earlyamerican

Crap. So it's starting to look like those who got into Chicago have been contacted. Anyone care to disagree and make my day?

[quote name="Louiselab

Inside sources tell me all decisions have been made. Nobody's heard? Really?

I don't know if any of you applied to Harvard's History of American Civilization, but according to my inside source, all decisions have been made. Since basically the FOURTH of this month. Either the admits aren't on here, are being extremely mum, or Harvard's sitting on the news. In which case: Bastards.

My husband and I were investigating the Peace Corps in case I didn't get in anywhere. I kinda wish we had done it now, but I've got acceptances, so: on to career!

Eeep. I only see two Chicago posts. Seems like it could be just one professor emailing? The waiting, it pains me.

Sorry, I suck at acronyms. What rankings are you talking about? Where do I find them?

Ziraffa, slow clap. I hear your anger and I know it so well it's like a second skin. I just read this entire thread from its inception and I want to give everyone a hug. Not in a pity party way, but in a "hell yeah, keep going everyone!" way. First thing I want to say is that anyone who has even the mildest interest in this thread should find, if they haven't already, ZZ Packer's short story "Drinking Coffee Elsewhere." It's the name of the book it's in, too, but that story in particular was the first thing I read that actually described and put a finger on the profound alienation I felt as a working class scholarship kid at a Ridiculously Prestigious University. I can write all day long about how miserable I was as an undergrad, and how much I wish I had the perspective then that I do now. Suffice it to say, it's along the lines of what you all have written. What I really want to add here is my recent thinking about how I'm going to deal with the re-entry into the world of the ultra-privileged, which I've rarely seen (thankfully) in the five years since I graduated. This week I was accepted to another Ridiculously Prestigious U for grad school, and I attended a couple of events. The old culture shock is familiar. I met snot-nosed first year man-children who act like they own the world (and they very well might). I cringed at the beautiful women with perfect teeth and skin. I'm no troll, but damn. I still don't understand how money buys beauty so consistently, but one thing I've learned is that it does. And I was reintroduced to the prim, restrained way that the privileged speak and act that makes me feel so awkward and unpolished, so much an uninvited guest to someone else's party. So what I know about myself now, that I didn't at 22, is that all of these things are my insecurity buttons. I'm realizing now that I'm going to have these buttons pushed hard and frequently in a way that I haven't for five years, by faculty, peers, and even students I'm teaching. I'm trying to look at this as an opportunity to put those demons to rest since I'll have plenty of opportunities to feel insecure based purely on the academic challenge, the job market, tenure review, etc, etc. I'm trying to edit the image I have of myself that's reflected in a group of privileged people. Like this: I am not awkward, I live in the real world. I laugh heartily because I love life, which is too damn short to spend worrying about laughing too hard. I don't speak Rich Person, but I can always find the words to move people. I impress people with my sincerity, insight, and enthusiasm, not my clothes or haughtiness. I can be confident because I've lived through a lot worse than some trifling department bullshit. I know I'm tough; I don't have to stage it. I'm damn skilled at being near-broke all the time, and I can hustle under-the-table work like a panhandler at a tourist destination. I'll be fine, but I know I'm going to get my rage button pushed from time to time. I'm telling myself that it's not really about me, because it isn't. I'm going to have to let other people's entitlement issues be like water off a duck's back. I know how to talk myself down off the crazy ledge, and I know that wherever I go, there are always some real people. I might have to work harder than everybody, but I can do it because I know what it takes to get what I want (a book contract and a job!), not because I have anything to prove. I write all this because I hope it's helpful. The application fees, the family obligations, etc., come at a greater cost to us than others, but clearly we've been making do with what we've got for this long and will find a way to continue doing so. What I find truly dangerous is the all-too-easily internalized sense that we don't belong in academia the way other people do. If we can find the strength to take the bullshit for what it is without letting it get us down - at least too often - we'll stay focused on the goal. Best of luck to everyone. You've earned it like few others have.

Just search the results for "harvard american civilization" and you'll see previous years' results. You should also just search "harvard american" for all of them, as some people put "american studies" or variants in instead of am civ. You'll get history and African-American Studies results, but if you can make it through Harvard's shitty lack of application instructions, I'm sure you'll find what you need here.

