Comparative Literature 2020

[Djinns&Dragons]

5 hours ago, EM51413 said:

6 hours ago, caeiro said:

Not sure how to read my interviews — definitely could have prepared better answers, but faculty seemed pretty friendly. Hard to know how decisive a factor these will be in the admissions process.  

 Agreed...Had my Duke interview yesterday and it was definitely something like an exam...penetrating and scholarly questions, not just "getting to know you better" or clarifications of application materials. I'm just gonna (try to!) forget about it and wait for the decisions.

Yeah, mine was something where at first I thought it was good, but now I'm not so sure. This is probably due to me going over some of my responses and the friendly atmosphere I had in the interview. Mine was also primarily researched based as the interviewers made it clear that the most important thing was my research project and ability. All in all, I think the post-interview is definitely more stressful than the actual interview, but that's just my two cents.

[blancacastillo]

20 hours ago, EM51413 said:

It's me! And thanks! 

 

 Agreed...Had my Duke interview yesterday and it was definitely something like an exam...penetrating and scholarly questions, not just "getting to know you better" or clarifications of application materials. I'm just gonna (try to!) forget about it and wait for the decisions.

Congrats for all the interviews! It’s great that you’re getting so many requests, and as I prepare to reapply to universities next year, I am attempting to understand how to make myself more appealing a candidate. May I ask you what you think your application strengths are? What I guessed the weak points of my own application are, are my appalling GRE results, the fact that I do not speak the language whose literature I mention the most on my SoP, the fact that i do not have any publications, conference presentations or research experience in my side, whereas that seems to be the norm on the forum. Any thoughts?

[Djinns&Dragons]

2 hours ago, blancacastillo said:

What I guessed the weak points of my own application are, are my appalling GRE results, the fact that I do not speak the language whose literature I mention the most on my SoP, the fact that i do not have any publications, conference presentations or research experience in my side, whereas that seems to be the norm on the forum. Any thoughts?

I know this wasn't directed at me, but to also give some suggestions as someone who is also hearing back from schools in my first time applying, I would suggest focusing more on your languages and research.

My GRE scores were also horrendous, but my schools flat out told me that they don't really look at them and more and more complit programs are foregoing them.

In terms of language, I'm not completely fluent in them, but am capable of conversing and using them. That said, I am choosing non European languages and have been told that if I was applying for something like French or German, I would need to be completely fluent in one prior to applying. So depending on your language, spend this year doing some immersion program to make yourself stand out.

I've had interviewers flat out tell me that the most important thing is your research topic and ability so also spend this time submitting to undergrad conferences and journals for that CV line. Also pick a good research topic that hasn't been touched, but gets you passionate.

Hope this helps.

Edited January 29, 2020 by Djinns&Dragons

[pdh12]

3 hours ago, blancacastillo said:

Congrats for all the interviews! It’s great that you’re getting so many requests, and as I prepare to reapply to universities next year, I am attempting to understand how to make myself more appealing a candidate. May I ask you what you think your application strengths are? What I guessed the weak points of my own application are, are my appalling GRE results, the fact that I do not speak the language whose literature I mention the most on my SoP, the fact that i do not have any publications, conference presentations or research experience in my side, whereas that seems to be the norm on the forum. Any thoughts?

I think there's something to be said for the well-written SOP, though. Do you have a clear vision for what you want to do? Did you research the schools to which you applied to determine if faculty shared your interests? Does your writing sample engage with those interests? Sometimes articulating these things well in that little introduction eclipses bad test scores/etc....but it's also a total crapshoot. 

[blancacastillo]

17 minutes ago, pdh12 said:

I think there's something to be said for the well-written SOP, though. Do you have a clear vision for what you want to do? Did you research the schools to which you applied to determine if faculty shared your interests? Does your writing sample engage with those interests? Sometimes articulating these things well in that little introduction eclipses bad test scores/etc....but it's also a total crapshoot. 

If there is something I was very careful (and pretty confident) with, is that my SoP conveyed a clear vision of how I want to employ my PhD and that the professors’ interests at the schools I applied to coincided with my own, so much so that I applied to only two. The problem is that both schools are suuuuper ambitious (and I’m guessing the most applied to), and probably do indeed take it for granted that applicants’ test scores be the highest they can be.

[EM51413]

5 hours ago, blancacastillo said:

Congrats for all the interviews! It’s great that you’re getting so many requests, and as I prepare to reapply to universities next year, I am attempting to understand how to make myself more appealing a candidate. May I ask you what you think your application strengths are? What I guessed the weak points of my own application are, are my appalling GRE results, the fact that I do not speak the language whose literature I mention the most on my SoP, the fact that i do not have any publications, conference presentations or research experience in my side, whereas that seems to be the norm on the forum. Any thoughts?

