy came back, universities didn't give a hot fuck. Instead of offering tenured lines, they transitioned to these endlessly renewable lecturer positions. (If you think you'll be happy in one of those once you're done, you won't. Trust me. They pay far less than a TT job and expect one to work much harder. You get treated like a second-class citizen in your department and have zero room for advancement.) 
My prediction is that the pandemic will have the same effect on universities. In the past year, they've figured out how much they can get away with in terms of online teaching and labor diversification. What I see for the future are a very small tenured few and a whole lot of everybody elses, teaching hybrid or online classes to students who figured out that they really don't need a brick-and-mortar to get the piece of paper, thank you very much. And I have to admit that I've been shocked, on some level, to see that people are still trying to apply to graduate school despite these conditions. When most of the programs are flat-out refusing to admit people, that's a sign, guys. They know that the party is over and the music has stopped. 
Going to grad school right now may indeed be really dumb decision. And if these programs were honest and ethical, most of them would have closed their doors already. I mean, my former PhD program isn't publishing their job placement statistics anymore, they're so bad. But they're still admitting people. I find this deplorable. 
Having said that:
I don't regret getting my PhD. 
Yes, that's right. After everything. After losing my TT job in the pandemic, after all the years of exploitation and heartbreak and humiliation, I don't regret it. The experience of having gotten a PhD informs every aspect of my life, and the weird little world to which I was a party was interesting as hell. It gave me a new vocabulary to describe my current situation, which I surprisingly find a lot more bearable than I would have BEFORE I got my PhD. Yes, the work I do is currently very boring and unstimulating. But I'm not as rattled by this as I was in my 20s. Grad school taught me how to look for fulfillment elsewhere. I still write and just had an article accepted to a major journal. I may finish my monograph anyway--we'll see. 
I do regret spending so much time on the academic job market. 
Seriously, give it two years, no more than three. Being on the job market made me a miserable person. It also doesn't get any better. My first year out, I interviewing for 2/2 loads at departments with graduate programs. My last year out, I was viewed as "stale" and tainted by my own VAP experience. (This is how academia thinks--if you don't land a job your first year out, you probably didn't deserve one anyway.)
Also, even though I refused to adjunct, I still allowed myself to be exploited by VAP positions. These schools act as though they're doing you a favor by paying you a salary with benefits. They're not. They're paying you far less and working you far harder than they are their permanent faculty. I wish I had seen this more clearly.
I wouldn't go to graduate school right now. However, no one would have been able to dissuade me from going to graduate school when I did. 
I think a lot of these discussions--in terms of convincing people not to go to graduate school--are largely pointless. People do what they want to do. I've never understood the point of trying to get people to give up on their dreams, because dreams are a highly personal, emotional thing. The me from 2011 wouldn't have been dissuaded from going to grad school regardless of how clearly the data showed I wasn't getting a TT job. Who in the history of the world has ever been persuaded away from such a personal decision by the existence of data? Getting married is usually a bad idea too, and we all have those friends who chose bad spouses, and the decision seemed obviously terrible to everyone looking on. Did they change their minds after hearing our objections? Seeing the data? Lol. Same goes for grad school. You have to experience it for yourself. 
The life of a professor is not all it's cracked up to be.
Others have already said this here, but it bears repeating. Yes, it's rewarding. Yes, it can be fulfilling. Yes, teaching is more interesting than churning out TPS reports. But it's also low-paying and very draining and often demoralizing. I worked far, far harder as a professor--for far less money--than I do now. Moreover, the academic life is one with a lot of roadblocks, in that you work hard for very little payoff. You spend all year writing an article, just to wait six months to get it back with snarky readers reports. You make all the changes the snarky readers wanted and send it back, just to wait another six months and have the article rejected anyway with even snarkier reports. Same with getting your book published. In no other sector did I sink so much time into projects for absolutely no payoff whatsoever (no money, nowhere else to submit, no credit toward anything, no "billable hours," etc.). 
It also goes without saying that academia has deep problems regarding equity and inclusion. I often got treated like a second-class citizen because of where I went to school--and that never stopped, regardless of how many awards I won or where I published. I'm actually glad to be away from that now, because it was just so damn toxic. I got so tired of having to justify my existence in a field that really didn't have any place for "people like me"--despite paying a lot of lip-service to the contrary.
So that's all I've got. And, oh yeah, Karen Kelsky is terrible at what she does for a living. Don't hire her.

