marXian

I completely agree with this and want to just emphasize why this is the case. Spending those two extra years is not just about doing extra coursework for the sake of coursework. I've seen a lot of people saying (in other threads) that they just don't want to do more coursework if they've already done one M* degree. I totally get that. I have two already and am earning a third in my current program. But the coursework is there (among some other reasons) to help you figure out what areas your exams are going to be in and in what direction your dissertation might go. The bottom line is that American institutions care a lot about competencies. The way you prove those is through comprehensive examinations. Those are supposed to demonstrate you're qualified to teach in the areas you take exams in. If you're in a program where all you're doing is directed research and writing a dissertation, it's going to be tough to convince American schools that you're qualified to teach, though it can be done other ways (e.g. publications.) But this is why even degrees second tier American schools may ultimately be more marketable than degrees from European schools. Certainly, there are some fantastic schools in the UK and on the continent, and I'm sure everyone knows more than a couple professors who did their doctoral work abroad, but it's important to know exactly what the disadvantages are in going that route, especially because those who do take on substantial debt.

I think part of the value of contacting POIs in advance of application is to weed out some options since the application process is so expensive. There were some programs and POIs I thought would be a great fit, but upon contacting them, I either got no response or a short message that more or less communicated they weren't interested. I was then able to cross those off the list. Others were exceedingly helpful, pointing me to other potential POIs either in the same department or elsewhere. Two members of UVA's department each spoke to me on the phone and gave me extensive advice for my SOP. After all of that, I was admitted to a program where I had not contacted my POI before hand (because I chose to add it to my list in November.)

The worst part about "fit" is that it's the one thing that is basically totally out of your control. You can (and should) contact POIs in order to figure out if there's some mutual interest in working together--it is definitely in your control to apply to programs that seem to work best for your interests. But fit isn't always just about you and what you're interested in. It's also about the sorts of students that are already in the department, students your POI is already advising, students the dept. wants to admit, etc. If you're interested in x, and x is a very narrow field, but your POI has one or two students already studying x, he/she may not want to take you on simply because he/she doesn't want that many students working in the same relatively narrow field. There are usually some political considerations with regard to what tracks get to take on how many students, if any, for a given year. There's only so much money. If NT and American Religions has 10 students each because they added 2 or 3 each last year but Islamic Studies and Theology only have 2 or 3 students each total, the department may want to focus on extending more offers to qualified students applying to those tracks in order to build them up. That doesn't mean that an NT or AR person has no shot at getting into a department like that; it just means that you need to do the research in order to figure out what the current department make up is, and what sorts of students were added to the department recently in order to try to increase your competitive edge. Finding out what your POIs emerging interests are is a really good idea. If you'd be willing to do a project that falls in with those, I think it gives you a bit of an edge because your POI is probably going to be more excited about that kind of project.

There's a difference though between doing some biblical work (e.g. referencing biblical texts in order to support an argument) and doing Biblical Studies in a Ph.D program. The latter requires a level of language work that goes way beyond the sort of practical application you're talking about. If your concern is practice, I'd suggest again an RS department that does theology or maybe a practical theology program would be a good choice. Not trying to steer you away from doing theoretical work, but you're probably not going to be talking practical church application much in a traditional theology program--even one that does something like theopoetics.

Good idea, Kuriakos. I can answer questions about Northwestern and studying theology in a religious studies department more generally.

Drew and CGU are probably the only prominent places in which process thought is still being done. I have to be honest though--I think process theology is a dead end. Catherine Keller (at Drew) is really the only person doing anything interesting, and her work isn't even really rigorously process. And I agree with fnkyfreshman--you'll need to choose whether you want to do theology or biblical studies. That doesn't mean you can't do a little of one from the perspective of the other, but biblical studies as a discipline entails a whole other set of skills (languages and particular research methods) that don't figure into theological work at all. If you're interested in combining the study of embodiment/lived experience in religious practice with theology, a religious studies program with a theology track would also be a good fit, I think.

