Summer

[geigwm6]

As someone who wants to probably pursue History as an Academic Discipline, I am a bit concerned about what to do over the summer. Many of my friends are doing things in government, interning for financial firms, law firms, accounting firms etc. Last summer I worked at two museums in Washington DC as a researcher/intern, but to be honest I didn't find those jobs very fulfilling (and DC is very expensive) as I was working on Women's History and Holocaust History, which is very nice, but I like Colonial American history. My advisors and professors tell me to just keep working hard, but summer is approaching and I don't have a plan. I don't want to go home (in this economy particuarly) and work part-time and hang out at the beach--that just isn't me. Any help/advice/experiences would be much apprecatiated!

Thanks!

[thepoorstockinger]

There were some suggestions here: http://forum.thegradcafe.com/viewtopic.php?f=51&t=15071

The consensus seems to be the order of preference seems to be:

Research Assistant for a faculty member

Archivist

Working in a museum

There must be an ungodly number of colonial America museums scattered around the north east (I'd assume more than women's history) so I'd cast my net wide. Is money an issue? (i.e. do you have to work to eat this summer/pay tuition fees in the fall)

[feisty]

Except for one paid internship at a major natural history museum, I worked menial jobs during my college summers.

I feel like the real value of an internship is to explore a career path, not to prepare for grad schools. What I did at the museum was pertinent to what I studied, and I loved working there, but I didn't learn anything new other than what it's like to work at a major natural history museum (it's awesome, btw.)

The ideal, I guess, would be to spend a summer as a research assistant. I had a friend who was sent to New York for a semester to collect all these documents for a professor at our college who would be out of the country.

If I could go back and do something with my summers other than work, I would either try to make more money or learn languages, since I'm still a disaster in that department.

[RF237]

My two suggestions, if money is not a major issues, would be to look for local National Historic sites and see if you can volunteer at one, hopefully working on the collection/archives or take language classes. Or both. The websites for history PhD programs may imply that if you're a strong candidate otherwise you can get in without a strong language background, but that just doesn't seem to be true. And languages can be useful even if you don't end up going to graduate school.

[synthla]

My two suggestions, if money is not a major issues, would be to look for local National Historic sites and see if you can volunteer at one, hopefully working on the collection/archives or take language classes. Or both. The websites for history PhD programs may imply that if you're a strong candidate otherwise you can get in without a strong language background, but that just doesn't seem to be true. And languages can be useful even if you don't end up going to graduate school.

That's a good point - I think the necessary language background is probably the most ... deceptive, for lack of a better word,part of the history doctorate application process. Now obviously a lot of people going into history professionally are going to have acquired some decent language skills along the way and so it doesn't necessarily turn out to be a big issue for most applicants, but I agree - you look at the websites and most of the big programs make it sound like you could walk in with minimal preparation and you just need to get up to snuff within a year or two. Compounding this is that technically meeting the language requirement is usually not that tough - for example, you can make multiple attempts at translation (sometimes of selections from works you choose yourself), or satisfy it with coursework (that doesn't usually count toward your doctoral coursework requirements). But while making it sound so innocuous, departments then really seem to focus on adequate language prep having already been achieved going in to school when they're actually making decisions.

[general_jr]

I'll reiterate language-study if you're able to swing it. Applying as a medievalist, it is really important for me and, I think, perhaps the strongest part of my app.

[klm22]

I am in the same situation (currently a sophomore) and have been seeking advice from all kinds of people. Working with a professor seems like the best option (and I've been told that many if not most history professors will use a research assistant over the summer). Try asking professors you're not currently taking classes with. See if you can get the history DUS to forward around an email letting all the professors know you'd like to work with someone. This may well not work (I've so far gotten one maybe out of my efforts), but it's worth trying.

The second choice seems to be museums and archives. Unfortunately, it's too late for a number of things (for example, most of the Smithsonian internships had Feb. 1 deadlines), especially if you want to get paid, but I'm looking at a bunch of archive things and smaller museums with March deadlines or no deadline at all. If you know where in the country you want to be, you can usually use a university website to find archives in that area.

And.. as a last resort, a librarian I was talking to recently suggested that I get a regular job at my school's (rather extensive) library and try to be placed in a department doing something with manuscripts or microfilm or something vaguely historical. Less exciting, but the campus minimum wage of $11 does have its appeal relative to the same thing at home. Maybe it would be possible to take language classes at the same time?

