I'm starting to really wonder...

[mentalyoga]

Hogwash. If a department has an undercurrent of latent animosity among its faculty members, I wouldn't want to go anyway. What's more likely, two professors who hate each other, or one of four professors that you mentioned in your SoP being on the adcom?

You are going to be entering this grad program and will be *representing* the university. You need to make it clear from the beginning that you are willing to do some research and reach out a hand to everyone in the department.

Well, thus my regret in taking that strain of advice. Like I said, if I had gone with my gut and been more proactive about 'namedropping' and showing off that I had a familiarity with the faculty I'd like to work with, I may have faced a different outcome in this round of apps. I could be wrong-there's no real way of knowing what happens in the adcom, so maybe it didn't have as much of an effect as I might think. In any case, if I end up reapplying next year, that'll be a main focus for me in making my apps stronger.

[mentalyoga]

So interesting to hear people's views on name-dropping. I did last year, and, granted the rest of my application was rather weak, I didn't get in anywhere. This time around, I decided I would go for the no-name approach. It worked out alright. I think it's important to convey fit throughout your SoP so that the folks you could work with would be obvious to the admissions committee, even if you don't spell it out. But that's just my take..

That was more my approach--I outlined my interests and framework to an extent that it would (hopefully) be quite clear which faculty would align with me. My only evidence is that in the one program I've had any success with, there were specific questions on the application concerning which faculty you'd be interested in. As we all have been reminded through this process, there's no way of knowing anything with absolute certainty--it's all dependent on context, you, the program, the adcom (of which you know almost nothing), funding, blahblahblah. I just figure if I end up having to reapply next year, I'll try some different things with my apps in the hope of a better outcome.

[the_lisbon_girl]

So interesting to hear people's views on name-dropping. I did last year, and, granted the rest of my application was rather weak, I didn't get in anywhere. This time around, I decided I would go for the no-name approach. It worked out alright. I think it's important to convey fit throughout your SoP so that the folks you could work with would be obvious to the admissions committee, even if you don't spell it out. But that's just my take..

That was basically the approach I took and was advised to take by the multiple people who told me name dropping wasn't necessary. Aside from the politics, the other argument against it was that you'd be doing the Adcomm's job for them since they'd be the ones matching you with the available faculty and they would probably like to think they know the faculty interests better than you. This isn't to say you shouldn't still research the people you'd like to work with -- if the research connections are there or they appear in your writing sample or something like that, the readers will get the message.

And to joeygiraldo: It has been my experience that there are very few English departments (from small unknowns to larger and more prestigious) that do not have an undercurrent of animosity running through them. It's more a question of degree....

[joeygiraldo]

Well, thus my regret in taking that strain of advice. Like I said, if I had gone with my gut and been more proactive about 'namedropping' and showing off that I had a familiarity with the faculty I'd like to work with, I may have faced a different outcome in this round of apps. I could be wrong-there's no real way of knowing what happens in the adcom, so maybe it didn't have as much of an effect as I might think. In any case, if I end up reapplying next year, that'll be a main focus for me in making my apps stronger.

Hm, I see. True that.

[irishcoffee]

So, I'm going to essentially agree with a lot of what's already been said, but do so in a handy and concise list.

Next time around:

1. Retake the GRE. Chances are high that the more competitive programs will at least spend more time with your application if your verbal is 700 or over.

2. Focus on the "fit" in your SOP. Make it personal, show that you've done your research.

3. In said "fit" paragraph, name-drop. Name two or three profs, and then fully explain WHY their work is appealing to you.

4. In the meantime, present papers at a couple conferences.

5. Apply to more schools on the "lower end" of things. Remember that there is no such thing as a safety school.

I would argue that this list consists of things that you simply MUST do. I would also highly suggest looking into Master's programs, as they'll a) improve your scholarship and introduce you to even more people/methods/opportunities in the field. You may also want to apply to a limited but more diverse spread of programs next time around. I can't imagine applying to 14 programs without having something go awry. That's an awful lot of keep track of, and a lot of SOP revisions. Quite frankly, I don't think I could find 14 programs that would even be a good fit for me. You might be better and more focused if you limited your applications to around 9 but broadened your options by applying to, say, one Ivy and more below-40 programs. Also, I don't know what your writing sample is like, but you may consider submitting a wholly new one next time, ideally one that showcases your diverse interests.

