Should I apply for an MA first?

[kdavid]

Background:

My goal is to get a PhD in Chinese history. However, my undergrad (graduated in 2005) was in English, with a minor in history.

I’m currently completing an MA in Chinese history at a Chinese university in China (I’ll graduate in 2014). I speak, read, and write modern Chinese fluently, and am learning classical Chinese as well as Japanese and Russian.

I’ve been told my Chinese MA won’t be worth squat back in the States. Though I'm researching and writing a proper thesis as part of my current MA studies, I’m not sure how much it will be worth in the eyes of top programs—it may not be worth much other than a writing sample.

Question:

First, do I stand a good chance at getting accepted to a top program as is, or should I plan to do an MA first and then apply for the PhD?

Second, if I applied for a PhD, would a school who liked me, but thought I needed more work before hand, say something along the lines of "We really like you, but you should do the MA here first."?

Or, alternatively, I apply for an MA and the school says, "You can actually skip right on to the PhD."

To be honest, I’d like to have the experience of going through an MA in the States with proper professors. On the other hand, I don’t have all the time, or money, in the world to do so unless absolutely essential to my long-term goals (getting a PhD) and career (teaching and researching).

What do you think?

Edited November 17, 2012 by kdavid

[TMP]

TGC Wisdom: Apply to both.

My Wisdom: "Proper professors" don't exist. They vary greatly. You can find yourself in a top-notch program where professors don't care about their students, only their research. On the other hand, you could be in a less-than-stellar MA program where professors adore graduate students. Who knows.

That written, choose a MA program that offers the best deal- cost-wise and resource-wise (meaning do they send their students off to top PHD programs?)

I would just reach out to some programs and have frank conversations. Ask the questions- the Asianists will know of reputation of your MA program and can give you some guidance.

Your MA thesis doesn't have to be a "mover and shaker" in your field- you're only just starting. The professors will see the potential in your thesis and determine if you have the talent, grit, skills, etc to succeed in a PhD program.

If you are concerned about "time," you should re-think the PhD then. It's unstable. There are no promises of ANYTHING, including jobs and fellowships to keep you going. My adviser, while a PhD student herself, said that she would simply quit if she didn't get fellowships or a job to support her endeavors because she valued her time and there were other things she could do.

[remenis]

TGC Wisdom: Apply to both.

I absolutely agree with TGC on this one.

Apply to the PhD programs you want, and some MA programs that would also be a good option. If you get into a PhD program, then cool - if not, then clearly the MA will help.

Also, just one thing I wanted to note - in my program all incoming PhD students are required to complete a MA here, regardless of whether they've already done one (or even two) at another university. The MA is just part of completing the PhD at this school, and since many people come in with an MA in hand, they often end up with two MA's on their CV. I don't think this is that common, but you might want to double check to see if your top-choice PhD programs function in the same way - just so you don't end up with 3 MAs.

[kyjin]

Agreed with previous: if you can afford it, apply to both. It's worth a shot.

I think you're right about the Chinese MA though. I'm in an East Asian Studies MA program right now, and a number of students are doing second MAs here in Canada who already have an MA from China or Japan. One of the students really should have gone straight into a PhD (he's that good), but decided to go with an MA first since he needed to learn about North American practices in academia since he's only used to Japanese academia. (Quite different.)

Take a look around for some funded MA programs as well. They're rare, but they do exist. (I'm in one right now!)

[New England Nat]

I'm going to third or fourth the "apply to both" advise.

On the subject of Chinese MAs, I was told last year by a now retiring very senior scholar of Chinese history that because of the amount of fraud and differences in the historigraphical approaches that they didn't count Chinese MAs for anything other than proof that you are proficient in Chinese.

On the other hand, proving that you are really proficient in Chinese is not an insignficant thing.

[kdavid]

Thanks for all of your replies so far.

One of the students really should have gone straight into a PhD (he's that good), but decided to go with an MA first since he needed to learn about North American practices in academia since he's only used to Japanese academia. (Quite different.)

I was told last year by a now retiring very senior scholar of Chinese history that because of the amount of fraud and differences in the historigraphical approaches that they didn't count Chinese MAs for anything other than proof that you are proficient in Chinese.

This is why I would really like to do an MA in the States before moving on to a PhD. At the end of the day, the three years I've spent here studying have done wonders for my Chinese, but I've gotten very, very little out of the classroom. With that said, I have been using the time wisely to self-study and increase my knowledge of my period.

[New England Nat]

That makes sense. She wasn't differentiating that much between the fraud and the difference between the historical methodology and tradition, and this was hardly someone who would have put down something just because it was foreign. A deeply serious advocate of Chinese history. She is famous in my department forforcing those of us that work on the rest of the world to think about China.

[pudewen]

While it's true that a Chinese MA won't prove anything about the quality of your scholarship, what the people on these boards who don't work on East Asia may not realize is that language abilities are a far bigger part of admissions for a Chinese history PhD than for one in European History (not that a European History program would let someone in without appropriate language abilities, but the demands of work in a European language are just so much less onerous that it isn't as major a worry for admission in that field), let alone US History. Your ability to complete an MA in China says very good things about your Chinese language abilities, which is the first thing any program will look for when considering you for a PhD.

That said, languages are still not enough on their own, and you'll of course still need to show that you can do good work as a historian to get in to a PhD program. That you weren't a history major in college doesn't make this impossible; if you have historians (from your undergrad, not from the Chinese MA) who can write strong letters on your behalf, have a very strong research paper that you can use as a writing sample and write a good personal statement demonstrating that you have a sufficient command of the field to describe an interesting and plausible research agenda, you will be in good position to be admitted to the best programs. But it's really hard to evaluate whether you meet those conditions from the perspective of those of us commenting. If you think that you can put together an application with the components I described, you should apply to top PhD programs directly. Even if you don't get in, it isn't uncommon at a lot of places that have East Asian Studies MA programs for them to accept promising applicants to a PhD that they don't think are quite ready yet to the MA instead; Harvard certainly does this regularly (and even manages to find funding for a lot of MA applicants). To answer one of your initial questions, it's far more likely that a school to which you apply for a PhD will reject you, but admit you to their MA than it is that a school to which you apply for an MA will admit you directly to the PhD instead. So if you are looking at schools that offer both, I'd recommend applying for the PhD.

If you don't think you're quite at that level yet, then look for MAs to apply to that have a good chance of being able to fund you; that is far, far more important than the name of the program. There are people in my department with MAs from Columbia, sure, but there are also people with MAs from places like UMass (or heck, even from universities in China).

Anyway, best of luck!

[kdavid]

Thanks again for all of your replies.

Would it count against me to apply for both an MA and PhD at the same school?

[New England Nat]

No. That happens all the time and many places will put all their unsuccessful PhD applications into the MA pool. But don't count on it unless you know that they will do that for sure.

[kdavid]

Okay, but doesn't this mean I'll have two different SOPs? One for the PhD and one for the MA?

Also, wouldn't the same people be reading both of these?

Any tips on how to word the different approaches?

[TMP]

Apply for the PhD. If you don't get in and they didn't move your application to the MA, ask to be considered for the MA. No difference in the SOPs really. But the MA SOP probably should be a bit broader as you're going in to get the basics that you need for the PhD.

[kdavid]

Thanks, TMP.

I'll be managing all of this from China, where the internet situation is finicky. I can only imagine tracking the progress of a dozen or so applications will be challenging enough.

As such, I'd prefer to have some sort of built-in contingencies. Would it be bad form to include in my PhD SOP that should my application be viewed as not quite ready for the PhD that I be considered for the MA?