[reallywantcolumbia]

I would strongly recommend taking a really really intensive summer language program for at least one summer. It is a kick ass way to learn the language, looks really good on your applications (shows you are really serious about learning the language), and it fills up your summer. Then again, you don't earn anything. But if you are choosing between learning a language and doing some internship - I would go with language any day. I did http://www.middlebury.edu/academics/ls/ and it was really pretty awesome.

furthermore, from what I've heard, the top three reasons why people get rejected from grad school are:

a) insufficient language training

no appropriate adviser in the department

c) shitty GRE/GPA

[Sonic]

I would strongly recommend taking a really really intensive summer language program for at least one summer. It is a kick ass way to learn the language, looks really good on your applications (shows you are really serious about learning the language), and it fills up your summer. Then again, you don't earn anything. But if you are choosing between learning a language and doing some internship - I would go with language any day. I did http://www.middlebury.edu/academics/ls/ and it was really pretty awesome.

furthermore, from what I've heard, the top three reasons why people get rejected from grad school are:

a) insufficient language training

no appropriate adviser in the department

c) shitty GRE/GPA

I agree with this wholeheartedly. I am also an Early Americanist, and my professors tell me that they see a lot of otherwise qualified applicants who, because they study the Anglophone world, are way behind what the department would like. This makes me think that the baseline language skills for acceptance and what the departments prefer are worlds apart. Any intensive language training would look great on an app and, of the three factors the previous poster mentioned, it is the only thing you can do something about immediately.

[thepoorstockinger]

I have read a few of these threads and as a result I'm curious: Is it standard for people in the States (I live in Canada) to not work during the summer? Is the sample on here just skewed?

A lot of people here seem to do internships/language training rather than just trying to get work to make ends meet/pay tuition fees. Is it that private schools have such high fees that slogging it out at or near minimum wage for a summer won't put enough of a dent in your debt to matter or do people here have someone else paying for school?

[feisty]

I have read a few of these threads and as a result I'm curious: Is it standard for people in the States (I live in Canada) to not work during the summer? Is the sample on here just skewed?

A lot of people here seem to do internships/language training rather than just trying to get work to make ends meet/pay tuition fees. Is it that private schools have such high fees that slogging it out at or near minimum wage for a summer won't put enough of a dent in your debt to matter or do people here have someone else paying for school?

I worked most summers, and most people I know did as well.

My college offered a stipend program for internships, which were usually only enough to cover housing. The summer before my senior year I was fortunate enough to "win" an internship through an alumni women's leadership council that paid for housing, transportation + a large stipend that equaled just about what I would make working for a summer.

[geigwm6]

Thank you for all of your responses. I am taking Italian up to literature level, and I don't like languages which works out well, because I like American history, and I know I will generally only need 1. I'm considering trying to do some research or just getting an internship in something unrelated to see if I like it (I'm also going to apply for jobs in the world of sports business/finance and I might as well see if I like it). Otherwise, I'm going to work hard on my SOP and on my research thesis (I'm going for honors).

On another note, the appeal of working is that school is expensive. They just raised tuition almost 5% for next year, so the sticker price will be around $50,000. Thankfully I have FA, some scholarships, and I am an RA on campus so that puts a dent in it, but regardless I will have a fair amount of debt.

And yes, money is a consideration. I was looking into doing William and Mary's Colonial Summer program, but it is just too expensive and they don't give aid (W&M is probably my dream school to go for graduate work).

[reallywantcolumbia]

I am taking Italian up to literature level, and I don't like languages which works out well, because I like American history, and I know I will generally only need 1.

Yet again, I would STRONGLY urge against assuming you will only need one language to do American history. First off, there are a huge number of people who apply to do American history. Standing out is hard to do in those circumstances - and additional language training is often the most effective way to do that. Secondly, I talked to a lot of history professors and they all told me that the 1 language thing is a bare minimum. In essence, it's there so that the absolutely most brilliant applicant won't be turned away for only knowing Spanish. But, for regular schmoes like me, that's just not going to cut it. At the very least - your 1 language has to be directly related to your field (colonial history - French; modern - German, French or Spanish; or something random if you can justify it).

anyway, thats just my two cents. I hate languages too - so that part has been like pulling teeth...