That's all I got.

[commoner]

I'm up to 23 rejections (if you want to count the MFA rejections from back in 2002, 27).

Don't lose heart just yet. Just remember that once you do get in, you will know the value of the accomplishment having known the anguish of falling short.

Come join our circle of rejects if you like. See URL in my sig.

c.

[abluedude]

Irishcoffee, I appreciate the list. I'm forwarding it onto some MA students looking to apply next year. You're a mentor in the making!!

By the way, RE: the current thread of conversation about name-dropping: do it. I did, and it was definitely something they took note of, because by the time I arrived to my campus visit, the grad coord. had scheduled meetings with nearly every person on my list. I researched, read an abstract or two by each person I was interested in to get a feel for them, then blatantly said, "Studying under X, X, and X would help establish a foundation for [such and such dissertation project], while X's grasp of [your favorite theory]..."

Also, if the department has a special institute, study group, or journal, you might consider including that instead of/in addition to the namedropping: "researching in your Feminisms and Genders Library gives me that special boost I need..." (sarcasm intended... oy).

[litguy]

Dear th3_illiterati,

I will not lie by saying I can understand your position. But I am sure that it must be a demanding journey to get those results with that background.

An idea came to my mind. I know it won't help you get into a good PhD program but worths listening.

When you consider the 20th century philosophers in the academia, especially in Europe, the situation is very different. I am sure that many of Faucoult or Derrida group would not have been admitted to the best PhD programs in the US after their M.As, simply because they did not have contacts or they did not have a good SOP. But that does not necessarily mean that they could not exist in the area. In contrast, the Critical Theory is deeply pioneered by European-educated scholars in 20th century.

Therefore, admission to top universities does not guarantee future success automatically; it just increases your chances. Without a PhD from Harvard, you still have chances, don't worry.

Secondly, the American educational system is already complicated and does not rely mainly upon the academic success of the candidates. The importance of SOP, and the extracurricular activities support this idea. I mean, you can be a genius in Critical Theory maybe the next Derrida in the area, but those schools simply say if you did not play basketball at the undergrad years or joined the Shit Club, you cannot study at Harvard. But I am sure you simply do not need to play basketball to be the next Derrida.

Thirdly, a PhD would be good for a future with money of course. But it does not have to be at Harvard. There is a life outside the best 30-40.

Just focus on your personal development. You can retake GREs and all that stuff, but do not spend your life on moaning about it. Publish two papers, go to 5 conferences, not only for your CV but also for your personal taste. I assume that you enjoy doing these things automatically as a PhD program candidate.

Best from Germany

[irishcoffee]

Thanks, bluedude! I also want to second what you said about dropping not just faculty names, but other specifics. This is what makes that "fit" part of your SOP work- what resources are available to students at X university that you want to take advantage of? Do they have special institutes, a kick ass library, a special collection of interest to you, certain teaching opportunities that appeal to you? If your fit paragraph solely consists of a couple faculty names, you're doing it wrong. Troll the library websites and see what they've got that you need. Look at the courses offered in the past year. Look at their graduate association site, if they have one. "Fit" is so much more than a potential dissertation chair.

The end!

[Emma]

You really need to contact a POTENTIAL SUPERVISOR. This is so much more important than your academic records. I am shocked your friends in academia did not tell you this. Good luck. I am sure next year will be the one

[SmartCookie]

Ok, I've just read this entire thread and it's amazing how much of a guessing game the whole process is. Especially when you take my applications and success rate into account. Part of me thinks I'm lucky, but actually, how lucky can you really get? I think I've done something right, although I couldn't tell you what. All I know is, I can tell you what's totally wrong with my application according to this thread, and yet, I've gotten into over half of the programs I applied to, all great programs, and I was waitlisted in two top 15 programs...

Gre's are horrible. I was sick when I took them, couldn't find parking, ran a mile to get there on time, (literally, relay for life was going on when I had to take them and I had to run a mile or so in the race because all streets were blocked ) So yea, Verbal=sub-600, and math...well, you can forget it. I crashed and burned.

I come from an average private institution. I had an okay overall GPA, but a very high major GPA.

