Fall 2020 Applicants

[homie_de_lettres]

Hi to all! I've been on this website for about three minutes but thought I would try to link up with other people applying for Fall 2020.

I'm interested in the 18th-century, race and slavery in visual culture, plus, broadly, topics in canon and canonicity . I currently plan to apply to the PhD programs at the usual suspects--most of the Ivies plus CUNY, the IFA, and BGC. I'll also apply to MA programs, but I'd much rather do the whole deal. 

Some things I'm worried about are not having an MA and the fact that my undergraduate focus was very different than the topics I'm interested in now--I actually wasn't even an Art History major although I definitely worked on art and material culture in my thesis.

Would love to hear from anyone (in no small part because the process has got me pretty stressed and feeling kind of isolated)! Where are you applying? What are you interested in? What are you worried about?

[mrssalad]

13 hours ago, homie_de_lettres said:

Hi to all! I've been on this website for about three minutes but thought I would try to link up with other people applying for Fall 2020.

I'm interested in the 18th-century, race and slavery in visual culture, plus, broadly, topics in canon and canonicity . I currently plan to apply to the PhD programs at the usual suspects--most of the Ivies plus CUNY, the IFA, and BGC. I'll also apply to MA programs, but I'd much rather do the whole deal. 

Some things I'm worried about are not having an MA and the fact that my undergraduate focus was very different than the topics I'm interested in now--I actually wasn't even an Art History major although I definitely worked on art and material culture in my thesis.

Would love to hear from anyone (in no small part because the process has got me pretty stressed and feeling kind of isolated)! Where are you applying? What are you interested in? What are you worried about?

Off the bat, I would say that I am less worried about not having an MA for you than I am about the places you are applying too. Specifically, who do you plan on working with at these institutions?The only person I can think of who works at one of those places on the 18th century + Caribbean would be Tim Barringer at Yale. I'm not entirely sure who could advise you at some of the other places. Blatantly missing from your list would be UW-Madison. Jill Casid is probably the best person you could work with when it comes to visual culture, 18th cent art, and issues of slavery/colonialism. I think Leo Costello at Rice has written about 18th/19th cent art and slavery. I'd urge you to drill down on where you are applying too and why. 

[homie_de_lettres]

5 hours ago, mrssalad said:

Off the bat, I would say that I am less worried about not having an MA for you than I am about the places you are applying too. Specifically, who do you plan on working with at these institutions?The only person I can think of who works at one of those places on the 18th century + Caribbean would be Tim Barringer at Yale. I'm not entirely sure who could advise you at some of the other places. Blatantly missing from your list would be UW-Madison. Jill Casid is probably the best person you could work with when it comes to visual culture, 18th cent art, and issues of slavery/colonialism. I think Leo Costello at Rice has written about 18th/19th cent art and slavery. I'd urge you to drill down on where you are applying too and why. 

Hi, thanks for your thoughts. I'm very interested in the work of the scholars you mention. I know this is something people feel very differently about, but I'm really not open to leaving the Northeast. It's something I've given a lot of thought to and I realize it's not the choice everyone would make, but that's how it has to be for me. I've identified a few people at each of these schools; Meredith Gamer and Frédérique Baumgartner at Columbia, Cecile Fromont, Edward Cooke, and, as you mention, Tim Barringer at Yale, Suzanne Blier at Harvard, etc. I'm also interested in working across disciplines, for instance with Yale's Department of African American Studies.

[mrssalad]

1 hour ago, homie_de_lettres said:

Hi, thanks for your thoughts. I'm very interested in the work of the scholars you mention. I know this is something people feel very differently about, but I'm really not open to leaving the Northeast. It's something I've given a lot of thought to and I realize it's not the choice everyone would make, but that's how it has to be for me. I've identified a few people at each of these schools; Meredith Gamer and Frédérique Baumgartner at Columbia, Cecile Fromont, Edward Cooke, and, as you mention, Tim Barringer at Yale, Suzanne Blier at Harvard, etc. I'm also interested in working across disciplines, for instance with Yale's Department of African American Studies.

