Linguistics 2012

[snoods]

shiiiiiiaaaat, boulder's a long wait! i'm not too hopeful as it is, so maybe that's okay....

[snoods]

congrats to the lucky Boulder acceptee!

[Unamuno]

Txelizabeth- I, too, was rejected from UMich. It's my fourth rejection, but somehow this one has hurt the most. I'm holding out for three more programs. My prospects aren't looking too good. It may be the case that I become a second-year applicant. The problem, however, is that I'm not sure if I can do another year of this process. It's too expensive, and I'm not sure if I'll be better off next year.

I think--no, I know--if I can get into any program, Master's or Doctorate, I'll be able to prove myself and have more linguistics courses under my belt to demonstrate my abilities. Unfortunately, I attended a small liberal arts university for my undergraduate degree, and there was no linguistics department. It doesn't seem to matter that I took every course offered in linguistics (general and hispanic) during my tenure. I'm guessing it is enough in this year's applicant pool. At this juncture, I feel I should have gone with my initial instinct of applying for Master's programs, but all of my professors strongly encouraged (and even required) my applying to PhD programs. Sigh.

My congratulations go out to all of you. Do you have any suggestions for me in the event that I find myself in the undesirable position of not attending graduate school in the fall?

I send many good vibes to those of you in my position... with the slightly stronger hope that I get an acceptance, too.

I'm in a similar situation. My M.A. is in Spanish and French, but not linguistics. However, instead of applying to just Linguistics Departments, I applied to programs in Hispanic linguistics which are usually housed in Departments of Spanish and Portuguese. For you Francophones out there, some schools also treat French linguistics similarly. So far I've been accepted to 3 out of 7 schools. I also took whatever linguistics courses I could and I think it helped. I figured my chances were pretty slim getting into a Ph.D. program in Linguistics, which is why I took the approach I did. Also, this is my second year of the application process.

Best of luck all!

[fuzzylogician]

I think--no, I know--if I can get into any program, Master's or Doctorate, I'll be able to prove myself and have more linguistics courses under my belt to demonstrate my abilities. Unfortunately, I attended a small liberal arts university for my undergraduate degree, and there was no linguistics department. It doesn't seem to matter that I took every course offered in linguistics (general and hispanic) during my tenure. I'm guessing it is enough in this year's applicant pool. At this juncture, I feel I should have gone with my initial instinct of applying for Master's programs, but all of my professors strongly encouraged (and even required) my applying to PhD programs. Sigh.

...

I'm in a similar situation. My M.A. is in Spanish and French, but not linguistics. However, instead of applying to just Linguistics Departments, I applied to programs in Hispanic linguistics which are usually housed in Departments of Spanish and Portuguese. For you Francophones out there, some schools also treat French linguistics similarly. So far I've been accepted to 3 out of 7 schools. I also took whatever linguistics courses I could and I think it helped. I figured my chances were pretty slim getting into a Ph.D. program in Linguistics, which is why I took the approach I did. Also, this is my second year of the application process.

Best of luck all!

For what it's worth, my program (and I'm sure others as well) does routinely accept students with limited and even no background in linguistics. First-year students usually have less background in at least one of the three core areas, usually in semantics and sometimes in phonology - less often in syntax, and that gets sorted out in the first-year classes. In general, adcoms seem to be looking more for sharp minds that can form interesting questions - they'll worry about teaching you how to pursue the answers later.

I think that what is making your lives more difficult is not simply your lack of formal training in linguistics but more acutely the need to establish that you have the necessary background to form coherent research interests that will sustain you through graduate school, lacking that formal education. Since you didn't take classes in formal linguistics (or took less of them, or a subset of what a major/minor would include), adcoms might assume that you are lacking fundamental knowledge about linguistics. The questions on adcom's minds will inevitably be - can this person succeed in our linguistics graduate program? do they know what they are getting themselves into? will they be able to come up with interesting questions and conduct meaningful research? A lot of time, money and effort are invested in every grad student who is accepted, and that will all go to waste if that person learns that linguistics isn't really their thing after all, and quits. If the adcom decides that the answer is Yes, you are a worthwhile investment, then you will get the training you need to go after your interests. It's less what you already know and more about the conviction that you'll be able to pick up what knowledge you're lacking (and importantly, be able to tell what that is). So, your SOPs need to be even more convincing, more precise and detailed than those of other applicants', whose backgrounds are enough to convince the adcom that they know/can know what are interesting questions in the field.

[LinguisticMystic]

Amen.

[Reddawg50]

thank you fuzzylogician--- what you just said makes me feel better about the rejections I got, but more importantly helps me think about what I need to do to at my JHU interview to show them that I belong there. so, thanks!