So for me, I don't think this was a numbers game at all. If it were I would've lost the game a long time ago, but honestly, I can't see how I'm the only applicant they've decided not to count numbers with...

That being said, I had a bomb writing sample. I mean I'm very proud of it. My LOC's are awesome. They're like my family and well known in their respective fields. My SOP is focused, straight forward, I discussed relevant theorists, listed relevant questions, I'm a creative writer also, so I discussed how that sets me apart (coming from both the writer and critique perspective), and so on. Oh, and I made sure that all of these pieces fit together. I didn't have a writing sample about one thing, and an SOP highlighting something completely different. It all fit together as a package. I don't intend to be arrogant (please, please no evil eyes!), I simply think that this is what made my application successful, and I hope that it's helpful information for anyone looking to try again. I do hope you will, because you sound like you could do wonderful work. Basically you know your weaknesses so sell your strengths!

[th3_illiterati]

First of all, thank you to everyone who took time to reply: I've basically been sitting back and watching this thread, trying to see how various insights would unfold without my intervention (especially when I've been in a really negative space about this and was beginning to doubt my own judgement and perception).

It is a very depressing year and I sincerely have no idea what I will be doing, whine, whine, whimper. But in all earnestness, I was a return student and have to make pressing decisions about what to do financially right now. Not that everyone doesn't, but I have this child to care for, as well as what feel like fewer and fewer years to get it all together. So setting aside my bruised ego, pragmatism looms.

In a pragmatic fit, I sent requests to various Universities requesting insight into the specifics of my rejections: it beats the Hell out of wondering on message boards.

Four Universities got back to me, three with the same highly useful piece of feedback (they had a few other key points as well, but at least I got some sort of helpful narrative from this): my field was too obscurely defined and/or they didn't know where to place me because of this. It wasn't something I'd really considered because since it's my field of study, I missed that possibility entirely. Furthermore, I already have a burgeoning thesis. So I wasn't just throwing things higgledy-piggledy together. But it would have helped, I infer, if I'd contacted the specific Professors I wanted to work with to explain how I was hybridizing my areas of interest.

Those same three encouraged me to reapply next year, one rather glowingly. I found out they had short-listed me (one of my two top programs). I received strong support about my Statement of Purpose, writing sample, and letters of recommendation. That was encouraging, especially given that the last thing on God's Green Earth I'd like to do is retool any of those again. Also encouraging was that my GRE's weren't stated to be a factor in any of the rejections, although I still plan to retake them.

Basically, I'm left with the simple need to 1. broaden my field-as-stated and 2. contact viable Professors in advance and find out who would be willing to listen to my ideas and work with me.

I strongly appreciate the advice given here to consider "safe schools" ones that are out of the top 30/40 ranking range. It goes against the conventional wisdom that I was given again and again, which was based largely on later employment options. Frankly, my Ph.D. is far more about personal gratification than employment. I get a kick out of academia. It's good stuff. I'll teach when I can.

Someone asked me what influenced my decision to apply to the schools that I did. The decision was largely based on either staying in the area where I presently live, applying to schools near relatives whom I could live with, plus a few dream schools.

I think I will reapply next year, since the feedback was so golden, to some of the same programs and also, to new ones that really are doing the work that I'm pursuing. I still can't believe I overlooked such an obvious issue as being slightly too specific, too hybridized, and decidedly cutting edge (I won't qualify that with "too" as well).

Anyways, you forum people, you are amazingly helpful and kept me even-keel through this rather helpless chapter of the application process. I'd started to wonder if I was completely thwacked in the head or what. Thank you, thank you, thank you!

[booksareneat]

If I can add one caveat to the idea that you need to adjust your stated field. Sometimes, as burgeoning scholars who like our new ideas, we feel like we have a great niche, by moving outside of rigid periodization. For example, you might feel like you have great things to say about Early American writers in conjunction with contemporary Americans. The idea of saying you're one or the other seems small and so you decide to brand yourself as making new connnections, etc... (hopefully my example made sense). The thing is, for as much as our field wants new ideas, they still want to be able to pin you down. They like categories, Victorianists, Modernists, etc... Even if you want to adjust these, schools want to know where they can place you. Perhaps this is not what your schools had in mind, but hopefully that helps.

