Linguistics 2012

[bluetourmaline]

Calling all linguists applying for 2012 to chat, celebrate and commiserate!

(I'm already in a grad program, but I learned a lot from the fun and insightful threads from previous years.)

[jolly_orang]

Great idea. I hope more people will be interested to join.... I learn so much better from interaction with fellow Linguistics students than from hundreds of pages of textbook...

[Phonix]

Thanks for calling!

[elizabethrose14]

Excited/nervous for this app season!

[bluetourmaline]

What are you interested in, Elizabethrose14?

[radioalfredio]

I've been lurking on here for a while, so I feel like it's finally time for me to post!

I graduated with a MA in linguistics from the University of Georgia in August, and I've been enjoying the break from school, but I'm looking forward to going back for a PhD. My area of interest is laboratory phonology, the phonetics-phonology interface, and speech perception. I'm planning on applying to UC San Diego, UC Davis, University of Washington, Illinois, SUNY Stony Brook, UMass-Amherst, and Cornell.

My grad GPA is 3.89 and my undergrad GPA (in English lit. from a small state school in CA) is 3.82. I bombed the GREs the first time that I took them, so I decided to re-take them to increase my chances for PhD admissions. The estimated score was somewhere between 1200 and 1310. Not great, but better than the first time!

Now I just need to get my SOP written...

[elizabethrose14]

bluetourmaline- I'm hoping for a sociolinguistics program, I'm especially interested in discourse analysis. Mostly I enjoy grammar of common usage, but also like phonology..

So, I'm kind of everywhere but really interested in discourse. I'm applying to Georgetown, NYU, and Yale, but I need to find another school. I'm hoping to stay in the East Coast-ish area, so I'm looking at U. Pittsburgh (I've got family there), and U. Chicago. I'm definitely open to any ideas though!

I don't have my GRE scores back, and my GPA isn't terrible (3.33 overall, 3.45 in my major). I'm hoping that my SOP and LORs will help me- I have great relationships with my undergrad professors, who are my main support for now. My major is Spanish, but I have a double minor in Comm. Disorders and Applied Linguistics, so I have some background. I think that graduating from undergrad in 3.5 years will also help my case, I've been motivated to finish in a very timely fashion.

Working on my writing sample, but I'm trying to figure out if I should submit a linguistics (probably focusing on a morphological issue) paper written in Spanish, or not. Also considering the pros and cons of sending in a document of applicable coursework.. any suggestions?

Edited October 25, 2011 by elizabethrose14

[radioalfredio]

Hi, Elizabethrose14,

I don't know a lot about which schools have strong discourse analysis programs, but you might want to look into some of the large Midwestern schools as well, such as Michigan, Ohio State, and Indiana. Have you looked into any Hispanic Linguistics programs with an emphasis on sociolinguistics? I've heard that the funding in Hispanic and Romance Linguistics programs can be better than General Linguistics.

[elizabethrose14]

raioalfredio-

I haven't looked into the midwestern school, or Hispanic Linguistics/Romance Linguistics programs, but that's not a bad idea- Lord knows I'll need funding!! What are you applying for?

[bluetourmaline]

Well, Elizabethrose, I am at U Chicago, so I can try to answer questions you may have about it. I was actually going to suggest, with that full disclosure, that Radioalfredio think about giving it a look, if his/her circumstances permit - the phonology people there are actually doing quite interesting research on speech perception lately, both on the psycholinguistic and the computational side.

Edited October 27, 2011 by bluetourmaline

[Bumblebee]

@elizabethrose14, there are several Hispanic Linguistics programs you might want to look at (that I can think of): Arizona, New Mexico, Penn State, University of Florida, Georgetown, Ohio State, UMass Amherst, Texas, Urbana-Champaign and Indiana University, among others. I know Indiana University does a lot of Sociolinguistics (mainly variation both through the Spanish Dept. and the Linguistics Dept. and some language contact).

