UTexas-Austin VS UGA, Ethnomusicology and Musicology!

[DouDou]

Both are master degree programs, AD, UT-ethnomusicology, UGA-musicology, hard to choose from the two......Which school and program would be more helpful for me to find a job in the future? who can give me some advice? Thanks very much!

[Joel418]

Some resources for you:

The musicology job wiki (previous years' records found through a link at the bottom of the page):

http://www.wikihost.org/w/academe/music ... musicology

These aren't all of the jobs, but it gives you an idea of the institutions that are placing successfully. If you can, make direct contact with the former UTA and UGA students whose names are listed on the wiki. This was a great help to me! (Just did a quick search of 2007-2008 and 2006-2007, and there are at least four UTA grads with ethno-specific jobs you could contact. One UGA grad, though no direct mention of an ethno focus.)

Another comparative (though much broader) picture of the schools can be found at:

http://graduate-school.phds.org/ranking ... w1=3&w32=4

You can plug in your own priorities, and it well tell you how each school ranks. A word of WARNING on this one: the rankings take into account all PhD programs in the school, so if UGA or UTA have doctoral programs in music performance, their overall placement rates will be lower than the ethno/musicology department's. Also, larger programs (those that take more students per year) will have a lower percentage of placements by virtue of the fact that there are more applicants from that school with only so many jobs available (and vice-versa, of course). Finally, schools will sometimes skew their placement numbers by including those working non-tenure-track jobs. Just be sure to give the final results a good looking over to see if you think it resembles reality...

Really the best thing to do is to call up both schools and ask for direct placements numbers, or at least the names of recent grads with which you can communicate. Of course, schools can be evasive on this question, so be ready to be persistent. Don't forget: you've "sold" your candidacy to them; now it's time for them to "sell" their program to you.

I realize that I may be coming off a bit biased toward UTA (no personal connections, I promise , but I have met and heard papers by ethno students from UTA, and they really are happy with their program and their scholarship is really impressive.

Best of luck with your decision!

[DouDou]

Thanks very much for your kind and warm help,really! The links you gave to me are helpful. I feel that ethnomusicology in UTexas is very academic-oriented, is that so? For UGA, it does have no specific ethnomusicology concentration. How are about the two locations--Austin and Athens? The natural environments, climates, living standard, people, orders and so on. You know, for an international student, these factors are also important and will be taken into consideration. Thanks!!

[Joel418]

Actually, I can help here again I went to Athens about 10 years ago when I was considering moving there for my undergrad. The campus is very large, and the town is a nice college town (lots of interesting stores and restaurants). It's only an hour or so away from Atlanta, which is a really great city (my sister-in-law lived there for about five years, and she really loved it!).

I have been to Austin too. Nice medium-big city that is surprisingly progressive for a southern city (voted for Obama in the most recent presidential election 65%-35%, the largest margin in any of the three Texas metros). A little more isolated from the big metros than Athens (about 3-4 hours from either Houston or Dallas). My friends who have been there more recently say that they've updated the downtown area and made it very hip!

Unfortunately, they are both still the south, and though there are so many wonderful people, some of the ugly old racism and suspicion of foreigners still lingers. I guess the only warning there is: don't let your guard down. Most of the time it will just be an impolite or inappropriate comment, but every loooong now and again, it can get ugly

UTA is very academically oriented, though they do give solid funding for travel research. None of the students I've met from UTA complained about stinginess (all of them, in fact, were presenting their field research at the conference). I'm afraid I can't say that I know anyone from UGA that could speak to their program.

[r1129j]

I am finishing my MA at UGA this semester. I have really enjoyed the program, but we are smallish right now, and growing. There is not a distinction between ethno and musicology, but we have two AMAZING ethnomusicologists in our department, and work in either area is encouraged by all our faculty. Of our two phd grads this year, both have already secured jobs, one tenure track. Athens is great, but I think it is very similar to Austin, so that may not help your decision. I can recommend UGA, and have had a great experience here, but that decision would come down to funding for me. If you'd like to get in touch with me and ask about UGA, please feel free to email and I can give you my number. rebeccaj@uga.edu

[DouDou]

Thank both Joel418 and r1129j very much from inside!You are very kind and obliging!I will combine all the information I've got and consider it seriously. I hope I could have the chance to meet both of you in the US someday in the future:)