[th3_illiterati]

You really need to contact a POTENTIAL SUPERVISOR. This is so much more important than your academic records. I am shocked your friends in academia did not tell you this. Good luck. I am sure next year will be the one

110% correct. But the closer something seems familiar to you, the less you tend to see it.

My partner was fairly aghast that he hadn't noticed that my field was fairly specialized. He spent this morning hand-wringing and apologizing. But the reality is, he's so familiar with my discussion of it that it didn't seem even remotely specialized to him, I'd wager. He probably regarded my application as "general" when really, there aren't many folks working in the cross-hairs of my area of interest. Likewise with my mentor, since he helped me develop this particular dialectic in the first place.

If I'd contacted potential directors first, I'd have probably received the feedback that I did wind up getting: "What's that you're studying there? Red-blue? I'm the Red person at this University. Talk to the Blue guy down the hall."

That's not to say that Universities don't accept multivalent approaches, but mine was apparently not making sense.

You know, I did receive that feedback from ONE Professor whom I TA'd for and earnestly, I owe her a letter. But she was the least involved person in all of this and I didn't take so much of what she had to say into consideration compared with those closer at hand.

So yeah, you are very correct.

@booksareneat: basically, yes. My period is overly specific, but I'm working through a few different theoretical lenses to then work through it. I need to dumb it down for admissions and broaden the marketed version of what I'm doing. That's the long and short of it. At least in the SOP. I can explain the specifics to individual people whom I want to work with.

Funny position to be in. Because I have a half-cooked idea, they're less sure of how to proceed than if I were a bit more vague. That's interesting, albeit a wee perverse.

[Jack Cade]

1.) Contact every program you've been rejected from. Make them earn your money and give you feedback. Use that criticism next time. Do it.

2.) Your scores and GPA could all be better, but they are not keeping you out. I promise; I know folks with worse in every way, they are in good programs. Your stuff is good, but not exceptional. To get in somewhere, you must have something that is exceptional. For some its a score or two, the writing sample, the SoP, the LoRec, extracurricular activities, or the fit and/or connection to the department.

3.) Build your CV. Go to a conference or two. Make contacts.

4.) The advice of your Teaching College professors, whose grad school days are long behind them, might not be the best source of guidance; however well meaning and supportive they are. This is especially true since you seem committed to getting in at a top school. The game has changed rather dramatically over the past decade or so.

5.) Do not rely on the advice of your partner. They are not objective. The end. Besides it messes with you and your relationship.

6.) "Safe schools" DO NOT EXIST. They are myths, the closest you get is an unranked school in which you have a clear natural fit, and with whom you have had some contact. The difference between U Mary at 34 and U Mich at 12 is simply not that great, if it exists at all in your focus area, certainly in some cases, for some emphasis areas Mary might be the superior program. You must know the difference. Plus remember, all schools in major cities get 300-500 applicants. Those schools often have cut off criterion, i.e. scores, grades, alma mater, etc. Top 40 schools outside of major cities get similar numbers and have similar tacit cut-offs.

7.) Finally, know the schools you are applying to and know your field. Know them both very well. Contacts are the keys to success. Research, read essays by the faculty you want to work with, perhaps include these essays in your writing sample. Get material of successful applicants to compare your material with.

8.) Have a plan, if you don't crack the top fifty, or even tier one, or even ranked, that is ok, plan to move up.

And remember, you are not entitled to a PhD. You earn it. You are not entitled to get in, you just get lucky, and maybe earn that too. Just like getting a job. The best don't get jobs, the lucky best do, and sometimes the lucky worst, while the unlucky best just don't for some fluky reason. It isn't fair. That is life. It is what kills one in four climbers on Everest, what puts a third of the world's population in extreme poverty while you and I able to dream of being professors, and while the self-centered, shallow-minded, and greedy fools on Wall Street ruin it for everybody.

Go to the school that is best for you. Regardless of rank or anything else.

The main thing though is Step One.

[abluedude]

Jack Cade -- I'm forwarding your awesome advice list to my grad coord. at an MA school. Thanks much for taking the time to synthesize what's already been said and adding your own tidbits. Extremely useful info.