[radioalfredio]

bluetourmaline: Thanks for the UChicago suggestion. I'd briefly glanced at their website, but I'm not very familiar with their program, since I don't know anyone who has gone there. I gave them a second look, and Prof. Yu's research in phonetics/phonology interface looks really interesting, and very similar to my own interests. I was kind of on the fence about applying to Illinois, so I might apply to UChicago instead. I'm trying to cap the number of programs to 7. It also looks like I don't have to send hard copies of my transcripts to UChicago unless I'm accepted, which is a big plus financially.

Elizabethrose14: I second the Indiana University suggestion. From what I've read on thegradcafe, the General Linguistics program at Indian University doesn't seem to give out much funding, but one of my friends recently began the PhD program in Hispanic Linguistics, and she likes it a lot -- plus I think that she's fully funded.

[Bumblebee]

@radioalfredio I'm not sure about the General Linguistics program at IU, but at least the Hispanic Linguistics program offers an AIship with tuition remission and stipend

[bluetourmaline]

Glad that you're interested, Radioalfredio, as Prof. Yu's research is indeed cool; other people whose work you may wish to look at are Jason Riggle and Diane Brentari possibly if you think you may branch out to sign language phonology (much easier to see the articulators.) They, and Ming Xiang for speech processing, are doing some really neat stuff (I am an S-side myself, but I will have to know something about it, as UChicago does not let you stay just on S-side all your grad studies.)

Elizabethrose - back when I worked with Spanish in my undergrad days, I also vaguely remember hearing good things about University of Southern California for its program in Hispanic Linguistics, besides the schools that other commenters have already mentioned.

[elizabethrose14]

I'll have to look into Hispanic Linguistics, I'm just not extremely interested in that field. But thanks for all of your recommendations!

[psycholinguist]

bluetourmaline- I'm hoping for a sociolinguistics program, I'm especially interested in discourse analysis. Mostly I enjoy grammar of common usage, but also like phonology..

So, I'm kind of everywhere but really interested in discourse. I'm applying to Georgetown, NYU, and Yale, but I need to find another school. I'm hoping to stay in the East Coast-ish area, so I'm looking at U. Pittsburgh (I've got family there), and U. Chicago. I'm definitely open to any ideas though!

Hello! I don't have much background in conversational analysis per se, but in spite of my name I actually am a sociolinguist, and so additional suggestions: UPenn's sociolinguistics subprogram is legendary (William Labov, Gillian Sankoff, etc.); the University of Vermont has Julie Roberts; the University of Ottawa has Shana Poplack; York University has James Walker; and, uh, we at Toronto have Jack Chambers, Sali Tagliamonte, and Naomi Nagy. Also, if you're into phonology and willing to go as far as Chicago, then check out the work of Janet Pierrehumbert at Northwestern; I think she's primarily a phonologist/phonetician, but she dabbles in pretty well everything, including psycholinguistics and sociolinguistics. Anyway, there are lots of options! I recommend looking up specific people, perusing their lists of publications, and seeing which titles/topics/whole papers excite you!

[funology]

Woo!

I'm applying to a number of programs, with a focus on phonology, the p2 interface and wherever computation intersects the two. I'm doing some laboratory phonology work for my undergrad thesis, and my background is a double CompSci/Linguistics major.

I'm looking at UMass Amherst, MIT, UCLA, UChicago and Rutgers with a side order of UBC and uOttawa for MA. (yay Canada). Northwestern is also super cool, I suspect it'll be a coin toss to decide between Northwestern and UChicago. I want to keep my list on the short side.

[radioalfredio]

Yay! Welcome, funology. Awesome user name, and it looks like you're applying to some great programs.