A lot of excellent points in this thread, that I hope newly-admitted PhD students are taking to heart.  One I will add:
Take advantage of the resources at your school, not just the resources of your program.  Odds are, the people in your program won't know a thing about preparing for a non-academic job.  The vast majority of English faculty at PhD granting institutions have never held/applied for one.  But your school will have tons of resources, and quite probably a whole office, for job placement/development.  Don't dismiss those resources just because they are intended for the undergrads.  Develop a resume alongside your CV and keep both updated accordingly.  Do an internship during your program.  If you make a point of contributing just one thing to each world (ac and alt-ac) in every semester and every summer, then by the time you finish your program, you'll be ready to put your best foot forward regardless of the path you decide to walk (and you'll be better prepared to pivot if you start down a path and realize that it's not what you'd hoped).

A lot of excellent points in this thread, that I hope newly-admitted PhD students are taking to heart.  One I will add:
Take advantage of the resources at your school, not just the resources of your program.  Odds are, the people in your program won't know a thing about preparing for a non-academic job.  The vast majority of English faculty at PhD granting institutions have never held/applied for one.  But your school will have tons of resources, and quite probably a whole office, for job placement/development.  Don't dismiss those resources just because they are intended for the undergrads.  Develop a resume alongside your CV and keep both updated accordingly.  Do an internship during your program.  If you make a point of contributing just one thing to each world (ac and alt-ac) in every semester and every summer, then by the time you finish your program, you'll be ready to put your best foot forward regardless of the path you decide to walk (and you'll be better prepared to pivot if you start down a path and realize that it's not what you'd hoped).

A lot of excellent points in this thread, that I hope newly-admitted PhD students are taking to heart.  One I will add:
Take advantage of the resources at your school, not just the resources of your program.  Odds are, the people in your program won't know a thing about preparing for a non-academic job.  The vast majority of English faculty at PhD granting institutions have never held/applied for one.  But your school will have tons of resources, and quite probably a whole office, for job placement/development.  Don't dismiss those resources just because they are intended for the undergrads.  Develop a resume alongside your CV and keep both updated accordingly.  Do an internship during your program.  If you make a point of contributing just one thing to each world (ac and alt-ac) in every semester and every summer, then by the time you finish your program, you'll be ready to put your best foot forward regardless of the path you decide to walk (and you'll be better prepared to pivot if you start down a path and realize that it's not what you'd hoped).

A lot of excellent points in this thread, that I hope newly-admitted PhD students are taking to heart.  One I will add:
Take advantage of the resources at your school, not just the resources of your program.  Odds are, the people in your program won't know a thing about preparing for a non-academic job.  The vast majority of English faculty at PhD granting institutions have never held/applied for one.  But your school will have tons of resources, and quite probably a whole office, for job placement/development.  Don't dismiss those resources just because they are intended for the undergrads.  Develop a resume alongside your CV and keep both updated accordingly.  Do an internship during your program.  If you make a point of contributing just one thing to each world (ac and alt-ac) in every semester and every summer, then by the time you finish your program, you'll be ready to put your best foot forward regardless of the path you decide to walk (and you'll be better prepared to pivot if you start down a path and realize that it's not what you'd hoped).

A lot of excellent points in this thread, that I hope newly-admitted PhD students are taking to heart.  One I will add:
Take advantage of the resources at your school, not just the resources of your program.  Odds are, the people in your program won't know a thing about preparing for a non-academic job.  The vast majority of English faculty at PhD granting institutions have never held/applied for one.  But your school will have tons of resources, and quite probably a whole office, for job placement/development.  Don't dismiss those resources just because they are intended for the undergrads.  Develop a resume alongside your CV and keep both updated accordingly.  Do an internship during your program.  If you make a point of contributing just one thing to each world (ac and alt-ac) in every semester and every summer, then by the time you finish your program, you'll be ready to put your best foot forward regardless of the path you decide to walk (and you'll be better prepared to pivot if you start down a path and realize that it's not what you'd hoped).