Thanks! I'm also extremely surprised by how things are turning out - I applied to 13 programs precisely because I expected to be rejected by the vast majority of them. I certainly did not think my application is a particularly strong one, and it does feel that I've somehow hit the jackpot. Maybe my luck will run out after the interview round; who knows. I do have very strong GPA and GRE numbers, but I'm also applying straight out of undergrad and my research focus is simply not very clearly articulated (something that has been brought up by all interviewers). If anything, my strength might be a good collection of languages (English, Modern and Classical Chinese, Japanese, Manchu, French, German) alongside a somewhat solid foundation in philosophy and literary theory.

Knowing the language whose literature you want to work in, I've been told, is fundamental to comp lit, so I think that might have worked against you. I doubt publications and presentations are particularly pivotal: my one publication is not in my proposed field and honestly don't reflect that kind of work I want to produce in the future. 

[blancacastillo]

1 hour ago, EM51413 said:

Thanks! I'm also extremely surprised by how things are turning out - I applied to 13 programs precisely because I expected to be rejected by the vast majority of them. I certainly did not think my application is a particularly strong one, and it does feel that I've somehow hit the jackpot. Maybe my luck will run out after the interview round; who knows. I do have very strong GPA and GRE numbers, but I'm also applying straight out of undergrad and my research focus is simply not very clearly articulated (something that has been brought up by all interviewers). If anything, my strength might be a good collection of languages (English, Modern and Classical Chinese, Japanese, Manchu, French, German) alongside a somewhat solid foundation in philosophy and literary theory.

Knowing the language whose literature you want to work in, I've been told, is fundamental to comp lit, so I think that might have worked against you. I doubt publications and presentations are particularly pivotal: my one publication is not in my proposed field and honestly don't reflect that kind of work I want to produce in the future. 

I did suspect the missing language might have been the decisive factor. Anyway, thank you for the valuable insights and good luck with your interview outcomes, but i’m sure you’ve smashed them all!

[EM51413]

8 hours ago, Djinns&Dragons said:

I've had interviewers flat out tell me that the most important thing is your research topic and ability so also spend this time submitting to undergrad conferences and journals for that CV line. Also pick a good research topic that hasn't been touched, but gets you passionate.

Fascinating insight! I've been hearing mixed opinions about undergrad conferences/journals (mostly people saying they're not really worth the time, while others say it's good experience anyway if only for the networking), though I do agree that a good, original, and well-articulated research topic seems to be what committees care the most about. 

[blancacastillo]

On 1/29/2020 at 3:09 PM, Djinns&Dragons said:

I know this wasn't directed at me, but to also give some suggestions as someone who is also hearing back from schools in my first time applying, I would suggest focusing more on your languages and research.

My GRE scores were also horrendous, but my schools flat out told me that they don't really look at them and more and more complit programs are foregoing them.

In terms of language, I'm not completely fluent in them, but am capable of conversing and using them. That said, I am choosing non European languages and have been told that if I was applying for something like French or German, I would need to be completely fluent in one prior to applying. So depending on your language, spend this year doing some immersion program to make yourself stand out.

I've had interviewers flat out tell me that the most important thing is your research topic and ability so also spend this time submitting to undergrad conferences and journals for that CV line. Also pick a good research topic that hasn't been touched, but gets you passionate.

Hope this helps.

Of course, this was all very helpful. I’m really trying to figure out how to make that all happen next year, whether by doing a masters of research or working as a teacher in Austria/Germany or something ?

[Glasperlenspieler]

12 minutes ago, blancacastillo said:

Of course, this was all very helpful. I’m really trying to figure out how to make that all happen next year, whether by doing a masters of research or working as a teacher in Austria/Germany or something ?

While I don't know your situation, I can certainly recommend the latter as a great option.

[Glasperlenspieler]

On 1/29/2020 at 10:09 AM, Djinns&Dragons said:

I've had interviewers flat out tell me that the most important thing is your research topic and ability so also spend this time submitting to undergrad conferences and journals for that CV line. Also pick a good research topic that hasn't been touched, but gets you passionate.

Forgive me, but I don't quite follow this line of thought. I certainly agree that research topic and ability are the most important part of admissions. However, it's not at all clear to me what undergrad conference and journals have to do with that.