*addition*

I revised the note ever-so-slightly to cater to some individual students I know at my MA school, so here's my revision of Cade's most excellent list:

Hello --

As you know, I'm applying to English PhD programs for the fall, and a member of a discussion board I keep up with posted the following list of advice which I think is fantastic and true. Obey it. To those of you not planning to go to grad school (but who were tagged anyway), this might be a good list to provide to students seeking advice. The market is unbelievably vicious this year, and I don't expect it to get any easier. Almost every English program reduced the number of people they accepted by at least 1/4, but I've seen some that accepted 3 this year after accepting 20 previously. It's not impossible, but it's not easy.

1.) Contact every program you'll be rejected from. Make them earn your money and give you feedback. Use that criticism next time. Do it.

2.) Your scores and GPA could all be better, but they are not keeping you out. I promise; I know folks with bad scores in every way, yet they are in good programs. It's most likely that your stuff is good, but not exceptional. To get in somewhere, you must have written materials that are exceptional. For some its a score or two, the writing sample, the SoP, the LoRec, extracurricular activities, or the fit and/or connection to the department. Attempt to raise your GRE score by at least 100 points if you can, regardless of where it is.

3.) Build an impressive CV. Go to a conference or two. Make contacts. Publish. Send articles to journals that are a good fit for your area, and list those articles on your CV as "under review." This shows that you're trying to be published, which appeals to grad committees. If you attend a (national) conference, review the agenda to see if professors from your dream schools are in attendance, and make yourself known to them. Do not attend a plethora of local, virtually unknown conferences. Attending one national conference trumps 3 mysterious city-wide conferences, but every one of them helps. After you present at conferences, send those papers into conference contests; revise them, and submit to journals. Always think forward.

4.) The advice of your Teaching College professors, whose grad school days are long behind them, might not be the best source of guidance; however well meaning and supportive they are. This is especially true since you seem committed to getting in at a top school. The game has changed rather dramatically over the past decade or so. Visit the forums at thegradcafe.com to locate excellent advice from people going through this process in the here and now.

5.) Do not rely on the advice of your partner. They are not objective. The end. Besides it messes with you and your relationship.

6.) "Safe schools" DO NOT EXIST. They are myths, the closest you get is an unranked school in which you have a clear natural fit, and with whom you have had some contact. The difference between U Mary at 34 and U Mich at 12 is simply not that great, if it exists at all in your focus area, certainly in some cases, for some emphasis areas Mary might be the superior program. You must know the difference. Plus remember, all schools in major cities get 300-500 applicants. Those schools often have cut off criterion, i.e. scores, grades, alma mater, etc. Top 40 schools outside of major cities get similar numbers and have similar tacit cut-offs. Apply to schools that fit your area from all over the US News and World Report list (for your field). Do not apply to only schools in the 20-30; rather, apply to several 20-30, a few 40-50, and beyond. Don't get cocky.

7.) Know the schools you are applying to and know your field. Know them both very well. Contacts are the often the keys to success. Research, read essays by the faculty you want to work with, perhaps include these essays in your writing sample (or the names of the professors in your SoP, along with some indication that you know their field and want to study under them). Get material of successful applicants to compare your material with. Literally: ask successful applicants for a copy of their SoPs, and then write one that's better.

8.) Have a plan, if you don't crack the top fifty, or even tier one, or even ranked, that is ok. Have a back-up plan. Perhaps consider applying to MA programs alongside PhDs. Apply to unranked schools. Apply for Teach for America, to teach abroad, or to teach college classes at your MA/undergrad school. Do not limit yourself to PhD or bust.

9.) Work on your supporting materials (SoP, other statements/letters, writing sample) tirelessly for *at least* one month. Throwing together something at the end doesn't impress anyone, and committees discern the thoughtful statements from the hastily compiled ones. Have professors, students, enemies, friends, and Writing Center tutors review your written works and suggest ways to make them more readable, authentic, deep, professional. Don't settle for texts you're not proud of.

10.) Don't stop working toward success after you've sent your packets out. Continue to attend conferences, shoot for publications, serve your academic community, etc. because if you're called in for an interview, these are all things you can mention above and beyond your CV. Gain teaching experience, which makes the difference between funding/no funding, or an offer of a TAship at all. Teach a diversity of classes: grad programs like to see a willingness to expand, not 4 semesters of teaching ENG101 only. Keep an ear out for opportunities in closely-related programs, community colleges, and online schools.