I have been accepted off of the UCONN waitlist. Very excited for this! For anyone still waiting, I turned down the offer of funding. I am already teaching FT in the community college system on the tenure track. Hopefully, this means another funded spot will open. 
 

Got into Rutgers off the waitlist! I am going to go cry into some champagne now 

AHHH I got into UVA! Brb as I commence a weeklong celebration ?

I JUST GOT ACCEPTED TO BOSTON COLLEGE! I'm crying so hard. I'm so thankful and in disbelief, I've been shaking since I got the email. I'll be emailing shortly to take myself off of the UConn waitlist and I hope this helps someone else out. Thank you all so much for your kind words and support through this whole process. It's especially wonderful because yesterday marked one year since my dad passed away, and I can't help but feel he's looking out for me.

It CAN be done, but that move is difficult as well.  In most of those fields, companies are wary of hiring a PhD because they seem "overqualified" for the entry level positions while also lacking the experience for the more advanced positions.  I know a lot of folks who take the PhD off of their resume when applying in certain fields, but even that's tough, because how do you explain a 5+ year gap in your employment history without mentioning that the teaching was part of your PhD program?
I think this topic (realistic plans outside of academia post-degree) should be FAR more prominent, because of the reality that there are significantly more PhD graduates than there are TT jobs.  Too many people adjunct for years hoping that the TT will happen, and it usually doesn't (though full time lecturer positions seem to be getting more common, which is at least a good middle ground).
I will say that if you ask most people what their "backup" plan is, they will offer vague responses about museum work, library work, or (and not digging at you here, as I've heard other people say the same thing) publishing work.  The problem there is that ALL of those fields have job markets that are as dismal, if not more so, than academia, and they often have their own certifications that you won't get from your PhD program.  I have some friends who started library science programs once they got to the candidate stage with their PhD, so they will at least have both degrees by the time they finish, but even then---academic library positions are a specialized field, often run by the same penny pinchers who are adjunctifying the TT job market.
I would encourage every PhD candidate to start diversifying their job materials as soon as they are ABD.  Don't rely on the professors in your department--not because they don't mean well, but the odds are that they don't know what they are talking about.  Most of them went right from high school to grad school to an R1 position that prizes research over anything else.  They've literally never HAD to search for a job outside of academia, and it isn't really fair to expect them to know how to guide students to do something they've never done.  That said, every university has job prep/networking kinds of resources.  Look for the job center.  See what kinds of workshops they offer.  Get feedback on how to transform your CV into a proper resume.  Take advantage of alumni networking opportunities.  Start building up your LinkedIn network.  Pick up some certifications (it doesn't have to be something as massive as an MLIS degree--you can pick up certifications in Microsoft Office, coding, and I know that Google has a whole series of certification programs).
I know that all sounds like a lot, but if you do one thing per semester and one per summer, you'll have a resume that looks like you are ready for a job outside of academia, rather than a poorly translated CV that looks like you are considering that job because you didn't get what you really wanted.  You can still do all of these things after finishing the degree, of course, but they take time, and it's better to build slowly and deliberately (and to use those job center resources while you still have student status at your PhD program).
Finally, I would recommend setting a concrete cap on the number of years you will play the academic job market.  It's up to you to figure out where your comfort level is, but going into the job market year after year, adjuncting your way through, is a recipe for disaster.  It's like a drug, and I've seen people stay on the job market for years and years almost chanting "one more year."  I decided going in that I would do a trial run, a run during my final ABD year, and then two to three years with degree in hand.  Whatever your comfort level, set a limit, and as you get closer to that limit, start diversifying your applications (some in academia and some out).