I would second Northwestern as a good option. I'm there now (in the Religious Studies dept.) and critical theory is a subfield of mine. Peter Fenves (German department) might be a person of interest. He is an Adorno and Benjamin scholar. Sam Weber (also German dept.) was actually a student of Adorno's. The way comp lit. works at NU is that you're admitted to a home dept. (like German or French) but you're working on a comp lit. PhD. There isn't a comp lit "department." We do A LOT of German stuff here across the philosophy, RS, and comp lit programs, from the Reformation to the present (for example, I study 19th/20th century German theology in the RS dept.) NU has a program called the interdisciplinary cluster initiative which encourages interdisciplinary study. There is a "critical theory" cluster that's fairly large and composed of mostly English, philosophy, comp lit, and poli sci students. From that, I've been involved in a fairly rigorous reading group in aesthetics for the last year with some English and art history students. We've been reading Hegel's Aesthetik over the summer. There is a lot of stuff like that going on here (more intangible stuff that you wouldn't necessarily be able to glean from the website.) With regard to the philosophy department specifically, it's true that no one is doing Frankfurt School work, but there are a couple people who could be resources for pre-FS philosophy (Rachel Zuckert does Kant and aesthetics and Mark Alznauer does Hegel and 19th/early 20th century social theory including Marx and Weber.) The humanities departments are very friendly with one another here making it very easy to take whatever courses you need, take comps in whatever areas are relevant to you, and include faculty on your dissertation committee from whatever departments make sense for you. Comp lit is obviously really flexible in this respect since the program is supported by multiple departments. Hope that helps!

To answer your primary question in brief: Your interests are very different, so yes, you would probably want to be very careful about seeking out potential POIs and deciding which programs would be strongest for which of your interests. With such a wide range, however, (theology and biblical studies alone cover...so, so much) I'd recommend paring it down a bit. From my perspective (and from reading other posts here), if you want to do Biblical Studies, just focus on that. I honestly can't imagine applying to both theology and biblical studies programs and remaining competitive. The applications are quite involved, and biblical studies programs are especially competitive. It sounds like your real interest is in theology and queer theory, so I'd stick with that. It's not too difficult to find programs that do literature (in the broadest possible sense) and theology (I have both a BA and an MA in English, btw) but you have to take a close look at those programs to make sure the faculty are interested in the sort of literature (and theory) that you are. In my experience, theologians are not interested in literature in the same way that literary scholars are. I took a theology and literature course in seminary (after my English MA) and was supremely frustrated by the lack of theory--since that is the bread and butter of most English departments in the U.S. That's not to say that theology must engage literature in the same way as literary scholars, but I think there is something to be said for the usefulness of theory with regard to literature (and theology, for that matter), and there wasn't any acknowledgement at all that that could be a valid way of approaching a literary text theologically. Often times, theologians who study literature study figures and texts who/that are already more or less overtly religious (Milton, Flannery O'Connor, etc.) I just don't find that compelling at all. I'm still loosely connected to the English world in academia, and it seems to me that religion (broadly speaking) has more or less become an appropriate avenue again into texts. If you were interested in doing something at the intersection of literature, religion, and queer theory, that sounds like the makings of a project proposal that some English departments would be very excited about. I don't know if I could say the same about RS/theology departments--other than Emory, I don't know of any programs doing contemporary literature and religion/theology. With regard to your other two ideas (theologies of the body and existential theology), there is no lack of programs where you could do a project in either of those areas. My own work at Northwestern is broadly working in Schleiermacher, Barth, Brunner, and Tillich. There are a few philosophers here who do work on Kierkegaard. I'm sure that is the case at many universities that also have PhD programs in religion. There are also a number of religious studies scholars/theologians here in the RS department at NU who do work on sexual ethics, phenomenology of religion, etc. who would probably be interested in taking on a student doing queer theory and theology/religious experience. There are no students here doing work in that area. I'm fairly certain all the top programs in RS (i.e. Duke, Harvard, Yale, etc.) have someone who does work in theology and queer theory or at least theologies of the body.

Northwestern has many certificate programs that also intersect with what's called the Interdisciplinary Cluster Initiative. (Some clusters offer certificates, but there are certificate programs without clusters and visa versa.) There are clusters (with certificates) in classics and critical theory (which has many art history students and a lot of reading groups in aesthetics. I'm a member of this cluster as well). Here's a link to the cluster initiative site (which links to the list of certificate programs as well): http://www.tgs.northwestern.edu/academics/academic-programs/cluster-certificate/index2.html It's not "classics" but there are A LOT of medievalists here (both students and faculty) who are interested in the intersection of religion and art, and they're spread out among the RS, art history, English, and history departments. Interdisciplinary study is highly encouraged here, though that's probably fairly common nowadays. Still, most students take at least one exam in a different department. Some have two home departments and TA/teach courses in both. What is maybe not quite as common is that the various humanities departments get along together quite well here--or at least with religious studies!