[Jack Cade]

Thanks and that is cool: knowledge is the ball in this game and despite the flaws in the system this game is supposed to be collaborative not competitive--gotta beat that capitalist market metaphor down.

Although, I would suggest that you just make sure to not tell them that it came from me!

Also, I did dash that off quickly, there are some faulty constructions in there, a few sentences I don't like, at least one could use a semi-colon or to be broken up, but...

[th3_illiterati]

That's a helpful and succinct list, and I appreciate your emphasis on social networking and "fit."

Several points, however.

- Publication at a BA level is not necessarily helpful for either Ph.D. application, and can represent (as somewhat less-mature work) a future blight on your record. This is a debate often had, and perhaps I should leave it out of this thread. But because I know several people who deeply regret their pre-doctoral publications, I feel obliged to mention it. Conference papers seem to have a different weight to them, and aren't generally seen as "risky." I was ready to dive in and start writing with my trusty Bachelor's Degree, when my partner (who incidentally is only a few years out of grad school, hence our having friends still in grad programs) informed me that it took him two years to write his last article.

- The argument you make about attitude and a sense of entitlement can be flipped on its ass pretty easily: if you've worked hard for years and years, why should graduate school represent an exclusive little coterie? Is it really a sound ethical construct for students to present themselves as subordinate entities whose agency is ultimately governed by the control of a dominant educational machine? At the logical extreme, that's where a "non-entitled attitude" assumed by a student who is entirely qualified might take them. I'm strongly opposed to the exclusivity of academia, and feel like if you've done everything right and well to qualify for entrance, why would you want to tell yourself you aren't entitled to play the game? At any rate, it's something to consider, because it's a piece of advice I see get tossed about an awful lot, and ultimately it doesn't really help anyone work more effectively toward getting into a graduate program so much as continue the hyper-competitive mindset and dominator model of capitalist society that may -- or may not -- chap someone's hide. I am of the very humble opinion that Universities are accessible institutions of higher learning that already have all the requisite hoop-jumping inbuilt. Unfortunately, underfunding slash cohort size, not a mass movement of entitled applicants who engage in secret intellectual slackery. Meaning that the problem is often a broader issue regarding the intersection of capitalism with learning. My ten cents. Not lashing out on you here, so much as a pretty endemic meme about the "We have many qualified applicants (and you aren't one of them." Call me crazy, but I think that most people who are serious about applying to a field with as much commitment as graduate school have decent insight into where they fall on the intellectual spectrum, for better or worse. In an economic situation like the present, as well as a climate that is so discouraging toward the Humanities, why not foreground that?

Sorry, I have a huge rant in me about how I feel like the Humanities need to start shouting to survive, and it's got nothing to do with my applications to graduate school as much as my love of the field.

Improve what you can. But why on earth do people (not you) give advice like "increase your GRE scores," presuming that you did not do as well as you could have, you didn't study, something was overlooked. Verbal standardized tests are just really arbitrary for English majors in particular. If your writing sample doesn't highlight anything the GRE possibly could -- your reading comprehension, analytical writing skills, and general vocabulary -- that is problematic in and of itself. I'm now officially on about three soap boxes, sorry. Bit caffeinated today. Probably shouldn't submit all this, since it's a somewhat polarizing topic, however, I will with the caveat that I'm not trying to start an argument but rather offer my sense of frustration about how encouraging words can sometimes seem derisive or dismissive.

Sorry for the typos, etc...

[Jack Cade]

- The argument you make about attitude and a sense of entitlement can be flipped on its ass pretty easily: if you've worked hard for years and years, why should graduate school represent an exclusive little coterie? Is it really a sound ethical construct for students to present themselves as subordinate entities whose agency is ultimately governed by the control of a dominant educational machine? At the logical extreme, that's where a "non-entitled attitude" assumed by a student who is entirely qualified might take them. I'm strongly opposed to the exclusivity of academia, and feel like if you've done everything right and well to qualify for entrance, why would you want to tell yourself you aren't entitled to play the game? At any rate, it's something to consider, because it's a piece of advice I see get tossed about an awful lot, and ultimately it doesn't really help anyone work more effectively toward getting into a graduate program so much as continue the hyper-competitive mindset and dominator model of capitalist society that may -- or may not -- chap someone's hide. I am of the very humble opinion that Universities are accessible institutions of higher learning that already have all the requisite hoop-jumping inbuilt. Unfortunately, underfunding slash cohort size, not a mass movement of entitled applicants who engage in secret intellectual slackery. Meaning that the problem is often a broader issue regarding the intersection of capitalism with learning. My ten cents. Not lashing out on you here, so much as a pretty endemic meme about the "We have many qualified applicants (and you aren't one of them." Call me crazy, but I think that most people who are serious about applying to a field with as much commitment as graduate school have decent insight into where they fall on the intellectual spectrum, for better or worse. In an economic situation like the present, as well as a climate that is so discouraging toward the Humanities, why not foreground that?