According to gradcafe archives, I think the earliest anyone has heard back from Harvard Am Civ was Feb 20. Mostly it's been at least a week later than that, especially last year. Harvard History seems to have reported, but not Am Civ.

Fuck. You realize Chicago's kind of notorious for accepting people with little or no funding, right? Do you mean they'll perhaps admit just the people they actually intend to fund (like sane schools) or will they play the same games, but with fewer people? As far as UCs, I happen to know that Berkeley History has restructured some stuff so that grad student stipends are largely covered by private donations from alumni-types. It's a little more crisis-proof, which is why they've released funding package info though none of the other UCs have.

I hope that any merciful powers left in the universe will converge to prevent those two from being gynecologists. You can major in Misogyny at Bob Jones, can't you?

OK, right? Barbara is absolutely the best. Wrote the most incredibly clear instructions, wrote when our files were complete, gracefully handled that whole Berkeley grad app server meltdown on the deadline - and yeah, that Dec 1 deadline almost killed me - and when I hand-delivered my non-electronic stuff on Dec 1, fifteen minutes before the deadline, because I am SUCH a neurotic freak, she was Zen-like even though she told me she had 95 phone calls that day. Applying to any UC school is like having the IRS give you a colonoscopy. Barbara rules. If only all departments were like Berkeley's.

You guys, I feel for you. I got rejected HARD last year, so I I've had no sense of where i stood, even though I knew I had a good application. My little sister is also applying to PhD programs (not in history) and now that I know I'm safe, all I care about is her getting admitted and funded. Everyone else can reject me; I'm going somewhere. In my happy fantasy land mind, I want everyone to get in. But I really just want my sister to get in. I haven't told her about this website because she'll lose her mind. But I'm checking all of her programs all the time. Crossing my fingers for everyone.

Oh. My. Effing. God. Thank Effing God, your post made me check my spam box on the off hope of notification. I'm f&cking admitted. Oh. My. Effing. God.

Holy shit. Seriously? In history? Did you post that on the results page? I didn't see it. Currently crapping myself. Berkeley is my one option where I don't have to haul husband, cat and thousands of books across the country. Shit shit shit, shit, shit. Who emailed you? A professor? Barbara? I really want to go to the Obama talk sponsored by history tomorrow night but I don't want to make an ass of myself. I know one of the profs from when he was a grad student, and he's awesome, and I have a total Obama fixation, so. I swear it's not a brownnosing endeavor. OMG, I'm dying now.

SNORT! Good one.

Ah, UChicago: Just doing their small part to ensure that the ruling class keeps its death grip on the intelligentsia. I've worked in several admissions offices, and their whole "No PhD, but we luuuurve you and will give you 20% off your MA if you BUY NOW!" is some ghetto-style 3-card-monte setup. Scandalous. I've seen more sophisticated maneuvers from For Profit Universities. I reconsidered applying when I saw their bullshit financial aid application. I forget the wording now, but it was something like "You're not likely to get funding, so please list your sources of funding (parents, friends, trust funds, etc.) available to you in the upcoming year." They annoyed me with "trust funds." I mean, we all have them, right? Like who doesn't? *eyeroll* But "friends?" This made me laugh. WTF? That's some friend to shell out 45,000 a year. Please. Or do they intend their educational services for those with wealthy grandfatherly benefactors, all Mr. Brownlow style? So just because I couldn't resist, I honestly wrote: Source: California Lottery (pending winning numbers) Amount: Mega Millions If I had known about their cheeseball recruiting strategy with the MA consolation prize, I probably would have said "screw em" and applied elsewhere. I already had GRE scores and letters being sent, but what a turnoff. The faculty I want to work with seemed lovely, despite having some kind of bailout-sucking AIG executive in charge of MA recruiting and application wording. ETA: I realize I'm about a year late to the party on this, but I was frankly horrified to discover this little MA trick via the archives for Chicago admissions/rejections.

Okay, this? m_stanfordRejectionCounter++; was the most clever comment ever. You win.

