Non-Traditional Fields and Decision Making

[goose]

Hello All,

My work is in Native American literature. Though I'm in an English department, I try to situate my work from within a "Native American Studies" perspective.

As you can see from my signature, I've been accepted at Emory, Cornell, and Illinois-Urbana (I don't count Oklahoma since I will have two degrees from here).

My fellow grad students tell me to go to Cornell. This would be the obvious choice, I think, if I were in a traditional field. Cornell does have a couple of Native lit people plus a separate American Indian Studies program. However,the faculty are not that well known.

Emory's English department has a leading figure in the field and I would very much like to work with him. However, Emory does not have a Native Studies program. As I understand it, they are trying to build one up. This is both a pro and a con. On the one hand, I would be able to help create that program. On the other hand, the number of courses I could take and the amount of people I would be able to work with would be very small.

Illinois has several Native lit people in the English department plus a really good (but relatively new) Native Studies program. I would be able to immerse myself in Native Studies/Lit coursework and meet important people throughout my time there. However, Illinois is not offering as much money and I would have a heavy teaching load.

Anyone out there working in a "non-traditional" field in a similar situation? It's hard to determine what criteria I should privilege in making my decision.

[greekdaph]

HI Goose,

I don't know anything about your field specifically, though it sounds fascinating!

But, a question and a couple thoughts:

-Have you visited any of these programs? A visit could help settle many of your questions almost instantly. I've done one visit so far and I found that my more concrete/rational questions vanished once I had a feel for the place--i.e., either I will love a place so much that I will find some way, somehow to be able to afford it, or I will dislike a place enough that no programmatic advantages would make me choose it.

-English grad studies seems to be a very small world, and given the specificity of your field, that world will be even smaller. Though professors obviously have to put themselves, their families, and their own students first, my sense--and I hope I'm right!--is that people will be helpful to you even if you don't choose to enroll at the schools where they teach. You'll run into these people at conferences, for instance, and so if there's one or two scholars you get along with well at a program you generally don't prefer, you may well still have a chance to correspond with them. Also, programs and professors will totally understand if you decide to go elsewhere; they won't hold it against you.

-The school I just visited was one that was growing their program in my field: it had some great people, but was overall weaker in my area than in others. Faculty and grad students tried to sell me on the program by telling me that I'd get to be part of the excitement of creating a culture--that I'd get in on the ground floor. Ultimately, though, I think I'm going to turn down that offer. As exciting as that shaping can be, and as wonderful as it can be to have students and faculty working together in that way, I am wary for two reasons: 1) What if the new culture doesn't stick? Institutions can be somewhat immune to progressive thought, or at least somewhat slow to arrive at it; and 2) I have a sense that I'm going to be busy enough in grad school without the additional opportunity/burden of trying to show others the validity of my area of study.

Good luck to you! Let us know how it turns out!

[bostdr4]

I'm doing work in Black queer studies and I applied to both English and American studies programs. I think my approach has been a holistic approach: considering faculty advisors (both core and affiliated)--because there are few doing this exact or even related work, funding--teaching asst. v. fellowship (which can aid or detract from academic pursuits such as publishing or conferences and collaborative efforts with other departments), location--outside academic resources and social outlets, and prestige--for a job's sake. For instance, given your concern over faculty, one school at which I'm accepted employs a gatekeeper in black queer studies but his administrative responsibilities prohibit him from graduate advisory work, and he was the main person with whom I wanted to work. However, I found other core faculty who study gender/sexuality or trauma or African-American lit who can all inform my research in some way. Look at CVs which give more extensive details about faculty research which their web profiles may miss. Also keep in mind, you can have outside readers for your work, though this does not take the place of all the opportunities you may be granted from having resources in your specific field on campus. After considering all of these I found that in actuality what formed my opinion was my visit. Visiting the program and the other departments and faculty with whom you'd like to work will help determine your decision. Right now, my first choice, though not the most prestigious, seems even more so to be the best fit for me after my recent visit. So, I say all this to say: go visit!