modern

Of course it's great advice to tell people to do what motivates them, to let them know that trends change, and that perhaps they shouldn't get into history at all if they are primarily concerned about getting a job. However, if someone asks what are the most in demand fields in history in a grad student history online forum, there's a chance that they might also want answers to that particular question from the perspective of grad students, or access to the kind of data that posters here have added. While the approach to studying history and getting a job in history that OP is seemingly adopting is not necessarily one that I have taken (or one I would recommend), I don't doubt that, like in any line of work, it might be useful to try to get a grasp of different perspectives about what is "in demand".

Thanks for the correction.

It's pretty funny how it seems so hard to get an answer a question like this without having colleagues feeling compelled to give advice such as "you shouldn't care about it". It's something everyone thinks about and cares about. Doesn't mean anyone will decide their fates based on it. And it's interesting, and could generate interesting discussions. Besides the regional "hot" fields, there's of course also thematic ones, like fellow forum momeber I'm-ina-control suggested: Some hot fields (in nor particular order and without necessarily meaning I appreciate all of them or even really find them to be meaningful as fields -- but some people clearly do), or buzz terms: - History of Capitalism - Science and Technology Studies-related approaches, histories of knowledge - Environmental History, including animals, climate change - Transnational/"Global" Topics and Approaches - Spatial History - Digital Approaches/Methods - Drugs - Memory stuff (though less than a few years ago) - Big Data- related (both as topic and as method) - Not-Only-Female Gender Topics

I'm pretty sure all graduate students in Yale's History Department, including those in terminal masters (who are indeed very few, and often in dual degree masters such as "History and European Studies", "History and Renaissance Studies", etc.) are fully funded. No cash cow in this case, although I generally agree with the advice that you're giving.

Yale's stipend is about 30,000 now as the standard minimum funding package for all PhD students in the Graduate School, and as of this year they also offer a guaranteed 6th year of funding (Teaching Fellowship) for students in good standing (essentially, if your advisor/DGS signs). Hopefully the 6th year (which of course was already relatively common practice in many places, but not guaranteed) will become more common.

One specific thing about funding is whether they have funds that you can use for your research, especially if your project implies traveling. You'll be applying for all kinds of grants, but even some of the most amazing projects sometimes don't get those. Having a safety net of potential internal funding for that (competitive but relatively accessible or, even better, not competitive) can make a huge difference for the quality of your dissertation research if it comes to that. Another caveat of your case is that, not knowing your subfield at least, and in a very impressionistic way, I don't think you need to look at rankings. The schools that admitted you, at least UCD, Maryland and Minnesota, are all very good and seem to be roughly on similar levels. I doubt rankings really mean much in this case. Having said that, by all means do pros and cons lists, listen to the advice of your professors and people whose opinion you respect, listen to what current and former grad students have to say, talk to potential advisors, look at placement records, the structure of the programs... but ultimately follow your gut. The relative weight of each pro and the con really depends on your own priorities.

Not true. More generally, good luck with getting away with skipping 80 years of "progress" (for lack of a better word) in any discipline and expecting people within that discipline to let you get away with it and even to support you and fund you. And I mean especially outside of the humanities and of academia.

They don't offer funding to every admitted student, but they do if they really want you and if the professors that want you are powerful enough within the department. This is probably a bad year for applying there though. Their history program is brilliant, but, as you may know, the university has been in deep trouble lately. They are cutting funds for the humanities, there have been protests, the republicans were even stalking William Cronon... they are cutting health ensurance in summers and things like that. And all those things probably have an effect on the general ambiance of the deparment, as people have to compete for funds, etc. That said, as TMP and Strangelight suggest, do apply if it is your first choice and contact the department to ask all sort of questions regarding funding and all that. It really has wonderful professors (arguably among the very best for some subfields) and a tradition of great scholarship. I've heard that Madison is a lovely city too.

I don't know of programs on history of psychology, but I do know that there are grad students working in the history of psychiatry and stuff like that in many places. You should: 1) Think about the historians of psychology that you think write great stuff and see where they teach. 2) Look for the faculty profiles on history and history of science programs in as much universities as you can, and see who works on what. They don't need to specifically work on your research topic, but stuff related with it in different ways (ie. history of medicine in the region / period that you are interested on doing research about, history of trauma, history of the relationship between medical practice and identity, etc.) There are many extremely strong programs in the history of science / medicine. Among them are the universities that are usually considered top in everything, those that are especially distinguished in history (like Michigan), and those are especially strong in the sciences.

If they don't specify, you can do as you wish.

I know that people has been admitted to Yale with reviews of very new books, very old classic books, books from current and former Yale faculty, and even with books that clearly oppose the views of some of the faculty that they end up working with (of course the latter seems a risky choice and I'm sure many professors certainly won't like it, but the fact is that some do). In all honestly, the most important things are that you pick a very good book and write a very good review, and that both the book and the review clearly relate to the reserach interests stated in your Statement of Purpose. Only after reading the book from start to end start reading reviews written about it. But definitely read these reviews, see if you are missing something extremely important, and try to say something they have not addressed some point. Also, if you really don't know what to pick, a safe choice could be chosing a first book from a relatively recent graduate of that program (Yale), or from a former student of one of the professors that you want to work with (maybe even from before they started teaching at Yale).

The worst thing you could do would be not to try.

