Hey, Medievalists... (Fall 2015)

[littlepigeon]

Hi, all.

 

I know there's an older forum for all the medievalists applying to programs in English, but I thought I might start a new one for the Fall 2015 application season anyway.

 

I'm applying for Ph.D. programs this year, having completed my MA at Northwestern this past spring. My interests are quite varied, but primarily center on medieval literature of death, grief, mourning, and consolation; hagiographies; representations of children/childhood studies; and medieval reception of antiquity and the perpetuation/revisions of the classical tradition. I love the Pearl-poet and Chaucer (particularly his earlier work), and am currently studying Catherine of Siena (though not specifically for any future research project).

 

I'll be taking the GRE Subject Test in late September, and hope to draft my statement(s) of purpose over the next two to three months.

 

That's all the relevant information I can think of at the moment, but I hope lots of other applicants join this group so we can all get to know each other better. It would be great to have a substantial support system of likeminded hopefuls throughout this application season!

[cloudofunknowing]

Hey there, felibus, 

 

There are several medievalists around here (including me) who're enrolling in a number of programs this Fall - and I know of one other medieval Fall 2015 applicant - with a wide array of interests, all of whom would be happy to correspond with you via forum or pm, I'm sure. 

 

And, for the record, Catherine of Siena had some of the most astonishing visions of any medieval mystic I know of! Cheers, and welcome to the monkeyhouse!

[ArthChauc]

I'm with Cloud--enrolling in a program that starts here in about three weeks. I applied to three of the places you're looking at (and was ultimately unsuccessful), but I know there's a Saint Louis person around here somewhere who's starting this year. 

 

I would recommend taking a look at UNM--we have a whole separate degree for Medievalists. 

Edited July 30, 2014 by ArthurianChaucerian

[cloudofunknowing]

You might also want to check out UT-Austin's program if you haven't already (http://www.utexas.edu/cola/depts/english/graduate-program/fields/medieval.php); they have 5 tenured medievalists on faculty in the English department and also have several outstanding early modern scholars, too. In my cohort, there are 3 of us who applied as/declared medieval literary studies as our primary area of focus. 

[ArthChauc]

Cloud, UNM is similar in that way--3 tenured profs in the Medieval Studies area, 2/3 of us in my cohort are Medievalists in that area. I hear WUSTL is amazing, OP should definitely give them a look. 

 

What are some of your interests, Cloud?

[cloudofunknowing]

UNM's program sounds awesome! (And, frankly, landscape doesn't get any better than New Mexico's, in my opinion.) As far as interests go (thus far), I gravitate toward the late Middle English things: the poetry to be sure, but also the play cycles (especially the mystery and miracle plays) and, especially, visionary literature. The rise of lay spirituality and vernacular theology are two things that really interest me, whether we're talking about pre/proto-Reformation and -Protestant things like Wycliffe and Lollardy or works like Kempe's book, Julian's revelations, etc. Since it's partly the heterogeneity of fifteenth-century England that engages me - particularly where spirituality is concerned - I'm also interested in what persisted/continued into the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, so I guess you could say, at least in terms of periodicity,  where the lines are drawn between the premodern/early modern is an open-ended question I hope to explore. (And how problematic such formulations are, to be sure.) As far as praxis or analytic axes go, my touchstones are gender and sexuality and, increasingly, temporality and affect. How about you?

[unræd]

Welcome, felibus! I'm the other 2015 medievalist applicant of which Cloudofunkowning knows. 

 

Although I may be the odd duck out: as my screen name indicates, my interests lie in pre-Conquest England. Within that narrower scope, though, they're pretty catholic, exploring everything from issues of gender and sexuality to more traditional philological topics (linguistic cruces, word studies, textual issues, etc) in all kinds of Old English texts. Further afield, I'm also interested in broader cultural comparanda for the Anglo-Saxon period--works in Old Norse, Old Irish (although I have neither of those languages yet!), as well as (of course) the Anglo-/Hiberno-/continental Latin contexts. 

 

I'm applying straight out of undergrad. I'm all registered for the subject and general GREs in late September/early October--we should plan on some online post-test commiseration!--and am currently editing my writing sample. My SOP is off w/ professors after a couple of read throughs from other advisors (Cloudofunknowing was gracious enough to take a look at it, as well), so for the moment it's just subject GRE studying for me.

 

(And in re Catherine of Siena, 'astonishing' is certainly one word for it!)

[ArthChauc]

Wow, Cloud--a lot of our general interests are similar. I'm very interested in temporality and affect (I used to work primarily with trauma theory--think Felman, Butler, Caruth, etc.) and the way that medieval religion has footprints in contemporary catholicism. I've worked primarily with de Troyes and Chaucer on my MA thesis, which dealt with concepts of posthumanism and Marxist feminism and the way in which courtly love mechanizes the female body. Lots of Zizek bashing and Willis/Steigler/Butler citing insues.