As someone who has done this before, I hope you take my advice. It could save you hours of time applying and hundreds of dollars on application fees. I'd first urge you to see if the names you have given are accepting students at this time. Generally only tenured profs take students (not lecturers,  etc).  I'd also urge you to check out the current grad student profiles and see how many of them have MAs. My friends who are at Yale, Harvard, NYU, etc all had MAs in art history. I'd also ask you to think specifically why the Northeast only and think about what kind of job you want. A PhD is a long commitment and a lot of work with no job promise. Why do you want it? Note that MANY JOBS (including your first one) may not be in an "ideal location." I had a friend who was stuck in an undesirable location before getting a "better" job in a more urban city. If a job does pop up for you but its not in the Northeast, would you still take it?

[epm8642]

I would also suggest Anna Arabindan-Kesson at Princeton and (if you decide to apply places not on the east coast) Darcy Grimaldo Grigsby at Berkeley, who is really one of the big names in race/slavery/colonialism in 18th/19th-c. visual culture.

[Bronte1985]

14 hours ago, mrssalad said:

Off the bat, I would say that I am less worried about not having an MA for you than I am about the places you are applying too. Specifically, who do you plan on working with at these institutions?The only person I can think of who works at one of those places on the 18th century + Caribbean would be Tim Barringer at Yale. I'm not entirely sure who could advise you at some of the other places. Blatantly missing from your list would be UW-Madison. Jill Casid is probably the best person you could work with when it comes to visual culture, 18th cent art, and issues of slavery/colonialism. I think Leo Costello at Rice has written about 18th/19th cent art and slavery. I'd urge you to drill down on where you are applying too and why. 

 

6 hours ago, mrssalad said:

As someone who has done this before, I hope you take my advice. It could save you hours of time applying and hundreds of dollars on application fees. I'd first urge you to see if the names you have given are accepting students at this time. Generally only tenured profs take students (not lecturers,  etc).  I'd also urge you to check out the current grad student profiles and see how many of them have MAs. My friends who are at Yale, Harvard, NYU, etc all had MAs in art history. I'd also ask you to think specifically why the Northeast only and think about what kind of job you want. A PhD is a long commitment and a lot of work with no job promise. Why do you want it? Note that MANY JOBS (including your first one) may not be in an "ideal location." I had a friend who was stuck in an undesirable location before getting a "better" job in a more urban city. If a job does pop up for you but its not in the Northeast, would you still take it?

I've got to respectfully disagree with this. I know I sound like a broken record, but however good a scholar Jill Cassid or Leo Costello is, a PhD from UW-Madison or Rice is not the same as one from Harvard/Princeton/Yale/Columbia/IFA/etc when it comes to resources, opportunities, and prestige. Even if the research area is not a perfect match, I'm sure there are profs at all of these schools who would be happy to advise a dissertation on race and slavery in the 18th century; in fact, it's often a good idea not to overlap too exactly with your advisor's research. Beyond that, I think it's perfectly reasonable to set geographic limits for where you get your PhD. Getting a PhD, and a job afterwards, does require a lot of sacrifice, but this is one stage where you actually do have some control. Why live somewhere you don't want to when there are good options where you want to live? If you decide you want to be a professor and have to move somewhere less than desirable for a few years after you get your PhD, why make the sacrifice sooner than you need to?

