Aubergine

koolherc: if I am reading your signature correctly, you already received three offers?? Impressive! Do you mind sharing where? (We applied to a couple of the same programs.)

Oh well. I interviewed with my top choice earlier this week, so all of my energy/worry/prayers to the universe are dedicated to the aftermath of that particular exchange. Congrats to all who were selected to interview!

Every once in a while I check my spam folder, just in case, where half of the email subjects start with "Congratulations!"

Congrats, Ivandub! I choose to remain hopeful as well... although Duke Lit would be a weird fit for me.

Nice! Mine pertains to the philosophy and politics of movement, mostly in dance. Kind of a performance studies/(process) philosophy/new media mash-up.

Congrats, Clifford! You will certainly have your choice of programs! I heard the same rumour about Tisch, and so naturally, I neurotically looked at the background of every single PhD student listed on the website (even though I'm only applying to the MA). It seems to be true: only TWO out of the many PhD candidates have MAs from outside programs. So it seems that it is possible, but not likely, to get an offer without a Tisch MA. Clifford, do you mind sharing what your research interests are (by PM perhaps, if you don't feel comfortable posting them publicly)? It seems we have Brown and Tisch in common. And best of luck on Monday's interview with Brown, which I am also awaiting with a combination of excitement and dread (but mostly just excitement)! Which faculty at Brown are you particularly interested in working with?

Right. The admits come after the interview weekend... the first step is getting asked to interview! tillium, I'm super curious about your research interests, as it seems we have applied to some of the same interdisciplinary programs!

Thanks, vordosbntwin! Good to know. I can probably stop hovering over my inbox until the start of next week....

Theatre and Performance Studies. Bats, I sent you a message.

Duke's program in Literature doesn't fit into the usual categorizations. The name is misleading! As I understand it, it is probably most in line with Comp Lit, but it isn't comparative in the traditional sense. It is quite interdisciplinary and heavily invested in theory.

I posted about the interview at Brown! I was contacted by the department coordinator on Friday in order to set up an interview over Skype with the graduate program and department directors. I don't have any info on how many interviews they are conducting or how the process works, sadly.

Hmmm now I wonder if I should be worried that I haven't received an update from Duke this week.

Sparrow, thanks so much for the great list! I just received a request to interview with two professors at Brown (in Theatre and Performance Studies) over Skype! So excited and afraid.

Actually I just looked back at the first email, and you're right. They ARE identical. I somehow missed that line in the first one! Slightly spooky...

I think that the difference between the two emails (I assume yours is the same) is the addition of this line in the latter: "Regardless of whether documents are missing from your application file, it has been sent to the department for review." The listing of items received was identical in both emails for me as well, but I suppose that for people who were missing elements when the first emails went out, the second would indicate a change.

I must add to this thread that Duke has been the best school on my list, by far, when it comes to application status updates. Not one, but TWO emails in the past couple of weeks listing documents received; the latest one also stating that the application has been forwarded to the department (gulp). Yay for organization!

Thanks, Seeking! I did apply to NYU but not to Northwestern in the end, although I considered it.

I am applying in Performance Studies (mostly PhDs), broadly speaking. Although only one or two actual performance studies programs, as my work lies between dance studies, philosophy and critical theory, and cinema studies. I am also worried... as I think most of us are at this point in the process. It's really difficult to know where one stands! In my case, wanting to work on dance is a bit tricky, for all sorts of reasons. I did notice that certain departments (Brown in particular) really emphasize that work outside of academics is important, so if your writing is also strong then I'm sure you'll have great chances!

Just called Harvard admissions. Apparently the financial side of things has nothing to do with the academic side of things, and becomes relevant only if admitted. So it doesn't matter that the form was late. Pheeeew!!!

I'm sure you are fine. It was a glaring oversight on my part. I will go to pieces if my app to my top choice gets thrown out because of it!

This grievance is entirely my own fault, but I am totally freaking out! I somehow failed to notice that Harvard requires a separate application for financial aid, so I missed the deadline (December 31st) and just submitted it now. I called the Graduate School office, and the guy on the phone said that he thought Financial Aid had a softer deadline and that it would all be okay, but that I should call the Admissions hotline to be sure. I will be freaking out and kicking myself until their phone lines open at 2pm.

Swagato, I'm a first time applicant this year. (In cinema studies as well... sort of!)

This feels right to me too. When my partner applied three years ago, he mentioned specific names in every single SOP, and most of them were rockstars in his field of modern and contemporary poetics. He also contacted them all in advance by email, and most were extremely responsive. He ended up gaining admission to five top 10 programs. Strangely, the two schools that he didn't get into were the ones where the rockstar faculty didn't respond or were less responsive to his emails. One could read into this, but when it comes down to it, I imagine that the fit wasn't as strong at those two schools. I'm not sure to what extent email exchanges helped, but they certainly didn't hinder-- nor did the mentioning of specific faculty in a strong application. In my own applications, I briefly mentioned faculty members whose research was extremely relevant to my own, but I didn't do this at every single school. If specific faculty were a major factor in choosing a certain school (this was often the case), then to me it seemed relevant to mention them.

I'm finished my applications for the American schools I'm applying to, but still have a couple of Canadian applications to finish, including one which requires a 3000-4000 word project proposal. Yikes!

I wrote something about my experiences living and teaching abroad. Just a heads up: in my Stanford app, I realized when I went to post my statement that the limit was actually 700 characters, not 700 words.