Critical Political Theory in US

[Z_Gundam]

I am considering to do a Ph.D program in the US and would like to pursue a career in the direction of political theory (perhaps minor in comparative politics). I like reading book/article referencing to Foucault, Butler, Badiou but I definitely understand that a doctoral degree (and the career that follows) is not about reading books that I found intriguing but pursuing my own research with my own research questions. 

At the moment, my first research interest is about to examine the effect of capitalism/ neo-liberalism on political activities (election, protest, community building). Also the grip of neo-liberal ideology on our social life. It is mainly inspired by the work of Wendy Brown and of cos I would like to get into the poli dept of UCB. 

Other than Wendy Brown in UCB, I found Bonnie Honig is a teacher that I would like to study under her (Brown U is not accepting application in Fall2021 cycle tho, sad...). 

I am wonder, are there any other scholars in US grad school that may suit me? Plus I am not familiar with depts' culture in the US so I have no clue on which school is strong at theory. I will be grateful if I got some suggestions from you generous ladies and gentlemen.  Thank you in advance! 

[Theoryboi]

Well, I'm a lot like you in terms of theoretical disposition, so I'll tell you it takes a lot of digging to find places that fit us. You should check out departments like Duke, Johns Hopkins (home to the immortal William Connolly), UCLA maybe, UVA, UC Irvine, Colorado at Boulder maybe, Virginia Tech ASPECT, maybe UC Santa Cruz, UH-Manoa. There may be a few others that folks can add. This list includes a range of ranks and difficulties of getting in, so I didn't discriminate between what some people think is 'good' or not. These are just departments that I know have people working broadly on small 'c' critical theory topics. Berkeley would be great for what you want to do though, I think. If you can get in.

[verschiedene]

I am in a similar position. I am less well-versed in the French strand but since I am also a German major so know more about the Frankfurt School, Habermas, etc. Definitely look into New School of Social Research. I am applying there anyway. There are top schools like Columbia and Yale but they are a ~long~ shot for me. 

[Z_Gundam]

On 10/27/2020 at 9:47 PM, verschiedene said:

I am in a similar position. I am less well-versed in the French strand but since I am also a German major so know more about the Frankfurt School, Habermas, etc. Definitely look into New School of Social Research. I am applying there anyway. There are top schools like Columbia and Yale but they are a ~long~ shot for me. 

Thanks for coming over to this post. Its always good to identify buddies. Wish you all best!! 

[Theory007]

On 10/1/2020 at 12:39 PM, Z_Gundam said:

I am considering to do a Ph.D program in the US and would like to pursue a career in the direction of political theory (perhaps minor in comparative politics). I like reading book/article referencing to Foucault, Butler, Badiou but I definitely understand that a doctoral degree (and the career that follows) is not about reading books that I found intriguing but pursuing my own research with my own research questions. 

At the moment, my first research interest is about to examine the effect of capitalism/ neo-liberalism on political activities (election, protest, community building). Also the grip of neo-liberal ideology on our social life. It is mainly inspired by the work of Wendy Brown and of cos I would like to get into the poli dept of UCB. 

Other than Wendy Brown in UCB, I found Bonnie Honig is a teacher that I would like to study under her (Brown U is not accepting application in Fall2021 cycle tho, sad...). 

I am wonder, are there any other scholars in US grad school that may suit me? Plus I am not familiar with depts' culture in the US so I have no clue on which school is strong at theory. I will be grateful if I got some suggestions from you generous ladies and gentlemen.  Thank you in advance! 

The truth is, I think, that you can study critical theory in almost any department that has scholars who focus on race and gender stuff. And almost every department has folks who do. I agree that a place like Berkeley would be ideal, but of course everyone in your position is applying to Berkeley for that reason. So I'd encourage you to apply broadly instead. Also, in case you are not aware of this, phd applications in the US are incredibly competitive. So even if you are a good fit with Berkeley and very smart, etc., it is very hard getting in.

[Theoryboi]

On 11/24/2020 at 10:49 AM, Theory007 said:

The truth is, I think, that you can study critical theory in almost any department that has scholars who focus on race and gender stuff. And almost every department has folks who do. I agree that a place like Berkeley would be ideal, but of course everyone in your position is applying to Berkeley for that reason. So I'd encourage you to apply broadly instead. Also, in case you are not aware of this, phd applications in the US are incredibly competitive. So even if you are a good fit with Berkeley and very smart, etc., it is very hard getting in.

The problem though is that while there are race and gender critical theorists dispersed, it can be difficult to find a program which has a concentrated cluster on different topics which might interest critical scholars. I myself focus on critical security studies, which is not easily found many places in the U.S. Since OP wants to do critiques of economic ideology, they have a similar set of problems to deal with. Unless you really want to focus on gender and race issues specifically (I don't), then the places where you may fit is smaller than it seems in the U.S. I can say as someone who has been in a few academic programs both analytic and continental-minded, the more you are involved in the community, the more you realize that continental theory is anything but monolithic. So the Frankfurt acolytes have very real differences with the Foucauldians, and the feminists have very different methodological predilections from the semioticians. OP just needs to figure out where they fit into all of that and dig for places which have people who do what they do. So like CU Boulder is great if you want to do race, gender, environment stuff, but they would have little to offer me in terms of security studies, as an example. In my department, the security people are generally Foucauldian, while the political economy people are generally Marxist/post-colonials. It's all cordial of course, but there are divides to be aware of.