[littlepigeon]

Unræd, it's great to have another person who'll be going through the application process here. I will admit, sheepishly, that you're leagues ahead of me in your preparations! I've been doing an intensive course in introductory Latin for the past six weeks, so have only had enough free time to research various schools this summer. Today was my last day of class, though, so I'll really start diving into all the major tasks over the next week or two.

 

Arthurian and Cloud, thanks for your suggestions! I hadn't considered either UNM or Austin, but will look into both of their programs as I finalize my list of schools. Out of curiosity, did either of you look at Toronto when you were applying? I'm really interested in their program, but my advisor told me that they rarely accept applicants with little to no background in Latin (the course I just finished covered the equivalent of two semesters, but she seemed confident that that wouldn't be sufficient). If either of you has any info on that issue, it would be greatly appreciated.

 

Looking forward to keeping this forum going! Hopefully we'll draw in some more people as the "official" application season gets closer.

[unræd]

Felibus, it is great to have another medievalist applying at the same time, and I'm sure there'll be more! And: pshaw. It sounds like your preparations are just fine!

 

I know your question was addressed to Cloud and Arthurian (as it should be, given their past success in admissions!), but I know a lot about the program at Toronto--I've had four profs (two Anglo-Saxonists, a Classicist who works on medieval reception history, and a Middle English guy, two of whom are letter writers for my app) who are products of their Medieval Studies program and have spoken about it w/ me in detail, I've researched it a ton, and it's kind of my dream program, even though I probably won't be applying there for financial reasons (cue tiny, tiny violins). I can't give you advice as to whether or not they take applicants w/ less Latin coursework or whether or not you should apply (I will give it to you anyway, though, and spoiler alert: I think you should), but I can tell you what I know about the program and its language reqs.

 

Which Ph.D. are you looking at--Medieval Studies or English?

 

The Medieval Studies program does place a huge emphasis on Latinity. As I'm sure you're aware, Toronto's Medieval Latin test is kind of the 'industry standard' that a lot of other schools use, and the Ph.D. program requires the passage of their Level One Latin exam for registration (seriously--you show up and are given a test, two hours translation w/ no dictionary, in September, and if you don't pass it, that's it) and requires you to complete the Level Two exam as quickly as possible. The Classicist told me that he'd had MA students (in Latin!) who were comfortable w/ their linguistic skills (this is at a big R1 state university with a pretty strong Classics program) struggle to make it. For shits and giggles and edification, here are past tests. 

 

Because of this languages are, I hear, really a factor in admissions (much as in Notre Dame's MS program). But even your advisor's "rarely" is not "never," and pace her you do have some Latin (and time to acquire more), and it's an amazing program, so why the hell not apply? I know you're done w/ your MA program, but any chance you could take more Latin courses this year (or even do more self tuition--there are some great Medieval Latin resources out there) and work a paragraph into your SOP about taking steps to increase your linguistic preparation? Do you have any other relevant languages that you could point up in your SOP, as well? Do you do any work in your writing sample w/ Latin sources in translation that you could shift back into Latin (or your own translations) to show your facility working with the language? A few footnotes you could add that quibble with a translation on some minor philological point? 

 

If you're considering the English Ph.D., though, then obviously the Centre for Medieval Studies' reqs above aren't an issue! If you aren't considering the English program, I'd encourage you to; one of my profs encouraged I apply to both programs simultaneously, since the English Ph.D. can act as sort of a 'back door' into the resources of Toronto's CMS--you can still take the Centre's classes, be a part of a vibrant community of medieval scholars, etc etc etc. The English program places less of an emphasis on languages--no scary tests to sit before you sign up for classes!

 

Another thing to consider is period. I can't speak to this directly in relationship to Toronto, but I know generally that there is a strong difference in language background required depending on whether you work with OE or ME literatures. All the Anglo-Saxonists profs I've had say they don't accept anyone w/o at least two years of Latin; my university (no Toronto, admittedly, but which has a very strong group of medievalists--six tenured faculty, about 3-4 medievalists in the incoming grad school cohorts the past few years) regularly accepts people to work on Middle English texts whose Latin is either in its infancy or even still just a glint in their philological eyes, and it sounds like your interests fall later rather than earlier.

 

I hope this helps!

Edited August 2, 2014 by unræd

[cloudofunknowing]

I investigated Toronto, yes, but - as with Notre Dame's Medieval Institute - knew I lacked the background in languages (Latin particularly) that, for those programs, would probably hurt my chances.

