Magazine writer and investigative journalist here—Would I be a fool to use journalistic work as a writing sample?

[scribblefutz]

I'm chatting with professors and current graduate students about this question, and I figured I'd float it here, too. 

 

I've written analysis, op-eds, and longform stories for newspapers and magazines. Some of that work I'm quite proud of, and a few folks in the academy (a sociology PhD candidate at UCLA, and a prof who got his PhD from Berkeley) seemed to think I should use my finer work as as a writing sample. Would I be a fool to follow their advice? 

 

I did well for myself in undergrad, where I studied philosophy and virtually nothing else. My most substantial work—a senior thesis that won highest honors (and yet looks atrocious now, having revisited it to much disappointment)—is utterly unmoored from history and its social formations. Not the sort of thing I would like to submit as a sign of my interest or capability. 

 

I really do think I am stuck between drafting a writing sample from scratch, and submitting journalistic work. If I take the latter route, I do have a piece in mind, one that relied on about 20 interviews, dozens of pages of internal records won through a FOIA request, and a relatively small amount of original textual research, mostly in IRS filings. 

 

I'd be grateful for anyone's advice. I feel utterly lost (shocker). 

[lkaitlyn]

It sounds from your phrasing like you gave these random people a choice of submitting a strong, polished journalism piece or a weak research piece. Obviously polish is better in that case, but that doesn't mean that's better than submitting a strong, polished research piece. Submitting a journalism piece instead of demonstrating an ability to conduct rigorous sociological research will substantially weaken your application. Perhaps you can rewrite one of your articles to make it sociological? Add a literature review, craft a research question and argument, etc.?

It is especially important that you show an ability to craft a sociological argument/question given that it sounds like you do not have any sociology experience. (I say this as someone who similarly had no sociology background.)

Edited May 30, 2023 by lkaitlyn

[scribblefutz]

10 hours ago, lkaitlyn said:

It sounds from your phrasing like you gave these random people a choice of submitting a strong, polished journalism piece or a weak research piece.

I wouldn't have suggested that, because that's not what happened! (Nor are they random; I know both of them.) Both suggested I not write a sample from scratch. 

10 hours ago, lkaitlyn said:

It is especially important that you show an ability to craft a sociological argument/question given that it sounds like you do not have any sociology experience. (I say this as someone who similarly had no sociology background.)

This post wasn't about my achievement, which is why I didn't mention it. Intellectually I'll be fine if I have to write a sample from scratch, it's just a massive investment (four months at least), on top of everything else. 

[lkaitlyn]

14 hours ago, scribblefutz said:

I wouldn't have suggested that, because that's not what happened! (Nor are they random; I know both of them.) Both suggested I not write a sample from scratch. 

This post wasn't about my achievement, which is why I didn't mention it. Intellectually I'll be fine if I have to write a sample from scratch, it's just a massive investment (four months at least), on top of everything else. 

I know what I said isn't fun-sounding, but I'm not going to say do the easier one just because it's easier. The writing sample is one of the most important parts of the application. It's doubly important when you need to convince the committee you know how to do sociological work because your background is not in sociology. I think not using this opportunity to demonstrate proficiency in writing sociological work by adapting an existing piece and making it sociological or writing something new will hurt you. You can choose to ignore this advice — you may get into your favorite programs anyway, and it sounds from your response like you're pretty set on using existing work — but I think it will weaken your application. I wish you the best of luck in whatever you decide.

Edited May 31, 2023 by lkaitlyn