[sra08]

Thank you for all of your responses. I am taking Italian up to literature level, and I don't like languages which works out well, because I like American history, and I know I will generally only need 1. I'm considering trying to do some research or just getting an internship in something unrelated to see if I like it (I'm also going to apply for jobs in the world of sports business/finance and I might as well see if I like it). Otherwise, I'm going to work hard on my SOP and on my research thesis (I'm going for honors).

On another note, the appeal of working is that school is expensive. They just raised tuition almost 5% for next year, so the sticker price will be around $50,000. Thankfully I have FA, some scholarships, and I am an RA on campus so that puts a dent in it, but regardless I will have a fair amount of debt.

And yes, money is a consideration. I was looking into doing William and Mary's Colonial Summer program, but it is just too expensive and they don't give aid (W&M is probably my dream school to go for graduate work).

As someone who has just been through the admissions process as an Americanist with only Italian (though not as much of it as you), I'd suggest seriously considering your research interests and what languages might be useful to have. I didn't do this, selecting Italian as a freshmen because I liked the language and heard my college had a great department. I stopped Italian after three semesters, after fulfilling my graduation requirement, only to take a fourth semester right now, my last semester. I don't like languages much either. But I suspect, with competition being so tight, that the poor language preparation was the weakest aspect of my application and may have hurt my chances, especially since I proposed a research topic in which French and German are quite useful. I've heard from 6 top programs so far, with one acceptance without funding. Though I still have to hear back from some places, it looks like my options are more limited than I'd ideally like. Granted, this is not unexpected, given the selectiveness of the 5 programs I've been rejected from. But it still helps to have every advantage you can, and starting a second language will make you a more attractive applicant. This is especially true because Italian is generally not as useful as some other languages in studying American History. (A generalization, of course. Italian is necessary for Italian immigration history, obviously.) So, it's not just knowing a language, but knowing a relevant language.

[kahlan_amnell]

Yet again, I would STRONGLY urge against assuming you will only need one language to do American history. First off, there are a huge number of people who apply to do American history. Standing out is hard to do in those circumstances - and additional language training is often the most effective way to do that. Secondly, I talked to a lot of history professors and they all told me that the 1 language thing is a bare minimum. In essence, it's there so that the absolutely most brilliant applicant won't be turned away for only knowing Spanish. But, for regular schmoes like me, that's just not going to cut it. At the very least - your 1 language has to be directly related to your field (colonial history - French; modern - German, French or Spanish; or something random if you can justify it).

anyway, thats just my two cents. I hate languages too - so that part has been like pulling teeth...

Sometimes there just aren't foreign language that are all that relevant to your research if you're an Americanist though. I study 19th Century social, cultural, and gender history. I've passed a language exam in Spanish, after taking a Spanish for graduate study course last summer to refresh my knowledge of the language. Before doing that I asked my MA advisor what languages she would recommend I learn/take my exams in and she told me just to take an exam in one I already knew, and substitute a research tool for the second language if I stayed at the same program for my Ph.D. Most Ph.D. programs I applied to don't require two languages for Americanists, they usually ask for one language and a research tool. Now, I'm not saying that having two or more languages wouldn't help your application if they are relevant, all I'm saying is that they aren't relevant for everyone. In planning academic things to do over the summer, intensive language study would not be on my list.

[redwine]

I am in a history graduate program right now, and in my program Americanists have to fulfill two foreign language requirements. Most people come in with at least one fluent or near-fluent language and take classes in another to pass the two language exams. I think if you already had two languages that would be a big positive. Plus, I would reiterate what was said above re relevance of the language - if your research has nothing to do with Italians, it is almost an irrelevance to have it. I think most programs would prefer spanish + french or german. Obviously if your interest require another specific language eg you are interested in Chinese migrants in California, you would also need to have Chinese. Most departments don't want students dragging their feet on their research because they can't read the necessary languages yet.

[reallywantcolumbia]

I think most programs would prefer spanish + french or german. Obviously if your interest require another specific language eg you are interested in Chinese migrants in California, you would also need to have Chinese. Most departments don't want students dragging their feet on their research because they can't read the necessary languages yet.

I would second that. From what I've heard, early Americanists are almost always required to have at least a basic reading knowledge of French. Historians of early American colonization are at an advantage if they know Spanish....the rest are pretty optional. As for research tools; I donno. I have heard that doing a summer of research for a professor (or just guided research for your own undergrad thesis) can be helpful. Working internationally and getting some offshore research experience also seems to be helpful. They seem to be a few fellowships around that can help you out with funding that.