Also, if I'm not mistaken, I don't believe they (Toronto) do much of any pedagogical training - or, at least, not that much. Teaching opportunities - & pedagogical training - were very important to me while researching programs because I genuinely want to teach & wanted one that would aid in those areas.

[littlepigeon]

Cloud and Unræd, these are both extremely useful responses. I'll definitely be applying strictly to English programs--not ones in Medieval Studies--so thankfully the very daunting Latin exam Toronto requires of its CMS students wouldn't apply to me! I think I'll likely end up applying there just because, as you say, why not? But I did notice, as Cloud points out, the dearth of pedagogical training offered there. That would be a pretty big "con," relatively speaking, but at the same time, I'm still compelled (at this point, at least) to apply there simply for how exceptional every other aspect of their program is/how eager I am to work with the medievalists in the English department.

[hreaðemus]

Another odd duck here! Hello! 

 

I'm also applying to Ph.D. programs to study Anglo-Saxon and Old English lit in the fall... I just sort of fell into all of this after transferring from a community college to my current school last fall, but I'm currently involved in a summer undergraduate fellowship/senior thesis project on color resonances in Old English (I'm using a corpus-based analytical approach, since we actually HAVE a comprehensive corpus of OE texts - U of Toronto has my undying gratitude for that), and I'm hoping I'll be able to continue that research in grad school. I'm a bit nervous about how my "new kid" status will look to admissions committees; I have a 4.0, a 170 verbal on the GRE, research experience, etc., but there's no getting around the fact that I had no idea I wanted to study what I want to study until 12 months ago. 

 

I've managed to teach myself a significant chunk of OE this summer, but I'm excited to take actual, real classes in the fall - I'm signed up for OE and an intensive 8-unit introductory Latin class, which I need in order to take the medieval Latin class being offered in the spring. I won't have years and years of languages when I apply, but I'm a quick study and I'll have had two semesters of OE and essentially three of Latin by the time I graduate, so hopefully I won't seem to far behind. I'm crossing my fingers.

 

Currently I'm getting ready to present at the undergraduate conference that concludes my summer fellowship, so I'm supersuper nervous... I'm on the plenary too, which means I have to stand up in front of EVERYBODY and pretend I know what I'm doing. Eep. But I really do care about/am proud of my research, so hopefully it won't be too bad.

 

Nice to meet you all! 

[unræd]

Another odd duck here! Hello! 

 

I'm also applying to Ph.D. programs to study Anglo-Saxon and Old English lit in the fall... I just sort of fell into all of this after transferring from a community college to my current school last fall, but I'm currently involved in a summer undergraduate fellowship/senior thesis project on color resonances in Old English (I'm using a corpus-based analytical approach, since we actually HAVE a comprehensive corpus of OE texts - U of Toronto has my undying gratitude for that), and I'm hoping I'll be able to continue that research in grad school. I'm a bit nervous about how my "new kid" status will look to admissions committees; I have a 4.0, a 170 verbal on the GRE, research experience, etc., but there's no getting around the fact that I had no idea I wanted to study what I want to study until 12 months ago. 

 

I've managed to teach myself a significant chunk of OE this summer, but I'm excited to take actual, real classes in the fall - I'm signed up for OE and an intensive 8-unit introductory Latin class, which I need in order to take the medieval Latin class being offered in the spring. I won't have years and years of languages when I apply, but I'm a quick study and I'll have had two semesters of OE and essentially three of Latin by the time I graduate, so hopefully I won't seem to far behind. I'm crossing my fingers.

 

Currently I'm getting ready to present at the undergraduate conference that concludes my summer fellowship, so I'm supersuper nervous... I'm on the plenary too, which means I have to stand up in front of EVERYBODY and pretend I know what I'm doing. Eep. But I really do care about/am proud of my research, so hopefully it won't be too bad.

 

Nice to meet you all! 

 

I already said this in another thread, but since it's so delightful to have another Anglo-Saxonist about: welcome!

 

Also, your color research sounds absolutely fascinating.

 

In re languages, I also wouldn't sweat it. The intensive Latin shows drive given your compressed timeframe, and given the way OE courses are structured at most departments in the US, I don't think it's at all unusual for applicants to have only had two semesters of OE by the time they graduate. Another way to beef up languages are departmental reading groups--does your university have an Old English or a Latin reading group? (If not, you could always start one, which makes for a lovely paragraph in the SOP!) Can I ask what you've been using to teach yourself OE over the summer? Anything fun you've been reading? Do you know what book you'll use for the fall? I assume the spring class is the standard reading of Beowulf, yes? Sorry for all the questions, but I am always up for a discussion of the language and its magnificent quirks!

[hreaðemus]

I already said this in another thread, but since it's so delightful to have another Anglo-Saxonist about: welcome!

 

Also, your color research sounds absolutely fascinating.

