Writing Sample Not On Proposed Field Of Study?

[mnemosyne]

How condemning is it to submit a writing sample that is not in your proposed field of study?

I’m suddenly wavering between two fields. The only paper that I would consider submitting as my writing sample is a Renaissance piece, yet I’ve suddenly realized my research interests may be better applied/explored in the 18^th century. I ask because the revelation is sudden, I’m applying this fall, and I doubt I have the time to write something completely different that will achieve the same quality—I am working three jobs, studying for and taking my GRE and subject test, and finishing up my undergraduate degree with a full course load.

Perhaps I’m just being naive about this whole situation. I feel it would be of more benefit to spend time studying for GREs and writing my SoP than writing a lackluster paper. My writing sample does what it should do—demonstrates that I can write, engage with theory, and am capable of complex thinking.

Has anyone done this and been successful? Or is it equivalent to death?

[foppery]

I know someone who was accepted to several good Renaissance programs (like, top 20-30) with an essay on Samuel Beckett, but that was six years ago. I don't think it's a HUGE problem, but is there any way you can tie the two topics together? What do you mean by "Renaissance," and is it at all related to your work in the 18th century?<br style="text-shadow: none;">

[diehtc0ke]

Two things:

1) I'm not quite sure how ethical this is but no one holds your writing sample/statement of purpose as a signed contract binding you to this line of research. I imagine you can continue applying as a Renaissance specialist and gradually move your interests into the 18th century as you go through your program (or do it suddenly; who cares?). Alternatively, you can use your statement of purpose to connect your paper to the 18th c. work you'd rather be doing. Outline how the approaches, practices and lines of inquiries you used in that paper can be applies to the 1700's.

2) You should know that it's generally agreed amongt people on the fora that the two most important parts of your application will be your sop and writing samples so you should probably be somewhat less flippant with it. More than just showing that you know proper grammar, it's really the adcoms only way of knowing whether or not you're capable of doing graduate level research. Some may disagree but I'd focus on the sample much more than I'd focus on the GRE's (not that you should bomb that either).

[BelleOfKilronen]

More than just showing that you know proper grammar, it's really the adcoms only way of knowing whether or not you're capable of doing graduate level research. Some may disagree but I'd focus on the sample much more than I'd focus on the GRE's (not that you should bomb that either).

I'd like to take diehtc0ke's great advice a step further. Your writing sample is where you show the adcoms that you're capable of doing graduate level research and that the research you propose to do is interesting, viable, and presents potentially novel implications for the ideas being explored within their departments. I think it would be difficult to do the latter with a writing sample that does not coincide with the research proposal you lay out in your SoP. So many people on these boards have written about adcom members lamenting the number of qualified candidates they had to turn away last year. With so many viable candidates to compete with, I think it's crucial that your research proposal makes the adcom members really want you at their school, and I think it would be quite a bit more difficult to inspire this kind of interest if your writing sample does not support your research proposal in some way.

To give a personal example, when I visited the two schools to which I was accepted, the adcom professors at both wanted to talk to me about my writing sample and the ideas it triggered for them, both in relation to where my own line of inquiry could lead and how it could tie into/come into conflict with their own work. These profs seemed to approach my writing sample as the beginning of an ongoing dialog about a particular question, and I feel strongly that this was a big plus in the admissions process.

All that said, I think foppery makes a great point that your writing sample doesn't have to be on the exact topic you're interested in. Does the 18th century topic you'd like to study share a theoretical framework with the Renaissance paper you'd like to use for a sample? If so, you can frame that paper as a springboard that helped launch you off into these other ideas.

I hope that helps in some way, and good luck with your applications!

Edited July 26, 2010 by BelleOfKilronen

[Phedre]

I agree with the above poster in that faculty on the admissions committee DO read and remember your writing sample, and when I came to visit, some were like "How wonderful that you took x and y approach to this text, did you think about adding z?" and it was really flattering (and important) to see how their thinking engaged with MY thinking on a real, professional level.

That said, I did have to apply to a few schools with a non-area of focus paper, because I split my applications between French and Complit and my French paper was NOT in my field. What I did was to send the off topic sample along with a shortened version of the long and a note expressing my interest in the real field of interest.

Lastly, people know your fields will change! it'sokay to be a Renaissance person moving forwards to 18th century.

I say send the best piece of writing possible.

[downtownchick]

I got into 3 schools (2 UCs and 1 good east coast school) with an off-topic undergrad paper (completely irrelevant, like Renaissance and hip-hop music). It doesn't matter. It's just an evidence to prove that you are able to write well enough. Remember, it's a writing sample. It's not an expertise sample. Contrary to the common belief, you are not required to know your proposed field of study well enough to produce a full-blown paper. You just need to know why you want to do that and how you plan to do that.

[mnemosyne]

I can't thank you all enough for taking the time to provide such thoughtful and thorough responses. I shall try my best to address them all without rambling verbiage.