It CAN be done, but that move is difficult as well.  In most of those fields, companies are wary of hiring a PhD because they seem "overqualified" for the entry level positions while also lacking the experience for the more advanced positions.  I know a lot of folks who take the PhD off of their resume when applying in certain fields, but even that's tough, because how do you explain a 5+ year gap in your employment history without mentioning that the teaching was part of your PhD program?
I think this topic (realistic plans outside of academia post-degree) should be FAR more prominent, because of the reality that there are significantly more PhD graduates than there are TT jobs.  Too many people adjunct for years hoping that the TT will happen, and it usually doesn't (though full time lecturer positions seem to be getting more common, which is at least a good middle ground).
I will say that if you ask most people what their "backup" plan is, they will offer vague responses about museum work, library work, or (and not digging at you here, as I've heard other people say the same thing) publishing work.  The problem there is that ALL of those fields have job markets that are as dismal, if not more so, than academia, and they often have their own certifications that you won't get from your PhD program.  I have some friends who started library science programs once they got to the candidate stage with their PhD, so they will at least have both degrees by the time they finish, but even then---academic library positions are a specialized field, often run by the same penny pinchers who are adjunctifying the TT job market.
I would encourage every PhD candidate to start diversifying their job materials as soon as they are ABD.  Don't rely on the professors in your department--not because they don't mean well, but the odds are that they don't know what they are talking about.  Most of them went right from high school to grad school to an R1 position that prizes research over anything else.  They've literally never HAD to search for a job outside of academia, and it isn't really fair to expect them to know how to guide students to do something they've never done.  That said, every university has job prep/networking kinds of resources.  Look for the job center.  See what kinds of workshops they offer.  Get feedback on how to transform your CV into a proper resume.  Take advantage of alumni networking opportunities.  Start building up your LinkedIn network.  Pick up some certifications (it doesn't have to be something as massive as an MLIS degree--you can pick up certifications in Microsoft Office, coding, and I know that Google has a whole series of certification programs).
I know that all sounds like a lot, but if you do one thing per semester and one per summer, you'll have a resume that looks like you are ready for a job outside of academia, rather than a poorly translated CV that looks like you are considering that job because you didn't get what you really wanted.  You can still do all of these things after finishing the degree, of course, but they take time, and it's better to build slowly and deliberately (and to use those job center resources while you still have student status at your PhD program).
Finally, I would recommend setting a concrete cap on the number of years you will play the academic job market.  It's up to you to figure out where your comfort level is, but going into the job market year after year, adjuncting your way through, is a recipe for disaster.  It's like a drug, and I've seen people stay on the job market for years and years almost chanting "one more year."  I decided going in that I would do a trial run, a run during my final ABD year, and then two to three years with degree in hand.  Whatever your comfort level, set a limit, and as you get closer to that limit, start diversifying your applications (some in academia and some out).

It ultimately depends on what kind of academic career you want to pursue and what the job market even looks like in 5 to 7 years.  The latter, you can't really control.  As for the former, you need to figure out what you are actually able/willing to do.  Are you only going to be happy at an R1 or a SLAC with a 2-2 (MAYBE 3-3) teaching load, where your primary job is research?  If that's the case, then Temple won't open those doors (neither would my program, to be clear).  Does that mean it's impossible?  No.  You could publish your backside off, and move into such a job, but the odds are a fraction of a percent without a top 10 degree.  
That said, if you are interested in teaching, don't mind having ~half of your load as composition courses, can teach a 4-4 (or a 5-5 at some places), then a degree from Temple would be fine.  
There isn't one job market.  There's a job market for R1s and SLACs and a job market for teaching focused schools.  How you prepare for each of those markets is different as well.  For example, I have a few publications (a book chapter, some DH stuff, etc), but my research portfolio would be blown out of the water by half of the ABDs at Harvard/Yale/Princeton.  My teaching dossier, however, is longer and more diverse than some of the full professors at those schools.  I got my job because of the latter.  I've lost out on jobs because of the former.  Every job requires a bit of each, but how you build your CV should be influenced--from the earliest stages of your program--by what kind of job you eventually want.  And even then, the odds are better than not that a TT job won't happen.  I'm not trying to be a downer, or one of those "it's easy for you to say that when you have one" people, but my job happened by dumb luck.  I had applied to 90 positions.  Had a handful of interviews.  Was adjuncting and teaching a 6-5 load across three schools.  I was at the point where I was ready to walk away, and just got lucky that a school needed someone not only with my--frankly odd--set of secondary interests AND a credential from a prior career that 95% of job applicants won't have. This Fall will be my 3rd semester here, and I still won't have taught my primary specialty (Shakespeare).
 