[mrssalad]

9 hours ago, Bronte1985 said:

 

I've got to respectfully disagree with this. I know I sound like a broken record, but however good a scholar Jill Cassid or Leo Costello is, a PhD from UW-Madison or Rice is not the same as one from Harvard/Princeton/Yale/Columbia/IFA/etc when it comes to resources, opportunities, and prestige. Even if the research area is not a perfect match, I'm sure there are profs at all of these schools who would be happy to advise a dissertation on race and slavery in the 18th century; in fact, it's often a good idea not to overlap too exactly with your advisor's research. Beyond that, I think it's perfectly reasonable to set geographic limits for where you get your PhD. Getting a PhD, and a job afterwards, does require a lot of sacrifice, but this is one stage where you actually do have some control. Why live somewhere you don't want to when there are good options where you want to live? If you decide you want to be a professor and have to move somewhere less than desirable for a few years after you get your PhD, why make the sacrifice sooner than you need to?

I wouldn't be so quick to dismiss those names or schools. Their names, especially Casid's pop up in many acknowledgements. 

Edited February 19, 2019 by mrssalad

[jbc568]

On 2/18/2019 at 5:08 PM, mrssalad said:

As someone who has done this before, I hope you take my advice. 

LOL don't take their advice. Speaking as someone currently enrolled in a top program, I can assure you that none of my peers agree with anything this user says.

[pedestal]

12 hours ago, mrssalad said:

I wouldn't be so quick to dismiss those names or schools. Their names, especially Casid's pop up in many acknowledgements. 

"Dismissing" a school is not dismissing a scholar. Jill Casid is undoubtedly brilliant, but have her students been getting the type of jobs you'd like to see yourself up for on the other side of a PhD? I honestly don't know where her advisees have landed because I've never seen a Wisconsin alum teaching at a school or working at a museum I've looked into. This is not to say that they're not there.

A more global point: to my mind it's a bit silly to imagine that you need to work with a scholar who focuses exactly on your area of interest. The place of slavery in 18th-century transatlantic economies isn't exactly something scholars of that period are ignorant of. Princeton, Columbia, Stanford, Harvard, Berkeley--and I'm sure many other places--would be viable programs to take on such a project (and as has already been mentioned, can provide their students the resources to do so). Many of these scholars who have forged new research tracks weren't themselves advised by professors whose areas aligned precisely with theirs. It can be liberating to do a Proquest search and see the variety of dissertation topics worked on by students of people like Koerner, Crow, Clark, Crary, Krauss, Kessler, Fried, Nochlin... even recently.

Please don't take this as an apology for a system that can be disastrously nepotistic. But also don't use nepotism as a reason to ignore workaday realities, like precarious funding and onerous teaching loads, that can prevent bright students from taking full advantage of the mentorship of almost always brilliant art historians. Few dummy scholars get jobs (let alone get tenure) at PhD-granting institutions. But the simple fact is that the work you're enabled to do at one might differ substantially--and unfortunately--from the work you're enabled to do at another.

Edited February 20, 2019 by pedestal

[mrssalad]

5 hours ago, jbc568 said:

LOL don't take their advice. Speaking as someone currently enrolled in a top program, I can assure you that none of my peers agree with anything this user says.

This says all what is needed to be known about "top programs." Michigan is not considered a top program either. FYI.

[jbc568]

25 minutes ago, mrssalad said:

This says all what is needed to be known about "top programs." Michigan is not considered a top program either. FYI.

Michigan is a great program, although not mine. 

People in top programs are usually very collegial. To the original poster: feel free to reach out to students in the programs you're looking at who share your interests. Many will be happy to talk to you and won't bog you down with condescending "advice". 

[pedestal]

48 minutes ago, mrssalad said:

This says all what is needed to be known about "top programs." Michigan is not considered a top program either. FYI.

I'm not sure why you brought up Michigan in response to the post you quoted, nor how mentioning it serves your claims.

[kat101]

I am new here and very confused. I am an undergraduate at an ivy now who wants to get a PhD in 19th cent art. My advisor (who also advisees PHD students/candidates) said there was a change a few years ago to hiring based on the prestige of the advisor over the prestige of the school. Gah! I'm so confused. 