This is key: Unless you have a degree in philosophy, you're probably not getting into a philosophy PhD program. There are probably some exceptions, especially if you're looking at religiously affiliated schools, but if you want to make extra sure, head on over to the philosophy forum and ask those folks what they think. Also, even if you did get into a philosophy program, doing a theological project is probably not going to be acceptable unless framed in a non-theological way (again probably barring strongly religiously affiliated schools.) I too will shamelessly plug my own program: If you're interested in the renewal of metaphysics in theology, you should consider Northwestern's religious studies department. Christine Helmer is broadly interested in that. She's primarily a Luther scholar but has done some extensive work on Schleiermacher as well. She has an article titled "Mysticism and Metaphysics: Schleiermacher and a Historical-Theological Trajectory" which I think is a good example of what we're doing theologically in the department (though the article is 10 years old now.) Most of the humanities departments at NU have a fantastic working relationship with each other. RS has enjoyed a great relationship with the philosophy and German departments in particular. The philosophy department here is heavy on the German side of things particularly in Idealism, which sounds like it would work for you. Most Catholic schools have a deep appreciation for philosophical approaches. I have a friend at Duquesne right now, and he's really enjoying it (and it is guaranteed funding for 5 years.)

Good to know someone is reading! Chicago Theological Seminary would be a place you could do continental philosophy/theology. Ted Jennings does some work on Lacan, and one of his former students is Adam Kotsko (who wrote Zizek and Theology and is one of Giorgio Agamben's primary translators). That would probably be an MA in theology rather than religion (with a philosophy of religion emphasis) but you would still be doing a lot of philosophy of religion. Again though, you probably won't get much aid, if any. Yale's MAR program might be a good option too. As you go forward though, I would advise flexibility and openness to what you'd be willing to study within the continental tradition. A lot of new grad students with interests in continental philosophy (typically Derrida, Lacan, Zizek, etc.) starting M* programs in religion or theology don't really consider the practicality of those interests in RS or theology programs as they're looking for places to apply for their PhD. Not saying it isn't possible, but the reality is that there are just very few programs (especially ones with good financial packages) that will allow you to specialize in, say, post-structural thought and theology or psychoanalysis and theology, and many of the ones that do are pretty tough to get into (UVA, for example.) I don't know what your interests are specifically, but being willing to do some work across the tradition (from Leibniz or Kant into the 20th century) is a good idea so that when you're researching PhD programs, you'll have many more options. You would have ample opportunity to do that at CGU, CTS, UChicago, or Yale. Also (as I've said in other threads) from what I've encountered so far, I think specializations in or dissertations on a historical tradition, genealogy, figure, etc. are more marketable than purely constructive/theoretical ones. The latter can be done in your second or third book!

I second Lux's suggestion. UChicago will probably fit your interests well, provide some funding, and give you great preparation for application to PhD programs, if that's your goal. A back up might be Claremont, but you're not going to get much if any funding there.

I have an Apple laptop that's on it's last leg, but in class, I take notes in a graph paper Moleskine. Many in my department only use an iPad and I've seen people from other departments with just iPads or netbooks. Those whom I know who bring iPads to class for notes and the readings also have either a desktop or laptop that they use at home for writing their papers. I'm thinking of switching to one of those options (probably a tablet) when my laptop finally croaks. I've become quite accustomed to using Scrivener to write my papers (which I highly recommend checking out, btw), so I will probably get a cheaper laptop or desktop to keep at home to write papers and a tablet for class. I did have an experience last quarter with a professor who refused to post PDFs of articles and chapters we were reading on Blackboard, though we could find them ourselves through JSTOR or what have you. Half way through the quarter he banned electronic devices for reading or note taking. In a graduate level seminar. He didn't do it in a mean or angry way, he just said he wanted to "be able to see everyone's eyes"--obviously because he felt like those of us who were using our laptops/tablets for some of the readings weren't giving our full attention. So I suppose you could encounter a situation like that where your planned style of regular seminar equipment gets thrown out the window! (Hopefully only figuratively.)