For a PhD, you may also think about Yale:Joanne Meyerowitz (http://www.yale.edu/history/faculty/meyerowitz.html) and George Chauncey (http://www.yale.edu/history/faculty/chauncey.html) are both great. And the university as a whole has a lot of focus on woman's studies, gender, history of sexuality, etc.

That said, I had the same concern before applying last year. I was also looking for those universities that don't ask for GRE, just in case. In the end, I decided to ignore that and just apply to my top choices. I ended with a very, very bad Quantitative score, a very good Verbal one, and admitted to my two first choices, which have insanely competitive admission processes. So do it as good as you can and don't base your choices on that, at least don't let it be the most important factor!

I think University of Michigan and University of California at Berkeley don't require the GRE. As far as I remember, Berkeley required either the TOEFL or the GRE for foreign-speaking candidates, so I don't know how it would be for a Canadian.

José Moya is at Columbia but he is part of Barnard College and I heard (from a pretty good source) that he is not taking students to supervise. You should check with him directly IMO. They have a woman working on modern Chile though and she seems pretty cool. As for places to study Argentina: I'd definitely add Indiana (Daniel James) and Princeton (Jeremy Adelman). But remember, as Strangelight mentioned, that the geographical field -in terms of nation- is not necessarily the most important fit. Your work could be interesting, for instance, historians of labor in Latin America, Cold War in Latin America, etc, and they could certainly help you with your research in many ways. And if what you propose in your statement of purpose is interesting, you show promise in your other material (and you are a little bit lucky; let's face it, that plays a part) it could as well be interesting for any historian of Latin America.

I did my 2008 BA Thesis on a series of events that happened in the late nineties, and there was no problem - and I got accepted into great (as in the best) History PhD Programs basing my Writing Sample on that. IMO "History" is a way to do research, approach the sources, and write, and not at all something related to how long ago it happened. That said, I have met several historians disagreeing, professors not allowing me to do my papers on some issues because they were "too recent" and so on. But these were usually far from being the best historians in their own research and teaching.

Northwestern University is supposed to be super strong in African American History.

Exactly. The "fit" doesn't have to be perfect and there are many ways to look at it. It can be region and period, but also theme or methodological approach. A historian of gender in Eighteenth Century Africa wouldmost likely be interested in a good application about gender in Nineteenth Century Africa, or in issues not related to gender in Eighteenth Century Africa. I got accepted to several programs and in none of them is there an historian working on the particular region I want to work, but some were urban historians of the field (Latin America), others were into modernization processes in Twentieth Century Latin America, environmnetal stuff, etc. and others probably just liked what I sent on the application, or what the letters of recommendation said (and who sent them) and felt good chemistry with me when we met some months before the application process. The perfect secenario is one where all these factors and the grades and test scores work together for you. Of course, the closer fit the better, but you will rarely find someone doing exactly what you want to do. It's not a bad idea to talk (or write) to some of the potential advisers in advance, so you'll know if they are interested. And mentioning them, and why you'd like to work with them, in you Statement of Purpose.

You should not limit your PhD applications to places where "you have a shot" if it means not applying to the best / most competitive schools. While you should apply to the broadest range of programs that you can, you should also aim as high as you can. If your research interests and proposals have a great fit with those of faculty at places like Harvard, Yale or Stanford and your application is stromng overall, you might beat supposedly stronger candidates (as in having better grades or a more narrowly historical formation), and they might pick you while less reputable places do not. While I understand the worry about "not getting in", I also agree with those that advice you not to pay for an MA, and most MA terminal programs require you to do so. In some cases, also, you can apply for the PhD but they might offer you a spot for the MA, funded or, more usually, unfunded. Ask.

I think it definitely is reputable for history, and it is a huge, huge institution. Probably one of the biggest. These public schools in the midwest seem pretty good, and tend to have well-respected history departments. Michigan, Wisconsin, Illinois and Ohio are all great in my field.

A GPA of 3.7 or 3.8 is good enough to get into any program .

One thing I'd like to add is that it is extremely important to do extensive research about the departments that you might want to apply to. Check every department webpage, see who works on your field at every place. See their faculty profiles, if possible their CV, read what they have written, what they are doing now, what reviews say about their work. It is not enough to go with your favourite scholars and authors. I have actually discovered many outstanding historians in this process and not onlythe other way around. I started with a huge lists of possible places (about 20+), then narrowed it to some twelve, and finally to six (in part by contacting people and seeing if they were actually interested).

Your GPA is outstanding, just forget about that. You can get anywhere with that in principle. If you get a good GRE you can forget about the scores crap. You can turn the transfers stuff into something very positive in your statement. The defining part is proving that you can write history and research history. The referees are extremely important for that, but so is the CV and even the statement. You got to show from the start that you have a clue of what is a feasible project within an interesting approach for a PhD, and it has to be coherent with your previous training (what you can do). The writing sample has to be publishable stuff or almost so, and it will obviously help a lot if it fits the professor/departments interests, at least in a broad way.

Your chances definitely increase if your interests match the faculty's past or -and even better- current research. However, it is far from impossible to get in without the exact fit; I just got into some great programs and in none of them the faculty I mentioned in my statement and contacted before works in my country. Of course they were interested about the project, but for different reasons (ie, one because it's urban history, another because it's transnationalish, etc.). So by all means look for fit, but in broad terms.