[kat101]

For what its worth, I thought I would share what the department chair said. I freaked out so I started talking to some of the professors in the department and some who I have worked with in the past. They said its good to go to an ivy and probably the best thing to do (with some exceptions such as Northwestern for me but my advisor didn't think they were admitting people for 19th cent anymore). The few profs very strongly stated that an ivy education is not a guarantee of getting the best job and pointed to several job searches that turned up folks from places like Pittsburgh, Tulane, Rochester, San Diego, etc. They said the second best thing would be a famous advisor (who is known inside of and outside of art history) at a reputable institution. The ideal combinations appears to be prestigious school plus prestigious advisor. I was mostly cautioned against going to any MA program that doesn't offer funding or any PhD program that can't offer me at least 4 years of funding with a livable stipend. This is what I was told and thought someone might appreciate it. 

[Bronte1985]

2 hours ago, kat101 said:

For what its worth, I thought I would share what the department chair said. I freaked out so I started talking to some of the professors in the department and some who I have worked with in the past. They said its good to go to an ivy and probably the best thing to do (with some exceptions such as Northwestern for me but my advisor didn't think they were admitting people for 19th cent anymore). The few profs very strongly stated that an ivy education is not a guarantee of getting the best job and pointed to several job searches that turned up folks from places like Pittsburgh, Tulane, Rochester, San Diego, etc. They said the second best thing would be a famous advisor (who is known inside of and outside of art history) at a reputable institution. The ideal combinations appears to be prestigious school plus prestigious advisor. I was mostly cautioned against going to any MA program that doesn't offer funding or any PhD program that can't offer me at least 4 years of funding with a livable stipend. This is what I was told and thought someone might appreciate it. 

I think this advice is absolutely sound. There are no guarantees when it comes to getting a job. There are a whole host of factors involved: who you worked with, what your dissertation topic was, what fellowships you got along the way, what and where you published, in addition to what program you came out of. A prestigious program guarantees nothing, but it does confer certain advantages both tangible and intangible. The best, to be sure, is a famous advisor at a prestigious institution. As it happens, though, the most prestigious institutions have the highest concentration of famous scholars. On that note, I would also caution that it is a bad idea to hitch your wagon to one person: if you come to a program with just one famous scholar to work with, he or she could leave and then you're in trouble (I would not be surprised, for example, if Jill Cassid is actively trying to leave Madison, given the situation there). Ideally, you want two or three people with whom you could conceivably work. 

[dutch718]

Hi all, 

I've been teaching in the visual arts for the last few years at the secondary level and recently made the decision to apply to graduate school in art history (my major in college.) This choice was made in part because in teaching art history, I've really come to realize how passionate I am about the subject and want to further my knowledge. I stumbled across this board a few weeks ago and it's gotten me totally spooked . . . I won't be applying until next fall and I'm more interested in a terminal master's program than going for a full PhD, but then again I don't yet know exactly what I want to study (I have a number of ideas, but my undergrad thesis was on contemporary middle eastern feminist art.) Also, for what it's worth, my end goal isn't specific — I could easily imagine returning to the classroom, curating, doing museum work, maybe even some gallery/auction house research.

Does anyone have any advice or suggestions? Do I even have a shot at getting admitted anywhere in such a hyper-competitive environment?

[cyborg213]

8 hours ago, dutch718 said:

Hi all, 

I've been teaching in the visual arts for the last few years at the secondary level and recently made the decision to apply to graduate school in art history (my major in college.) This choice was made in part because in teaching art history, I've really come to realize how passionate I am about the subject and want to further my knowledge. I stumbled across this board a few weeks ago and it's gotten me totally spooked . . . I won't be applying until next fall and I'm more interested in a terminal master's program than going for a full PhD, but then again I don't yet know exactly what I want to study (I have a number of ideas, but my undergrad thesis was on contemporary middle eastern feminist art.) Also, for what it's worth, my end goal isn't specific — I could easily imagine returning to the classroom, curating, doing museum work, maybe even some gallery/auction house research.

