crater21

Congrats CPetersen! That's great news to get an acceptance so early! In other news, I also finished my very last application last night! I guess the waiting properly begins today...

Nevermind, goldielocks. Just read your comment again. This is just for your academia.edu profile, right? I get it. lol, I think I'm going crazy! For a second I thought there was some service that would let you know if someone from an academic server googled you... (I suppose it's possible technically). But, nevermind! Back to my paranoia!

Whoa. Back up the bus. Are you telling me there's a service out there that will tell you if someone in academia has googled you??

Yeah, I agree. Toronto's application has been the worst! It drove all my references crazy because it would not send them a notification saying that their letter had been uploaded. For writing sample, it has asked for 6,000 words, which is not bad, but still a pain to cut down to. And, yeah, I had to write the SoP from scratch because the ones I submitted to American schools were unusable. Good luck with yours!

Does your application go to the History department or the Medieval Studies department, or both? I'm applying for the History PhD, and my application specifically asks for a Statement of Purpose (500 words). Incidentally, have other Toronto applicants felt that this statement of purpose is different from those at American universities? It seems to me that this one requires a more thorough "research proposal" rather than a general statement of your background and motivations for wanting to do graduate study in history. Is that just my sense?

Have you considered getting a PhD in the UK? You'd be done in three years (4 with a Masters). In contrast, North American PhDs can take anywhere between 5 - 7 years, maybe more. To me, spending that much time without the goal of going into academia just seems unwise. In the UK, it is very common for PhD students to pursue non-academic careers, partly because the degree is so short (it's not uncommon to do a BA, MA, and PhD in 7 years total). One of the reasons why the degree is short is because it's purely research-based, with little to no teaching commitments. Since you don't want to teach anyway, that would work for you. Places like Oxford, Cambridge, LSE are extremely well-regarded in foreign policy / international development circles, and London is quite the hub for think tanks and NGOs that work in those fields. So, it might be a good fit for you.

To be fair, the purpose of Occupy was not to bring about a revolution. So, the comparisons with the Arab Spring, etc, are flawed, I think. Rather, the purpose was to create a space - both physical and rhetorical - in which to start a dialog about inequality. In that much, it has succeeded. To take one small example, just think of how the terms "1%" and "99%" have become a part of public discourse. In many ways, Occupy has transformed the political debate in this country, as it is becoming evident through the 2012 election race. Obviously, we need some distance from the event to know how it will ultimately be viewed in history. But, I suspect that its real significance will be in the way it has brought issues of inequality and wealth distribution back to public discourse.

Ah, I see! Thanks!! I just checked, and yes, it does say "YES" under "At department".

My Columbia status still says "Submitted".

Yep, I got the email too. Panicked for a second because I thought my application was incomplete, but thankfully not. In terms of timeline, I am curious where they might fit the interview process, if that is something they are now doing (looking at the other thread...). Though, I have myself convinced that I won't be invited to an interview, so probably don't need to worry about it!

To expand on my point earlier, I am certainly not suggesting that history writing is completely objective. Of course it's not. Subjective biases creep into all parts of the process, from selecting sources to presenting evidence to making arguments. That does not mean, however, that we should not strive to write objective history. Personally, the way I see it is this: we begin with the premise that there is an objective past (or pasts) out there, and it is our job to try and get as close to it as possible. We recognize that we'll never fully access it because it will always be mediated by language. And, we will only ever be able to interact with it through sources, the production of which is itself deeply political and subjective. But, that is where the challenge of being a historian comes in. By critically evaluating sources and addressing our own biases in the work, we can strive to reach an objective account, even though we might never realize it fully. That is why I don't think we can start with the goal of wanting to support a particular agenda. We can't say, "I want to write a history in support of XYZ". Instead, we should start with a question we want to answer, keeping our minds open to whatever the answer(s) may be. Of course, the fact that we choose to ask one question over another is a result of our own experiences, and that is unavoidable. Anyway, this is just my view of it. Admittedly, I am more on the traditionalist side of this debate. But, the fun part for me is to see how other people view and write history, and that's why this thread has been so great. Thanks for all your responses!

To be honest, I don't really think it is the job of historians to support particular movements or causes. I think a historian's job is to be the dispassionate observer who aims to find the historical truth (or get as close to it as possible) without bending to ideology. So, red flags go up in my mind when I read things like To me, that sounds like the job of an activist, not a historian (and, I say that as someone who, on a personal level, supports a great deal of what the Occupy movement stands for) I fully recognize, btw, that this is a debatable position. Many people believe that historians should not be (and cannot be) impartial or that there's no such thing as "historical truth" etc etc. I totally respect this view, but just don't agree with it.