Kuriakos is right that Fuller is quite expensive, but I do know someone there doing his Ph.D who was able to secure some funding from them and enough external scholarships to have at least the first couple years paid for. There is funding out there, but you really have to work hard to figure it out (I did my MA in theology there.) The other thing to consider is how a Ph.D in theology from a seminary might limit your job prospects (obviously barring a place like PTS.) In fact, it was Nancey Murphy at Fuller who convinced me to take seminaries off of my list of places to apply. If you do a Ph.D in theology focused on systematics/constructive theology, it will be pretty tough to land a job in a secular department, limiting your prospects to religiously affiliated schools. If that isn't a problem for you, then obviously ignore this. =) But if you'd be interested in doing something more related to historical theology/intellectual history and/or philosophy, then you could essentially write the same dissertation in a secular institution that you would have at Fuller, GTU, or Claremont-Lincoln. I could be wrong, but my sense is that historical doctoral work in theology is more marketable for jobs than constructive work, overall. And that doesn't mean you have to then become a historian who never does any constructive work. Lots of active constructive theologians did their doctoral work on something historical. Sockness at Stanford does do theology--it's just from the perspective of intellectual history/historical theology. There are two recent Stanford grads in my department (one faculty one post-doc) who did more "traditional" RS tracks and neither are hostile toward theology. Obviously that doesn't necessarily reflect the faculty there, but they both seem to have some comfort and familiarity with historical theology, intellectual history of theology, etc. being a part of a religion department. I agree with Windfish that your family should come first, but if there's any flexibility there, I would consider programs all over the country in order to both find a program that is going to be a good fit and one that is fully funded.

I second Kuriakos. A prof who has sat on an adcom will have a general idea of what they look for. Of the profs I spoke to about this, they all stressed the importance of making it clear that you have a direction in which you want to go, that you're somewhat familiar with the department and your POI's work, but you're not so specific that it seems you have nothing left to learn. Humanities programs in the U.S. all want to know that their program will shape your thought in a significant way, and if it seems like you think you already know everything and are ready to jump right into the dissertation, (or have even written a substantial part of it already!) they're going to be less interested. Obviously striking the balance between demonstrating enough interest and preparation while not over-doing it can be quite difficult, but keeping in mind that your interests are not set in stone based on your SOP and that POIs all understand and expect you have things that they can teach you and work with you on can be helpful.

Lux, I think you're absolutely right. The theologians (all two of them) at Northwestern are interested in constructive work, but they believe strongly that what theology contributes to the religious studies department (of which theology is a part, much like Yale's set up) the larger institution is important intellectual history. Most of the other humanities departments here concur. Chicago has some younger faculty doing constructive work (Kevin Hector comes to mind), but I think you're right. Definitely a good question. I think "systematic theology" covers a much broader range. That is, it could be that a systematic theologian does constructive work (i.e. normative theological work that makes claims about how people should think about theological concepts today), and many who are out of programs and teaching do, but I think there are many studying systematic theology in Ph.D programs who are doing work on particular theologians and making claims in their dissertations about how we should read and understand someone else's theology. But even then, what is being done is almost strictly theological work. Of course at a certain point, one crosses the line into "historical theology" as a field, but where that line is seems to be more or less subjective. What Lux is alluding to and what my department does is something that stretches out a bit more into the the philosophical/historical/political context and implications of a particular theologian's work and how those theological claims participate in a broader tradition of thought. No one studying theology in my department is making normative constructive claims about contemporary theology. Hope that helps!

I assume by "women's studies" you also mean "gender studies?" I ask because those aren't necessarily the same to everyone, and the latter seems to fall more under the category of "theory" while the former seems to be something more general in the humanities. Theory does seem to be hot right now at a lot of institutions (and gender or queer theories in particular.) I come from an English lit. background where theory has been the name of the game more or less for the last 50 years. In that discipline, it's something that seems to come and go in waves, but it never fully disappears. Some literature scholars despise it while others do far more theory than they do work on actual literature. While the two are not entirely analogous, I think it's safe to say that we could expect a similar trend within religion/theology/biblical studies. People have been interested in questions of difference and "othering" for a long time, and I don't see that disappearing anytime soon. The good news for religion and related fields is that unlike literature departments, the departments who lean towards theory also recognize other methodologies as valuable.