I realize that my inquiry may have been posed unprofessionally. My intent was never to diminish the writing sample to a demonstration of supposed ability. I never considered graduate school until this past year. Considering that, I didn't have any clear path of future study when I wrote the paper I wish to use. Looking back on it, I do see some threads that unite to what has finally taken shape as my proposed studies. While it focused on gender subjectivity in a sonnet, part of it dealt with how a poet-speaker constructed their identity in relation to their creative act. I wish to study manuscript/print cultures and identity construction, so that portion can serve as a springboard. I believe I will present myself as early modern so I can straddle the line between Renaissance and 18th Century.

I have been exceedingly lucky to have a research assistant position, and that has been the biggest impetus for the questions I wish to pursue. This is also why I feel I shouldn't agonize more than necessary over my writing sample because I also have that important experience to describe in the SoP.

Once again, thank you for all of the advice, enouragement, and caution.

[poco_puffs]

This is mostly in response to your follow-up post (#7) but also to earlier replies:

I'm not saying that you have to write a whole new essay, but I do strongly advise you to polish the hell out of the grammar any errors that other readers catch, to make necessary adjustments to the structure of the paper overall to improve flow and address gaps in your argument, and to DEFINITELY take a step back from the original paper and examine how you could, as you say, incorporate more of your current scholarship as a framework or present the paper as a springboard to future research and related topics. Use every writing exercise and revising exercise you have ever learned, and every friendly or even not-so-friendly reader who perhaps owes you a favor, and go over your paper with an eye to all those special qualities upon which professors have graded your writing in the past.

The single best thing I did for my own writing sample was to reverse engineer it. Other than the briefest of outlines with lists of in-text citations to use later in the paper, most of my actual composition/writing involves a natural flow from one idea to the next. I'm great with an introduction and thesis sentence, but I can't be consistent with topic sentences FOR THE LIFE OF ME. It's terrible. I just write as the spirit strikes me, and try to include the most relevant of the passages or ideas that I've outlined for myself on a piece of paper.

So, after I got a good grade on this paper I wrote for a class and decided that I would use said paper for my writing sample, I read each paragraph on its own for some sort of topic sentence and then made a new outline of what my paper was actually saying. It was a new outline that was truly representative of what had survived previous edits and what had crept into the paper as the result of rambling or explanation that seemed truly necessary at the time. It became very obvious to me that the focus of my paper was somewhat skewed from what I had originally intended, because I gave altogether too much supporting evidence to certain passages or details and then completely omitted or glossed over certain points of my argument.

Looking at a representative outline of a paper, preferably with fresh eyes and several weeks or months after you have written it, seems extraordinarily helpful to me as I try to figure out what on earth I could possibly cut out of my monster-baby of an essay. It also helped me say "Oh, now that I've cut that entire tangent of a paragraph, I have room to address that entire facet of the argument I forgot about all those months ago."

If you do decide to use this particular paper as your writing sample, a process like this might help you figure out some natural spots to insert some threads of your more recent research or topics that are more relevant to you nowadays. Finally, if you do decide to add in some framing devices to tie this to your other work and interests, make sure you have at least one other nitpicky editor read over your paper to look for seams in the argument or language-- something that is very obviously tacked-on would probably go over worse with an adcomm than something that was simply its own piece of writing and consistent within its own framework and language.

[lady_coffee]

This is also a concern of mine. I'm debating whether or not to reapply -- had across-the-board rejections last year with one offer for a Masters (turned down). So, to share my failed experience! *smiles

On the whole, it seems wise to go with your gut, but sometimes, the subject matter can push an ad comm's boundaries. (This is more speaking to the general question of matching the sample to the SOP rather than the initial poster's Renaissance/18th cen question.) I know there are people who have successfully submitted crazy, out of the ballpark writing samples (and my hat is off to you!), but the feedback I received after rejection was that professors like to see a solid foundation in the existing literature in your proposed area, or at least in an identifiably Canon area. My honors thesis falls under the "fairy tale" heading; suffice to say that it didn't engage with canonical English Lit texts or lit-specific theorists (lots of theory, but not the ones you typically go to for a lit paper). In many ways, it accomplished the "writing sample must-haves": show where your thinking fits with current scholarship, address gaps and propose new directions. But the subject matter was a risk; I was told that it would be by the very profs who recommended that I send it. And it sure didn't match my 19th cen interests! *chuckle (Unless we start talking about George MacDonald...)

I'm aware that there are a variety of reasons for rejection and that the topic in itself may not have been off-putting, but from the feedback I received, I can tell you that it didn't help. Unless the thesis is executed to perfection (and every prof will have a different definition of perfection), some papers just are not worth the risk.

Again, this is anecdotal, so take it for what it's worth, and best of luck to you.

**As a note, I know this touches on that can of worms that is the Definition of Literature, and that is not my intention. Ad comms are (probably) composed of professors whose definitions of literature vary wildly... one personalized rejection detailed that he and several others had advocated for my app, but there weren't enough of them. Lesson Learned from Round One: It's a total crapshoot. Total crapshoot.

Edited August 12, 2010 by lady_coffee