Troppman

Nope, one rejection today followed by an offer from my top choice!

It isn't over until its over!

I keep rereading this e-mail. I've been accepted to my top choice with a seriously amazing funding offer. I'm supposed to call tomorrow, wow. I thought that this season was going to be a learning experience and a choice between a poorly funded program and a round two. It really isn't over until its over! They even made a bunch of references to my papers in the offer; they love me, they really love me...

E-mailed one of my top choices, wont start making decisions for another four weeks. Yikes!

Grats!

I write this only to affirm your disposition and the absurdity of the situation: Go to the most prestigious conference in your field. Meet grad students from top-tier fully funded programs. Talk to them. Realize how much more they know about the just kidding... Realize that they are, ten times out of ten, not actually more knowledgable than you are (given the shared topic(s) of inquiry). Suffocate with angst when watching others treat these prized students with such dignity and reverence. Hear a point that you made in an undergraduate writing assignment articulated by one of these students in a presentation at said conference. Watch as editors of an esteemed journal invite this student to submit his or her piece. That feeling when your advisor tells you that you need to be like that student. Seriously, I would wager that many of us know this feeling from at least one side of the dynamic (if we are mindful and honest enough). I've been in classes where some student will say more or less what I would have said, but the teacher tells said student that they are wrong and immediately asks me for the better answer--which is basically identical to the 'wrong' answer proffered yet stylistically packaged differently. It is all about the ineffable it that you either are or aren't (given that on paper you look decent enough). Although I haven't 'struck out' this season, if I were to need a round two I would do these things differently: 1) Not ask my professors for feedback on writing samples and SOP drafts. Or, i'de ask professors who are in a better position to judge such things. (this might differ for others, but I am currently in a field that is not the field I want to be in. I think that with the best intentions, I received some really bad feedback and followed it this year). 2) Not care so much. It is completely not-sexy to care. 3) Affirm the status quo.

Noice

Here's hoping for good news today!

aaaa yeaaaaaah!

Secularism is protestantism. Discuss

Affirming your post: I lost a parent two weeks before my first semester of grad school. It fueled my ability to produce, but it clouded my brain severely--perhaps to this day. Having a supportive partner is definitely great, and so is trying to build a life outside of the academy.

Send me a PM, i'de love to chat! (Your posts have also intrigued me, and I know a student at OSU currently doing feminist hip-hop studies.) This! Thanks! George Mason. Limited funding opportunities, but fellowships and TAships do exist so i'm going to get on that ASAP. The program is attractive in the liberty it grants students to pursue their path/project. This has obvious job market downsides, and many people on these boards indicate that they would never take a non-fully-funded offer--for good reasons. I trust my own ability to hustle, however, and i'm sure that if my work (and teaching/networking ability) is good enough i'll be able to find funding and a job. I'm also waiting on five or so other programs, so it is all up in the air at this point. It definitely feels good though to know that a round 2 is only necessary if I want it to be... Keep it trill yaal, i've got to go make some phone calls!

Well, after wallowing in despair, it looks like i'll be going to a PhD program after all! I woke up today determined to remain positive: to set my despair (over assumed rejections) aside, and finish proofing this article to strengthen my round 2. BOOM! e-mail for Skype interview with two academic heros of mine (the program is in London though, which I could probably never afford unless I luck out with grants/funding, which actually seems like a real possibility). One hour later, BOOM, acceptance from a great department in the states! Funding is pending on this one, but they usually hook it up somehow. Knowing something lukewarm made my whole concept of gravity change; knowing something good has made me weightless!! Will be sending out my positive-vibes to those who are still waiting. Thanks for keeping it trill, gradcafe! (Also, i'm not really a lit, rhet or comp person, so I doubt that the department is of shared interest. I am more like psychopolitical/psychosocial studies, hip-hop, and masculinity in late-capitalism person. I don't have an english degree. It works, trust me). Will be going on a long walk now :-). Hopefully this proofing process will be easier now that I'm not convinced the world wants me to fail.

Congrats Proflo! Please channel your excess goodness to us downtrodden and proceed righteously. :-)

I find this song to be a critique, a protest even, against politics of difference that implicitly assume a certain identity: ... I can no longer justify derailing threads. Too much plan b'ing to do...

Regarding notions of cultural capital, lettuce not forget the intricacies of a cleft-habitus.

I'm feeling it, bluecheese. On another tangential note absolutely not geared towards specific things said here, I wish that one could critically engaged questions of masculinity in this academic climate without being dismissed as a masculinist or under-read fool. That being said, I'm sure that my wish could come true were I to be smoother with the whole pitching a project thing.

To make good on the intention of exchange, I will upvote your post.

Regarding swear words such as "biology," are accusations of essentialism not always already essentializing gestures that deny heterogeneity...

No doubt, I was feeling your point. I just question the political purchase of totalizing categories such as "male," or "male privilege." And, I find it to be ethically imperative to allow room for such questioning--which is why I tried to create some. Keep it moving y'aal, nothing to see here. (Edit: Legit, I wasn't attacking anybody here. I am actually, mindfully and admittedly, violently derailing the conversation for hedonistic purposes.)

Are there "men" who exist but exist sans "male privilege"? If so, please say more. If not, please say more. This question has almost nothing to do with the conversation at hand, just to affirm that suspicion were it to arise.

Congrats HGG, throw some of that goodness my way please!

Or, we could take seriously the mathematical purport of the dilemma at hand wherein the only laudable answer is to be found midway between a few and twice a couple...

Spoken like a true ivy-goer...