 Does anyone have any advice or suggestions? Do I even have a shot at getting admitted anywhere in such a hyper-competitive environment?

 

You definitely have a shot! You wrote an undergrad thesis, so you have some experience in research, and you have teaching experience in the field as well. I think it all depends on how you present a coherent project. And the most important think to do this, I believe, is to have a clear idea on what you want to do and why, and to pose interesting questions that are relevant to the field and are a consequent result of your intellectual history and development. MA programs are not as competitive as PhD programs (and they don't require you to have a research project as concise and specific as the PhD), but it's important to keep in mind that most of them are unfunded. Some of them will offer you tuition scholarships or TA positions, but it's rare they will offer a monthly stipend.. I'm sure you can find plenty of information on fully funded MA programs on this forum. 

 

Edited February 25, 2019 by cyborg213

[Harper]

On 2/18/2019 at 11:59 PM, Bronte1985 said:

 

I've got to respectfully disagree with this. I know I sound like a broken record, but however good a scholar Jill Cassid or Leo Costello is, a PhD from UW-Madison or Rice is not the same as one from Harvard/Princeton/Yale/Columbia/IFA/etc when it comes to resources, opportunities, and prestige. Even if the research area is not a perfect match, I'm sure there are profs at all of these schools who would be happy to advise a dissertation on race and slavery in the 18th century; in fact, it's often a good idea not to overlap too exactly with your advisor's research. Beyond that, I think it's perfectly reasonable to set geographic limits for where you get your PhD. Getting a PhD, and a job afterwards, does require a lot of sacrifice, but this is one stage where you actually do have some control. Why live somewhere you don't want to when there are good options where you want to live? If you decide you want to be a professor and have to move somewhere less than desirable for a few years after you get your PhD, why make the sacrifice sooner than you need to?

When it comes to prestige and top programs, how does this translate to MAs? I've heard from multiple people that the MA programs at Columbia, Penn, and the IFA aren't worth it because of a lack of funding and professors tend to focus more on PhD students. Tufts and Williams are considered top programs from what I've heard, but are they worth it if there aren't really classes or professors that are of interest to you? After this year Tufts will have only one pre-modern professor available for teaching and advising for the foreseeable future and her research seems pretty niche. Williams has a lot of great resources for the location, but there is only one professor there whose research is only tangentially related to my interests. The resources also seem to be more focused on modern/contemporary art. If you get into a fully-funded MA program at a less prestigious school that's a better fit for your interests, is it worth it over all the programs I mentioned?

I'm also wondering if top PhD programs are different for different fields. For example, Michigan recently received over $8 million in funding specifically for medieval art history. Does this make it a top program for medieval art considering the resources?

Edited February 25, 2019 by Harper

[curatortobe]

13 minutes ago, Harper said:

When it comes to prestige and top programs, how does this translate to MAs? I've heard from multiple people that the MA programs at Columbia, Penn, and the IFA aren't worth it because of a lack of funding and professors tend to focus more on PhD students. Tufts and Williams are considered top programs from what I've heard, but are they worth it if there aren't really classes or professors that are of interest to you? After this year Tufts will have only one pre-modern professor available for teaching and advising for the foreseeable future and her research seems pretty niche. Williams has a lot of great resources for the location, but there is only one professor there whose research is only tangentially related to my interests. The resources also seem to be more focused on modern/contemporary art. If you get into a fully-funded MA program at a less prestigious school that's a better fit for your interests, is it worth it over all the programs I mentioned?

I'm also wondering if top PhD programs are different for different fields. For example, Michigan recently received over $8 million in funding specifically for medieval art history. Does this make it a top program for medieval art considering the resources?