I think campus visits are very helpful either before applying or after you have been accepted. But, I wouldn't recommend doing them during the waiting period. It might come across as if you were trying to influence the admissions decision. And, if it were purely informational, then wouldn't they wonder why you didn't visit before applying? After all, the decision to apply has already been made, so presumably you had the information you needed. I guess if you were in town anyway and wanted to visit campus on your own without asking the department, there's nothing stopping you. But, I wouldn't contact PAs at this stage to request a visit. Just my two cents - other people may have other and better advice.

I haven't seen any official statistics or data about Oxbridge DPhils getting jobs in the United States. But, just from personal experience, I have seen many, many Oxbridge DPhils who are very well-placed in the United States and Canada. Part of it depends on the field too. In certain fields, practically every big name has been through Oxbridge at some point, either for undergraduate or postgraduate work. So, in that sense, their networks are very strong. Oxbridge is a small world, and they sometimes have a tendency to look after their own.

Happy New Year, everyone! goldielocks - congrats on the fellowship nomination!! That is wonderful news! I'm done 6/7 apps, and one is due later this month. I almost feel like the process never really ended, and before we know it, it'll be decision time!

5/7 applications in. I hate that I once again put myself in a position where I was scrambling to submit stuff an hour before the deadline! I'm sure it has affected the quality of my application, and will certainly hurt my confidence during the waiting period. Still I guess, it's a relief that this process is finally coming to an end!

Question for people who don't have their scores yet: When you go into your GRE account, does it give you an option "View Scores" or not? My account does give me that option, but when I click on it, it says, "Your request could not be completed." I am trying to figure out if this is because my scores are not yet available, or if there is some reason they are not showing up. I contacted GRE, and they basically said that the date for scores to become available is November 8th.

Took the test on September 7th. No scores yet. But, based on the comments posted here, I am already a bit disappointed. It seems that the new scale is set up to have very little variation among top scores for verbal, which means that if verbal is your strength you don't really get an opportunity to distinguish yourself particularly. On the other hand, there seems to be much greater variation among top scores for quant. In my case, I feel that what would have been a decent score on the old quant scale will translate into a less-than-decent score on the new scale.

As long as you guys are talking about writing samples... Does the sample need to be a fully-formed, stand alone essay? Or, could it be a chapter or two of a larger piece?

Great list! I study the eighteenth century too, and I love the Brewer and the Klein. Pitts has also been very important to me. By the way, have you read Emma Rothschild's The Inner Life of Empires? It was just published a few months ago, and it is already one of my favourite 18th century histories. If you enjoy 18th century and imperial history (as I can tell you do from your list), I guarantee you will love Rothschild.

Thanks for the advice, Safferz! I went to university overseas, and have graduated and moved back since. So, unfortunately, dropping by his office is not an option. I guess I will give him a call. But, he is notoriously disorganized, and I'm starting to wonder if it's worth the stress. I can just see it now - the missed deadlines, the frantic phone calls, the hastily written letters. Maybe it's better off to go with someone else. And, yes, you are right about the GRE. Hope everyone's weekends are going well!

Yep, nervous breakdown happening any moment now. Sources of anxiety: 1. One of my referees still has not responded to my message yet (sent email on Monday). I know he will write a good reference (because he himself offered to do it last year without my asking) and he is well-established in the field. But, he is extremely disorganized, and very likely to miss deadlines, which is making me wonder if I should just drop him altogether and get someone else (that would be another source of anxiety...) 2. Supposedly GRE results will be coming out soon. I just know that the Math section is not going to be good. But, what if I screwed up the essays? In a panic attack last night, I registered to write the GRE again in late-November. I figure I will just cancel if the scores are okay.

Great. So, my 750-800 range in Verbal doesn't really matter because people with lower than that will still get 170. But, my sucky quantitative range will look even worse. I just knew that the revised test was going to screw me over somehow!

Thanks! That is similar to what I'm doing as well. But, I was thinking of registering my referees on the online application now, rather than waiting until each application was complete. Are you waiting to register them when you have completed all the applications?

Super unproductive weekend! With family visiting from out of town, my grand plans to whip off another draft of my SoP went totally awry. In the end, I managed to write to a couple more potential supervisors (positive reply from one, still no reply from the other), and worked a bit on condensing my thesis into a writing sample. That is going to be one of the harder parts of the application, I suspect. I still don't know what to cut and what to keep.