Is it alright if I rant about the application process a little bit? Specifically transcripts... I attended a study abroad program in Finland for a semester through my undergraduate home university, and my home university did not list the courses that I had taken. They only list that I was on a study abroad program and what my transfer GPA was. This means that I need to send a transcript from my university in Finland, but so far it's been difficult to figure out how to do this. I emailed them, but they wrote me back with a PDF of my transcript, so now I've sent another email explaining how the transcripts have to be sent through the mail and come directly from the university. I think European universities must not be as concerned about people doctoring their transcripts. Anyway, has anyone had to deal with something similar? I know this isn't really that big of a deal, but it just makes me nervous, since I'm worried about transcripts arriving on time.

Also, how awesome are those universities where you only have to scan your transcripts?

[psycholinguist]

Anyway, has anyone had to deal with something similar? I know this isn't really that big of a deal, but it just makes me nervous, since I'm worried about transcripts arriving on time.

I did a semester abroad in the UK when I was an undergrad, and all they gave me in the end was a single sheet with my grades on it. Furthermore, it had them listed on the UK scale (80+ is awesome, 60-80 is an A-, etc.), meaning that to North American eyes they looked like disproportionately low percentages. I ended up simply photocopying the sheet and attaching a note pointing out that the marking scale was a little different, and that my grades were equivalent to one A and two A-s at my undergrad school (which is what the study-abroad office had informed me). That was fine. Honestly, I would just do your best with whatever they give you. It's your main undergrad transcript that is the really important part, anyway.

[fuzzylogician]

Anyway, has anyone had to deal with something similar? I know this isn't really that big of a deal, but it just makes me nervous, since I'm worried about transcripts arriving on time.

The best I could do for a similar issue was have a local friend print the PDF I got from the university on official letterhead, get official envelopes and beg one of the secretaries at the program I was registered at to sign the seals after she confirmed that the "transcripts" corresponded to the "original" they emailed me. Then my friend sent me all the transcripts in a big envelope and I mailed them to the universities myself together with the rest of my hard-cope materials. Convoluted, but it worked.

[radioalfredio]

Thanks for the advice. I especially like the creativity your idea fuzzylogician. Luckily, the university in Finland said that they could just mail the transcripts for me without a self-addressed envelope or a wire transfer of euros or something complicated like that. I was just having some good old fashioned application-related panic. I also like your idea to attach an additional sheet about the grading system, psycholinguist. My GPA from Finland is on my undergrad transcript, so hopefully the universities can refer to that, but like psycholinguist said, they probably won't care about my study abroad too much.

[elizabethrose14]

GRE scores are back, I'm solidly average. Also, finally got my CV finished and wrote what feels like draft 32 of my personal statement. Slowly but surely working my way to finishing out all this stuff. I think I'll be happy when I've got everything turned in and I'm just waiting for results. With the end of the semester and these apps, I'm up to my neck in work, and trying to stay afloat. Anyone else with me?

[radioalfredio]

Oh yeah! I'm just about done with my statement of purpose. I'm currently grappling with my essays for the San Diego Fellowship at UC San Diego though. I'm a first- generation college student, so I figure that it's worth my time to at least throw my hat into the ring for it, but I get so stuck writing about myself. I'm happy to write about my research and linguistics though. Oh well... The UC San Diego deadline is on Dec. 1st, so I need to get everything done really really soon. I can't wait to have everything turned in as well.

[bluetourmaline]

I think I'll be happy when I've got everything turned in and I'm just waiting for results. With the end of the semester and these apps, I'm up to my neck in work, and trying to stay afloat.

You think so, but you'll actually be antsy and anxious as anything.

Don't stress too much about the GREs. In my experience and that of people I know (and during prospie visits and after being admitted, we hardly mentioned the GRE), beyond not bombing it, they have almost no correlation with grad admissions in linguistics. People with average scores get in, people with stellar scores get turned away. It's all in the other factors.

[elizabethrose14]

FINISHED SOP. I've never been happier to finish a paper, but I'm very satisfied with the outcome. One step closer. My goal is December 12th, because my earliest deadline is the 15th.. and bluetourmaline, you're absolutely right. I'm sure I'll be anxious- but at least I won't be stressed to meet all of my deadlines!