High school history is not the same as academic history. Survey course history is not the same as academic history. Dude, don't be such a careerist: it kills your imagination. Imagination and a sense of narrative are important if you want to spend your life writing books about history! Type-A perfectionism does not make for good writing, just clean citation and correct grammar. Important stuff, of course, but not compelling in and of itself. See if you can get a work study job in your library's archives/special collections. If you don't have a heart attack from giddy bliss at being surrounded with primary sources - every single time you're there - rethink the PhD. Or, unless you can be totally engrossed by scanning horrible-quality microfilm for so many hours that your butt falls asleep and doesn't wake up until the next morning, rethink it. You get what I'm saying. My favorite prof of all time told me "there's no such thing as a child prodigy in the humanities." You're what, 19 at most? Live a little. Date early, date often, get your heart broken, get over it. Go volunteer in an emergency room and watch some human drama. Read some mystical stuff and have a spiritual crisis. Have multiple identity crises. An academic career is one long set of insecurity-inducing trials, so the more firm a grasp you have on your own self and what counts for you, the more stable a grad student you'll be. After all, it's just another kind of job, and no civilian cares how prestigious you are. Sorry to get all preachy, but I do honestly worry about the straight-from-undergrad people. Every year, at universities everywhere, there are an awful lot of suicides by students and even faculty, and I have to believe that the one-dimensionality of the "X-TREME ACHIEVEMENT" cultures at so many schools is at least a contributing factor.

It's just like if you were being recruited for any other job in a place requiring relocation. Obviously your spouse/partner isn't going to go into the office, sit down in the boardroom, and meet your boss, right? But if there's a definitively social, after-hours event planned, of course partners are going to be invited. In the unimaginable-to-me scenario that they wouldn't be, whoever your contact is will certainly be expecting that question.

OK, this whole thread cracks me up. True story: Back when my senior honors cohort was beginning the sequence of seminars for our theses with our beloved department advisor (BDA), one student asked the rest of us what we called the BDA. Turns out we were all super confused & awkward. None of us could think of a single time that he had actually introduced himself at the start of one of our classes, thereby cuing us. We started breaking it down. We knew the following things: 1. Other faculty AND staff called him by his first name, which is actually a common nickname for his real first name 2. One of us had called him by his first name once, and was not corrected, though the student felt weird about it 3. He signs all his emails very warmly but with only his initials 4. The initials he uses on those emails are the initials of his full first name, not the nickname. 5. Our university's culture was such that only the most arrogant blowhard profs would demand that they be addressed as Prof X, and nobody really went by Dr. X. 6. Our BDA was no blowhard, yet had his share of sensitivities. 7. Here's the catch: he was a senior lecturer, not TT, though he frequently ran the department and has been there since the 70s. So not actually technically a "Professor." We were wise enough as undergrads to allow for the fact that this may be a sore spot. It's like a freaking LSAT logic problem, is it not? We spent most of an hour one night discussing this! I took the strategy of trying to use his name as infrequently as possible, but I have stuck with Professor Lastname. Years later, I figure it's a term of endearment. It still cracks me up because even now, when writing emails, I have to pause to consider whether to issue the "Professor" treatment or to just skip it. If I'm replying to an ongoing thread, I skip it. If I haven't written in a while, or he hasn't, I bring on the Prof. All this complicated BS and he probably doesn't even care or notice.

For those of you with interviews where they actually want you physically on campus, I certainly hope they're giving you some kind of travel stipend. If this were common practice, and I had to fly to even *some* of the 7 schools to which I applied just to keep myself in the game, I'd be pissed. Frankly, my credit cards can't take any more abuse like that now that I'm done with applications.

Well, I didn't expect to hear anything this soon, but now that I have one acceptance, with no mention of funding or when that's decided, I'm checking the results page like an addict. At least it's an acceptance, I know; without their top funding it's not going to do me any good though. I just started a fairly intense new job so I haven't had this barfy nervous feeling for weeks. It's back now.

Hi everyone, good luck surviving the waiting. So I want to know what the deal is with interviews. I've never really heard of humanities programs calling applicants for phone interviews, but it seems I saw a couple updates at one of my schools that indicated profs were calling some students (though I've seen no decisions either way). It seems the hard sciences and business are more into interviews than history. Does this vary completely by school, department, and faculty member, or is it a tool for when they can't decide between Person A and Person B, or what?