I will also say this--much of this advice pretty much echoes what I was told by a newly-hired professor that I first met during my MA program.  He had just earned his PhD in Renaissance rhetoric from Temple, and was willing to relocate to a school beyond the middle of nowhere and teach a 4-4, where composition would be his primary responsibility (he even ran the writing center for a bit).  Not having an Ivy degree doesn't mean you can't get a job.  But it might not be in a place you'd like to live. It will probably be a generalist position rather than a job directly in your specialty field.  You might need to wear a lot of hats, and you will definitely need to teach your backside off.  If that sounds completely unappealing, then it might be best to roll the dice again, targeting only top programs.

Program rep is a big thing, especially if you plan to go on the academic job market, but personal happiness and health is super important as well. That's the thing I always tell prospective grad students to keep in mind.  A bad fit in terms of location/mentor/program makes it exponentially more likely that a person won't complete their program (and a LOT of people who start a PhD never finish it.  My cohort started with 8--three of us finished).  You want to look at that comfort level--on the virtual visit, get as much information as you can.  Ask prospective advisors questions.  Ask them to explain what an average advising meeting might look like.  Ask them what their expectations of advisees might be in terms of production of chapters, lists, etc.  See if you vibe with them.  If it's awkward now, it probably won't get better in the program.  You can also ask them questions about how grad students make it on the stipend.  Do they do a lot of room shares?  Is there campus grad housing?
If you get the sense that you can complete your degree there, to me, Toronto is the clear choice for a medievalist.  If you have doubts, though, and feel more comfortable at Rutgers or IU (both excellent programs, and IU also has a stellar rep for medieval), then that would be the better choice.  
Get the information that you need, and if you still have doubts after the visit, you can always ask them for more time to make your final decision.

Thanks, Tybalt! These are all really helpful suggestions. My advisor told me that I should select an environment where I'll feel content on a day-to-day basis, which is quite similar to what you said. Same advice to everyone else who's also struggling!

In my application year, we were actually able to track wait-list movement in our version of this thread.  Someone who was admitted to Indiana got in off a waitlist at her top choice.  Her spot at IU then went to someone who had been admitted to U of Rochester, and that person's U of R spot went to me.  We saw all of that movement happen from like April 11th-13th.  The wait is agonizing, but don't give up.  The departments are hamstrung until they hear from the people who received initial offers, and those people might be waiting on their own waitlists.  A LOT of movement happens in early April, usually.
 

Saw that the offers and wait lists for U of Rochester went out.  I know a lot of folks can't do campus visits because of the pandemic.  If anyone has any questions about U of R, feel free to send me a DM.

This really reminds me of the David Attenborough documentary clip on hermit crabs trading shells. I found it has an unsettling resonance to our situation so I'm sharing it here ??? 

In my application year, we were actually able to track wait-list movement in our version of this thread.  Someone who was admitted to Indiana got in off a waitlist at her top choice.  Her spot at IU then went to someone who had been admitted to U of Rochester, and that person's U of R spot went to me.  We saw all of that movement happen from like April 11th-13th.  The wait is agonizing, but don't give up.  The departments are hamstrung until they hear from the people who received initial offers, and those people might be waiting on their own waitlists.  A LOT of movement happens in early April, usually.
 

In my application year, we were actually able to track wait-list movement in our version of this thread.  Someone who was admitted to Indiana got in off a waitlist at her top choice.  Her spot at IU then went to someone who had been admitted to U of Rochester, and that person's U of R spot went to me.  We saw all of that movement happen from like April 11th-13th.  The wait is agonizing, but don't give up.  The departments are hamstrung until they hear from the people who received initial offers, and those people might be waiting on their own waitlists.  A LOT of movement happens in early April, usually.
 

In my application year, we were actually able to track wait-list movement in our version of this thread.  Someone who was admitted to Indiana got in off a waitlist at her top choice.  Her spot at IU then went to someone who had been admitted to U of Rochester, and that person's U of R spot went to me.  We saw all of that movement happen from like April 11th-13th.  The wait is agonizing, but don't give up.  The departments are hamstrung until they hear from the people who received initial offers, and those people might be waiting on their own waitlists.  A LOT of movement happens in early April, usually.