[blancacastillo]

The publication/conferences experience thing is a tricky one. I too have noticed that many of the forum’s users have got that; on the other side, I never had the opportunity to do either research experience or publish anything during my undergrad, and even as a masters student I’ve been told publishing takes long and is something much more accessible to phd students (in the UK anyway)

Edited January 30, 2020 by blancacastillo

[Rrandle101]

My research advisor told me that he had mixed feelings about undergraduates going to conferences (especially if they weren't getting reimbursed for at least some of it) because on one hand it did sometimes provide that student with good insight into how research should be presented/conveyed and such but on the other hand you might not get any good feedback as an undergrad because profs and grad students typically don't care that much about what undergraduates are researching. I think that dynamic probably varies from conference to conference (I never went to one so I can't speak from personal experience) but I think what everyone else has been saying about language proficiency, a clear research focus, and various indications of your investment in developing yourself as a scholar in your field (which can include conferences but also more importantly coursework, honors theses/research papers, etc) definitely rings true. 

[olivetree]

Someone posted a Rutgers interview invitation on the results page yesterday

[FiguresIII]

Just to let you all know, I heard from our DGS that Yale will be deciding today and official notifications will be going out early next week. They're only making 6 offers (as opposed to 8 last year)...

Edited February 3, 2020 by FiguresIII

[EM51413]

25 minutes ago, FiguresIII said:

Just to let you all know, I heard from our DGS that Yale will be deciding today and official notifications will be going out early next week. They're only making 6 offers (as opposed to 8 last year)...

Very exciting, and very nerve-wracking news! Thank you for relaying it. I wonder why they delay the notifications by a whole week...

[caeiro]

1 hour ago, FiguresIII said:

Just to let you all know, I heard from our DGS that Yale will be deciding today and official notifications will be going out early next week. They're only making 6 offers (as opposed to 8 last year)...

All accepted applicants will have been interviewed, correct? Thanks! 

[caffeinated applicant]

Duke literature: Does anyone have an inside scoop on what's going on there? The chatter on the results board appears to indicate only one round of interviews this season, but that they did two waves (the Jan 22 invites and at least one Jan 29 invite), and at interview time, adcomm was citing mid February as ETA on results.

I assume I'm out of the running since I've only had radio silence from them, but of course, I'd love to be pleasantly surprised by a message, for example, that every year half the cohort is admitted without having to go through what sounds like the most painful interview in the business ?

[EM51413]

3 hours ago, caffeinated applicant said:

The chatter on the results board appears to indicate only one round of interviews this season, but that they did two waves (the Jan 22 invites and at least one Jan 29 invite), and at interview time, adcomm was citing mid February as ETA on results.

It sounds like they're saying "next two weeks" regardless of when the interview took place: mine was a week ago and I was also told they'll send decisions in two weeks. Hopefully that means next week, at the latest!

3 hours ago, caffeinated applicant said:

what sounds like the most painful interview in the business ?

Yup - having gone through that interrogation I'm questioning if I actually want to spend six years there...

[FiguresIII]

5 hours ago, EM51413 said:

Very exciting, and very nerve-wracking news! Thank you for relaying it. I wonder why they delay the notifications by a whole week...

Probably administrative gears turning slowly. The offer has to be approved by the GSAS as a whole. My offer last year came on the 11th.

[Ivy0327]

54 minutes ago, FiguresIII said:

Probably administrative gears turning slowly. The offer has to be approved by the GSAS as a whole. My offer last year came on the 11th.

Thanks for your info! Do you know whether the admission of joint Film and Media Studies and comp lit will be released at the same time with pure comp lit? 

[FiguresIII]

2 hours ago, Ivy0327 said:

Thanks for your info! Do you know whether the admission of joint Film and Media Studies and comp lit will be released at the same time with pure comp lit? 

Yes, the decision is released by the 'main' i.e. non-film department. At least that's how it went for someone I know in English and Film.

Edited February 4, 2020 by FiguresIII

[LineOfFlight]

I had a Skype interview for a comp lit program yesterday. Should I send the people who interviewed me an e-mail to thank them? This is not a common thing to do at all in the country where I live so I'm not really sure in what cases you should send one.

[brownjournal]

On 2/3/2020 at 3:38 PM, EM51413 said:

Yup - having gone through that interrogation I'm questioning if I actually want to spend six years there...

Same here--that interview was brutal

[Stella S]

Hi, does anyone knows whether the Uni of Pennsylvania will have second round interviews? Is it proper to email the DGS at this time?

Also, I saw an acceptance by Cornell. To the one who has been admitted (though you might not view this), which research direction do you plan to study? Thanks☺

Anyone else got any responses from Cornell?

Stressed out.