African American Studies 2009

[GoodGuy]

Yeah, it caught my eye. First because I thought "Gee, when did Princeton Af Am start taking PhD candidates, and why the heck didn't I know about it?"

Then I read the comments and I thought "Ah."

[naniifresh]

Yeah, it caught my eye. First because I thought "Gee, when did Princeton Af Am start taking PhD candidates, and why the heck didn't I know about it?"

Then I read the comments and I thought "Ah."

Your reaction made me chuckle a bit, GG.

I guess I posted the listing because I hoped that the writer was active on this forum and had written it ironically/satirically. (Mentioning West and Cornell marks a certain familiarity with either Princeton or the AfAm field.)

It is interesting; I think I received very similar reactions, though scantily veiled, when I mentioned that I'd applied to a few AfAm doctoral programs.

Q: What would you DO with that degree?'

A: ...about the same thing that I'd do with an English degree...or any other degree in the humanities.

Oh, GG--I'm terrible at responding to messages on the board. I am ecstatic about my trip to Providence next week; I actually have a meeting with Dr. Bougues-- and I'm just hoping that I won't make a terrible ass of myself in his presence...lol. I'd love to hear more about your work and what you've been doing since your undergraduate degree at Brown (unless I'm completely wrong and you are still an undergraduate student ?)

Oh, and of course I have a boatload of questions about housing in Providence. Any recommendations? (Especially for 1/1s...lol.)

[GoodGuy]

Mani

I'll send you a private message with my info in case you have questions.

I dont mean to seem like an idiot, but what's a 1/1 in terms of living arrangments???? let me know...

GG

[immersion]

(Pet peeve alert: "c'est la vie," and "converse." Conversate is not a word... I hate to be 'that guy,' but we're getting PhD's, people! We need to step it up!)

So, yes: many of the faculty at Harvard are superstars lacking in free time, but do realize that Harvard isn't shy about being a little grad-focused. Certainly that's been shifting, and yes there will always be professors to avoid -- Homi Bhabha would be an example -- but there are some really great mentors outside of some of the 'bigger names,' and these people are big names themselves: Larry Buell, Phil Fisher, others. I've not heard negative things about studying with Elaine Scarry. I mean, sure, she doesn't have an email address and is a little loopy, but she's a great ally. Helen Vendler is my friend's adviser, and he seems to adore her. I've heard good things about the medievalists, as well.

As well, any Af Am student is going to have to work with Evelyn Higginbotham at some point, and she's got the tough matriarch style that some students find very, very beneficial.

There are problems with Harvard's faculty, but I don't know that I'd accuse the English department as a whole of bad advising.

1) I don't care too much about being grammatical on a blog..particularly in French....lol...as this is the third person to make a similar comment, I wonder if this disqualifies me from being a good PhD? In any event, I spend a lot of time reading Mrs. Smittherman (who is another Harvard woman) and she makes me feel betta about not bein' able to spell stuff good...http://www.amazon.com/Black-Talk-Geneva ... 0395699924 although AAVE does have a really fine grammar to it and while I wouldn't rest my carelessness on culture.. I do think my grammatical errors point to a pet peeve of my own..I really dislike prescriptivism: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linguistic_prescription

for all my friends who are up on their poststructuralist thought, we can draw a direct link between the description of prescriptivism detailed in the Wikipedia link..and all the problems of ideological coercion which language unleashes...there is a direct link between how we enforce language and how we enforce social codes...

2) Oh, I didn't realize we were talking about the English department. I was talking about the Af Am department. Though, now that you mention it, I prolly don't have many good things to say about the English department as well...My reasons, again, are not from first hand experience but from various faculty members...but they could be wrong...and I imagine you are right about the department's culture changing..I wouldn't know...

3) I'm not sure if we can talk about folks as "great advisers.." that is to say, that I think that advising is all about personality types and work habits..its far too idiosyncratic of a dynamic to generalize..one's man great adviser is another man's annoying weirdo who is way too touchy feeley.

BUT...I do imagine that a great litmus, lowest common denominator way to determine a programs quality of advising is to get a look at their retention rates...oh, and I think Kfed is pretty cool, so to be sure this was all written within a spirit of intellectual cogenality...

[kfed2020]

1) I don't care too much about being grammatical on a blog..particularly in French....lol...as this is the third person to make a similar comment, I wonder if this disqualifies me from being a good PhD? In any event, I spend a lot of time reading Mrs. Smittherman (who is another Harvard woman) and she makes me feel betta about not bein' able to spell stuff good...http://www.amazon.com/Black-Talk-Geneva ... 0395699924 although AAVE does have a really fine grammar to it and while I wouldn't rest my carelessness on culture.. I do think my grammatical errors point to a pet peeve of my own..I really dislike prescriptivism: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linguistic_prescription

for all my friends who are up on their poststructuralist thought, we can draw a direct link between the description of prescriptivism detailed in the Wikipedia link..and all the problems of ideological coercion which language unleashes...there is a direct link between how we enforce language and how we enforce social codes...

2) Oh, I didn't realize we were talking about the English department. I was talking about the Af Am department. Though, now that you mention it, I prolly don't have many good things to say about the English department as well...My reasons, again, are not from first hand experience but from various faculty members...but they could be wrong...and I imagine you are right about the department's culture changing..I wouldn't know...

3) I'm not sure if we can talk about folks as "great advisers.." that is to say, that I think that advising is all about personality types and work habits..its far too idiosyncratic of a dynamic to generalize..one's man great adviser is another man's annoying weirdo who is way too touchy feeley.

BUT...I do imagine that a great litmus, lowest common denominator way to determine a programs quality of advising is to get a look at their retention rates...oh, and I think Kfed is pretty cool, so to be sure this was all written within a spirit of intellectual cogenality...

1) Hot mess. I'm leaving it at that. You took it to a new level, such that I can safely admire it while still maintaining that good grammar is an asset to the aspiring intellectual.

2) We were and we weren't. Harvard's af am department isn't just an 'af am department' -- every student is pushed to work within a particular discipline outside of the department in order to be more marketable and disciplinary. I used English as an example because it's the dept. I know best, but I'm sure what I said holds for the other departments.

3) Sure we can. Do their advisees produce challenging, fresh work -- or don't they? You can't judge a book by its cover, but I think it's fair to judge a professor by his/her intellectual legacy. Look at Judith Butler -- her intellectual spawn are everywhere, and they're often doing great things. Sure that has a lot to do with their own capabilities. But the commonality in adviser and their willingness to constantly engage her work speaks volumes. (Also, I know for a fact that she's helpful/nice).

Also: I would never say Harvard's culture is changing. I merely meant they're more undergrad-friendly than they used to be. I wouldn't put my money on some radical ideological shift anytime soon.

[anxious1]

Does anyone have a sense of what the Indiana PhD in African American and African Diaspora Studies will be like? I know it is the first year of the PhD program but they have had a masters for a while. Anyone know anything about the faculty or the culture of the department? How do you think Indiana would compare to the Afro-Am program at UMass Amherst? My interests are historical/political in the US, if that helps. I think I'm struggling with the decision making process because these interdisciplinary humanities programs feel so risky to me. How are the rest of you doing? Hope everyone has had some good news.