@Yetanotherdegree Interesting that you mention developing competency in an area far from your interest. When I read that, I immediately thought, "Yep, I've been told that I'll probably be asked to teach World Religions or Intro to Religion in my first job in which I'll obviously have to include Eastern religions of which I currently have almost no knowledge." But then you mentioned pastoral theology, which is a completely different way to think about it. Again, it's just interesting how different one's experience can be. Of course, no one in my department expects that theologians develop an official competency in an Eastern religion, but no one would ever suggest pastoral theology to me either, though I wouldn't be opposed to developing that (I was on the pastoral staff of a church (as the youth pastor) while I attended an Evangelical seminary very committed to training pastors.) Pastoral theology is maybe a very marginal concern of the theologians at NU, and although I could take courses in pastoral theology at Garrett Evangelical Seminary, it would probably be seen as an odd choice here. It sounds though like you have some good options where you are. I do think there is wisdom in developing sub-disciplines and taking comps in areas that can diversify your skill set without seeming completely random and unrelated to your primary area of interest.

There are obviously a lot of ways to answer this depending on what one is interested in. American Christianity comes with very different prospects than either NT or theology, though there's some overlap. In my department, 40% or so of students study American religions (and most of those American Catholicism.) None have any interest in jobs at religiously affiliated schools. I, on the other hand, would be willing to take a job just about anywhere that would have me--as long as I could sign the statement of faith in good conscience! Point is, it's hard to compare subfields within RS. But I can speak to theology more specifically. When I applied to PhD programs, I was originally interested in doing something in constructive/contemporary theology and theological method, and in my experience, a lot of people who become interested in continental philosophy and/or radical theology tend to lean toward doing something "cutting edge" in their dissertations. I was one of those. As I emailed back and forth with my advisor over the summer before my first year, she convinced me that doing historical work would be far more marketable. Write a historical dissertation and save the constructive work for my second or third book. We've compromised a little bit. I decided to work on Schleiermacher and will hopefully do a project that incorporates Paul Tillich. I also have a background in critical theory, so I'm fashioning that into a political theology subfield with her help. I think much depends upon one's institution, advisor, and the resources available in order to write a first-rate dissertation. I wouldn't overlook the importance of that. After a year at Northwestern, I can see that it would've been pretty difficult to pull off a constructive or very contemporary dissertation had I been really stubborn. But NU has a very strong faculty in 18th/19th century German philosophy and literature as well as critical theory. Anything that I need outside of that (e.g. seminars on Schleiermacher, Tillich, or other theology) I've can take at UChicago. Or as a directed reading. So leaning the direction I did was a natural fit for me. I say all this because even though it would be really nice to have our pick of top ten programs to attend in order to end up in the program that fits us exactly, the reality is that many people (like me!) only get into a couple places which may make a change in the game plan necessary.

I second everything that jdmhotness has said and would add, per your question about social life, that it is a really really good idea to have one. It is possible, especially at the Ph.D level but even in the M*, to spend just about every waking moment reading, studying, and writing. You'll go nuts doing that. It's a good idea to come up for air, see a dumb movie, get a beer with friends, go for walks (not in that order necessarily!) Finding some balance is necessary in order to be successful.

Body Politics is absolutely right: You do not want to come across as if you have nothing left to learn and that you just need a school to pay you to write your dissertation. Much of that impression is going to be made in your SOP, but having a list of publications and conference presentations that is *too long* is not going to help you. I've heard this from professors at multiple institutions. Of course, like with literally everything else in a doctoral application, it's going to be subjective. But if you don't have any of the things listed above, I wouldn't worry too much--just make sure you've done your homework on the schools you're applying to, have contacted some POIs, and work really really hard on your SOP and writing sample.

Since you're not moving and planning on applying to the same institution, I concur with jdmhotness. Normally, I would say the doctoral seminar because (at least in my experience) you'll be writing a longer paper, probably with a narrowed focus, and the prof. is more likely to give you extensive comments if you ask and say you'd like to use it for a writing sample. But yes, since you're planning to stay local, how well known the prof is nationally probably isn't going to be that important. Local schools will most likely have some idea who people are at your institution.