Sorry, I have a huge rant in me about how I feel like the Humanities need to start shouting to survive, and it's got nothing to do with my applications to graduate school as much as my love of the field.

I agree with you 100%, and often rant myself, to say nothing of my disturbing tendency to typo.

However, regardless of what we feel should be, the reality of the thing persists. To succeed in academia, at least on the English end, particularly at the level your ambition and its dirty little cousin your ego, urge you to, you must engage the reality, not the preferable fiction we wish to have found instead. This game is pretty messed up. It is not romantic, noble, an escape, or anything else. It is a profession, which is, in some ways, quite nasty and gross. If you get into it you will have to compromise. How much depends on your particularly goals and agendas, and your luck.

I truly hope you do go on. I hope you, and all of us, remember this mess and start working to fix it when we get the chance.

For decades this society has followed the echo of Micheal Douglas' character Gordon Gekko's statement, that, "Greed, for lack of a better word, is good."

We have seen CEO pay rates jump from a modest 13ish times the average worker's to 300 times that in the past 40 years, a similar trend has occurred with college deans and presidents.

As Mark Slouka argues in his op-ed in Harper's last March (I think), all American authority needs to be reevaluated and essentially drastically reduced.

Police should not be able to arrest you on the street if you are not a risk to others, employers should not be able to fire you at will, CEOs and presidents and such need to have their salaries slashed by orders of magnitude, and their authority gutted.

Can anyone tell me what these people do that is so important that they cannot be replaced and their duties filled by a rotating committee of faculty?

How has this happened in Academia?

How has the average percentage of tuition that is public funding changed from 70-80% 15 years ago, to the 20-30% it is today?

Why has the cadre of tenured jobs withered to less than 25% of what it was during the American University's rise, despite the ever rising enrollment rates?

Why does the less rigorous, but more economically viable faculty (cough, biz and marketing) make so much more than those that are less viable (hiccup, English and Theater)?

What has that to do with university pay?

Why have the arts failed to adequately describe their import to the culture at large while the sciences don't seem to have to?

We cannot continue to ignore questions like these. We must start being aware of them, both the reality they expose, the fiction they deny, and the fiction that those "realities" actually are founded on and the reality that is denied by them (follow me camera guy?)--the rest of that tail spins into a Latour inspired Derridean downward spiral of messiness. We need to begin to do something about it all. However, when jumping through disciplinary/university hoops, sometimes, surrender is the only answer.

How's that for a rant?

[Emma]

This is all fascinating but lets come back to your application: If your statement of purpose was too "cutting edge", you might want to alter it and make it more pleasing; Never underestimate the politics of academia. You might be offending or irritating people on the admissions comittee! Once you are in, you can do whatever you want (well, as long as you can select a cool enough advisory committee). I would just do 3 things then if I were you: 1) Retake the GRE (not that I agree with what it is), 2) Rewrite your letter of intent to make it an easier "fit" to most departments and the tradition of your field. Maybe you can keep your cutting edge part as open questions only at the end?, this would not be as threatning as a small burgeoning thesis! and 3) Contact potential supervisors, try to meet with them in person if possible or ask them to direct you to the better specialist for your project.

I totally agree that a good fit for your interests is much more important than the rank of your University. Although when comes time to get a job, you might be at a disadvantage...the ideal is to have both.

Anyway, I really hope you get in next year. I am also coming back after 2 kids and 6 years off. Some programs, I was not even short-listed and some, I was offered funding and Fellowship. Go figure! It is all a matter of politics and fit with a faculty!

ps. English is not my first language so sorry for simple syntax.