A professor at Yale - and I think this translates to many other top PhD programs - told me that at this point nearly 50% of their accepted students have MAs from Williams or the Courtauld.* (FWIW Tufts was not mentioned. And the Courtauld is not great about funding if you’re not from the UK.) This may have been an exaggeration on his part, but I think overall his point stands and the preference for MAs is only going to increase for the time being. I can’t speak to the quality of professors and fit at every MA program, but I think the reason people like MAs from Williams is less that they know the MA increased your expertise in your field and more that the MA rigorously trained you in how to think and how to be a professional art historian. At most top PhD programs you’re going to have to do two years of coursework again (effectively a second MA) so in many ways with the first MA you’re just proving you can hack it as an academic more than anything else. So the impression I’ve received is that, at least for the MA, be less concerned about professors’ areas of research, as frustrating as it may be when they don’t overlap with yours. 

*Usual caveat that there are people who got MAs from other institutions who are at Yale, and that not everyone wants to go to Yale.

[evelynne]

3 minutes ago, curatortobe said:

This may have been an exaggeration on his part, but I think overall his point stands and the preference for MAs is only going to increase for the time being. 

 

I was wondering how the committees/professors look at people applying WHILE in the second year of MA (if the writing sample and references were already strong, as you've done the first-year coursework/papers/etc) ? Is a MA student viewed as "someone with a BA", "someone going to get a MA", or "someone with an MA"? Is it more preferable to take a year off after MA and apply then (to prove you've done "the whole degree")?

[kat101]

I don't understand the point of applying to programs that don't have a faculty member that pertains to my research area at all. My current advisor doesn't either. 

[dutch718]

On 2/25/2019 at 5:04 AM, cyborg213 said:

 

You definitely have a shot! You wrote an undergrad thesis, so you have some experience in research, and you have teaching experience in the field as well. I think it all depends on how you present a coherent project. And the most important think to do this, I believe, is to have a clear idea on what you want to do and why, and to pose interesting questions that are relevant to the field and are a consequent result of your intellectual history and development. MA programs are not as competitive as PhD programs (and they don't require you to have a research project as concise and specific as the PhD), but it's important to keep in mind that most of them are unfunded. Some of them will offer you tuition scholarships or TA positions, but it's rare they will offer a monthly stipend.. I'm sure you can find plenty of information on fully funded MA programs on this forum. 

 

@cyborg213 Thank you so much for the reassurance, the information, and the advice — I'm really grateful! You all are such an amazing resource — thanks for contributing to this forum! 

[Guest tarsila89]

On 2/24/2019 at 5:16 PM, dutch718 said:

Hi all, 

I've been teaching in the visual arts for the last few years at the secondary level and recently made the decision to apply to graduate school in art history (my major in college.) This choice was made in part because in teaching art history, I've really come to realize how passionate I am about the subject and want to further my knowledge. I stumbled across this board a few weeks ago and it's gotten me totally spooked . . . I won't be applying until next fall and I'm more interested in a terminal master's program than going for a full PhD, but then again I don't yet know exactly what I want to study (I have a number of ideas, but my undergrad thesis was on contemporary middle eastern feminist art.) Also, for what it's worth, my end goal isn't specific — I could easily imagine returning to the classroom, curating, doing museum work, maybe even some gallery/auction house research.

Does anyone have any advice or suggestions? Do I even have a shot at getting admitted anywhere in such a hyper-competitive environment?

Reading your research interest made me think you could apply for the MA at UC Davis to work with Prof Talinn Grigor. And the MA is fully funded with great TAship salaries, which is rare in masters. Good luck. 

[kat101]

Can anyone speak to the reputation of the department at UNC-Chapel Hill? I recognize that it can't possibly be the same without Mary Sheriff, but I imagine its still a well-regarded program? Thanks.

[staxdo_21]

@dutch718 I would love to hear more about your research. I plan to take a course on Middle Eastern or Islamic Art prior to applying to graduate school, though I do not plan to focus in this area. My boyfriend and I went to Morroco this past September and we both fell in love with the traditional abstract art. Unfortunately, we didn't make it to any of their contemporary art museums which are supposed to be fantastic. We hope to return in the next few years and I would love to be better informed about the art beforehand.