[Reddawg50]

oh thank Jesus-- UMD's Second Language Acquisition just sent interview invites. Note: another non-linguistics (strictly speaking) program. Good luck to everyone else--- Triple Tall??

[Triple Tall Cappuccino]

@Reddawg: YES! I just got mine! I'm going to make it ASAP (Friday). You?

Good luck!!!!!

[Reddawg50]

I have to teach during all that time on Friday, but Monday is a holiday so that's when I'll do mine--- buena suerte, let me know how it goes!

[Ling304]

Rutgers are so weird. They sent me what seemed to be a super polite rejection, in which they said I am welcome to ask to join their waitlist. I thought it was just politeness, but I was apparently waitlisted. And Yale's interview requests/open house invitations are out (or at least some of them are out), good luck to all of you who applied there!

Edited February 15, 2012 by Ling304

[Triple Tall Cappuccino]

Good luck, Ling304, and everyone else!

@Red: I know! It was super tough choosing a time, so I'm getting someone to watch my class during that time on Friday. I'll let you know how it goes!

[funology]

@fuzzylogician, amen to what you're saying. I've met a number of graduate students pursuing PhD's in Linguistics with little or no formal training in their undergrad.

For those of you with interviews, consider fuzzylogicians post carefully and emphasize aspects of your undergrad career which make you well prepared to ask good theoretical questions. For me, it was my electives which prepared me for a PhD more so than the few linguistics courses I've taken.

Also, any word from Chicago?

[cunninglinguist]

Goddamn. Just got my official rejection from MIT Still says "applied" on UMass Amherst's application status thingy. Trying hard not to be disheartened. Harumph.

[txelizabeth]

Make that 4 rejections in one week...

[cunninglinguist]

Make that 4 rejections in one week...

Yeppp... Congrats on UIUC, though It'll all work out!

[elizabethrose14]

I am excited that we're finally getting results though! Well, that people are getting results.. maybe not me..

[Reddawg50]

yeah elizabeth, you seem to have happened to apply to some of the latest schools to announce! i dono what's up with chicago, they already met and made decisions allegedly, but have not contact anyone, yay or nay...

[snoods]

@Reddawg, how'd you hear this alleged Chicago-decisions rumor!? Seriously, I'm still waiting to hear from four schools. I was doing well for a few days being all zen and patient buttttttt that's gone haha.

Pitt & Gtown seem really late too! What's up with that? Anyone have the scoop?

[Reddawg50]

someone who is a current grad student there posted so on the forum a while ago; i got my masters there and i know first-hand that most of the other social science programs there have already made their decisions and invites. not sure what's holding them up...

[LinguisticMystic]

Oh man, I'm scared to hear back from Georgetown. I made ridiculous changes to my SOP the night before I submitted my app & i regret them. Oh well. Just kind of want to hear any news at this point I guess. Only have a UCSB rejection to my name so far. Saw today that I lost a few followers on Twitter & immediately checked to see if it was a POI. PARE-AH-NOYD. 0__0

[Triple Tall Cappuccino]

Yeah, Georgetown is taking a RIDICULOUSLY long time. UUUUUUUURRRRRGHHHHH This is killing me! We're halfway to March already! >.<

[snoods]

So I heard through a friend that GTown is in the process of hiring a new faculty member and that process had bumped the grad app process back a bit....

[ladyling]

Cunninglinguist - you should get in touch with someone at UMass sooner rather than later and just make sure there hasn't been any kind of mix-up with your application. I had a similar thing happen at one of my schools last year and it turned out the adcom never got my file from the administrative staff. That kind of stuff can impact funding decisions, so the sooner you sort it out, the better.

Everybody else--just to reiterate what fuzzylogician said, I think it's really important to show that you know what you're getting into, and one great way to do that is to demonstrate that you've done your research about the program itself. It says a lot about your knowledge of the field if you can articulate well why you'd like to work with a particular member of the faculty.

[LinguisticMystic]

So I heard through a friend that GTown is in the process of hiring a new faculty member and that process had bumped the grad app process back a bit....

That's reasonable. Are they err, uhh having to replace someone?

[elizabethrose14]

I mean, I guess I can wait haha. But I just got finished stressing about what I was gonna do for the next three months (too many good things offered), that now I need something else to stress about. When all these decisions are posted I'll feel happier. C'mon March, get here faster- you have too many good things happening (hopefully good!).

@snoods yeah.. someone.. who's already there said that Chicago's made their decisions. And that's crazy about GTown! I had no idea that was happening, and I was up there not too long ago..