You're asking a really nuanced question that no single answer is probably going to be able to cover. For instance, if your friend believes that the Bible must be the foundation of faith, that's going to eliminate whole groups of texts. If he's open to understandings that don't take the Bible as the foundation of faith, that would argue that, in general, searching for a foundation is a bad idea, he might have an easier time understanding the question: "How can the Bible be the foundation of faith if it isn't inerrant?" That can be answered with, "It can't, but the Bible doesn't need to be the foundation of faith in order for faith to be robust and real." I don't have Bible-specific recommendations, but I can recommend some texts on theology that might help. Something like George Lindbeck's The Nature of Doctrine, in which he employs Wittgenstein to talk about theological language, would be good. Lindbeck doesn't really focus on the Bible, but his discussion of the philosophy of language with regard to theological language applies to the Bible. It's also sort of passé among contemporary theologians, but for someone who is trying to understand how one could dismiss inerrancy and still argue for a robust theology, it's a good starting point. Fergus Kerr's Theology After Wittgenstein is good, and more recently, Kevin Hector's Theology Without Metaphysics. All of these treat Wittgenstein and theology. Another older book that treats Derrida and Karl Barth together is Graham Ward's Derrida, Barth, and the Language of Theology. If those seem too progressive or too liberal for your friend, James K.A. Smith might be a good person to turn to. Who's Afraid of Postmodernism? might be helpful (he discusses Derrida, Lyotard, and Foucalt.) It's a fairly loose reading of those three, but it's a good, more conservative introduction to some answers to your friend's questions. I'm heavily invested in critical theory and postmodern philosophy of language in my own work, so those are the sorts of things I've recommended, but I'm curious to see what others have to say.

The thing I don't understand about those sorts of articles or, for example, this blog, is that the complaints largely seem to be "it's really hard to be successful in academia because there are all these hoops that are really inconvenient." But isn't that true of just about every occupation? That just seems to be a complaint about life in general, as if once one finished dealing with the "rigors" of getting an education, one wouldn't have to work that hard anymore. Moving up the corporate ladder is hard work, political, envolves some risk, etc.--it's just a different kind of work. Complaints about academia being hard, thankless work seem to be transferable to a lot of different occupations. I'm also not sure I buy the argument that a person with a humanities BA can't get a job outside of retail. (This isn't a knock on jdmhotness's friends--I know lots of people who have struggled too.) I certainly agree that there are ready-made jobs for people with science degrees, but someone with a science degree may have just as difficult a time finding work as someone with a humanities degree--unless someone with the humanities degree is set on a job related to his/her field. There are lots of people who love the humanities subject in which they major, but for whatever reason don't love school enough to go on to graduate school, who then struggle to find work--But do those people expect to find work related to their field outside of teaching/academia? If they do, then someone wasn't honest with them when they chose their major. There are also people who major in something just because they can, either because it's easy, convenient, etc. I have a cousin with a BA in philosophy from UCSB. She wanted to major in sociology, but she couldn't get the major classes she needed to graduate on time but figured out that she had enough classes to switch to philosophy and graduate. She works for a nursing home and is finishing an online MS in senior care (or something like that)--a practical degree directly related to her work that will increase her pay (i.e. not a degree she had to have to in order to do her job.) I know people with degrees in English, philosophy, etc. working in administrative positions in schools (meaning university office jobs, admissions counselors, etc.), insurance, entertainment promotion, advertising... I'm not saying these are jobs that are going to lead to wild financial success and fame, but they're absolutely respectable and are good enough to become careers.

That depends on many factors, as you might expect, but mostly who your committee ends up being. When I did my first MA (in English), I had an idea of the novel I wanted to write on, and the approach and argument developed and changed all the way up until the final draft. But having a general sense of direction is good because it will allow you to maybe do a directed reading or aim a seminar paper at that topic to see what you can do with it. You can then use that paper as a jumping off point to expand into your thesis. BUT I will say it's also important to not marry yourself to an idea right off the bat. Things happen, interests change, your committee may influence you somewhat--or you may discover someone has already done what you want to do. Being able to take a deep breath and move on from a topic you really had your heart set on is really important if you want to finish on time. Hopefully that doesn't happen, but it's not unlikely.