 

In re languages, I also wouldn't sweat it. The intensive Latin shows drive given your compressed timeframe, and given the way OE courses are structured at most departments in the US, I don't think it's at all unusual for applicants to have only had two semesters of OE by the time they graduate. Another way to beef up languages are departmental reading groups--does your university have an Old English or a Latin reading group? (If not, you could always start one, which makes for a lovely paragraph in the SOP!) Can I ask what you've been using to teach yourself OE over the summer? Anything fun you've been reading? Do you know what book you'll use for the fall? I assume the spring class is the standard reading of Beowulf, yes? Sorry for all the questions, but I am always up for a discussion of the language and its magnificent quirks!

 

Thank you! I'm also pretty pleased to have a pre-1066 comrade in arms. I bought my OE textbooks for the fall earlier this semester, so I've been using those for some of my self-study - we're using Baker's Introduction to Old English and The Cambridge Old English Reader, but I've also got Mitchell and Robinson's A Guide to Old English, which my mentor recommended as a supplement.

 

Most of my self-study has been based on my research, though - I've had to compile data sets of 800+ passages from the Online Corpus, including homilies, poetry, the leechbooks and medicinal texts, charters, etc, and because many of these don't HAVE a published translation available, I've had to do the bulk of the translation myself! It's amazing what 8 hours a day with a dictionary and a foreign language over two straight months will do for reading comprehension. I quite enjoy the "phoenix homilies" (Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, MS. 198) - one of my proudest moments was translating all the way through and only needing the dictionary for three sentences!

 

I'm afraid I don't know what our spring offering will be for Old English, but this past spring it was indeed a Beowulf translation seminar (which I sadly did not know about until its final weeks), so you're probably spot on! I do love your idea about a reading group. I'm almost positive we don't have one, but I'll ask my mentor - it would be such great practice!

[unræd]

Good times!

 

Baker's great; it's what was used for my intro class, and I think it's definitely the best purely introductory text, especially for people with no background in an inflected language. But to be honest, at this point in the game I think you'll find the Mitchell & Robinson much more useful for your purposes. Marsden's reader is stellar--a little over-glossed, depending on what you're using it for, but great texts--I've used some of them for our OE reading group. And if it was Beowulf last spring, it might not be so this year--some schools do Beowulf every year, some alternate out Beowulf with something else. Which is the case at my school--I took the Beowulf seminar last spring, and I've been hounding the prof who's teaching the OE seminar this year for months to find out what the topic will be!

[littlepigeon]

Another odd duck here! Hello! 

 

I'm also applying to Ph.D. programs to study Anglo-Saxon and Old English lit in the fall... I just sort of fell into all of this after transferring from a community college to my current school last fall, but I'm currently involved in a summer undergraduate fellowship/senior thesis project on color resonances in Old English (I'm using a corpus-based analytical approach, since we actually HAVE a comprehensive corpus of OE texts - U of Toronto has my undying gratitude for that), and I'm hoping I'll be able to continue that research in grad school. I'm a bit nervous about how my "new kid" status will look to admissions committees; I have a 4.0, a 170 verbal on the GRE, research experience, etc., but there's no getting around the fact that I had no idea I wanted to study what I want to study until 12 months ago. 

 

I've managed to teach myself a significant chunk of OE this summer, but I'm excited to take actual, real classes in the fall - I'm signed up for OE and an intensive 8-unit introductory Latin class, which I need in order to take the medieval Latin class being offered in the spring. I won't have years and years of languages when I apply, but I'm a quick study and I'll have had two semesters of OE and essentially three of Latin by the time I graduate, so hopefully I won't seem to far behind. I'm crossing my fingers.

 

Currently I'm getting ready to present at the undergraduate conference that concludes my summer fellowship, so I'm supersuper nervous... I'm on the plenary too, which means I have to stand up in front of EVERYBODY and pretend I know what I'm doing. Eep. But I really do care about/am proud of my research, so hopefully it won't be too bad.

 

Nice to meet you all! 

 

Hi there! Glad we've got another person in our pre-1500 forum. : ) I did an intensive Latin course this summer at UChicago, and it wasn't bad at all, especially if you like languages. That being said, I had 5 hours of class each day, and would typically study between 8 and 10 hours after that, so it wasn't exactly easy rolling. It sounds like you pick up new languages easily, so I'm sure you'll do fine. I'd love to hear more about this color research, though! Also, any ideas yet about where you want to apply?

[hreaðemus]

Hi there! Glad we've got another person in our pre-1500 forum. : ) I did an intensive Latin course this summer at UChicago, and it wasn't bad at all, especially if you like languages. That being said, I had 5 hours of class each day, and would typically study between 8 and 10 hours after that, so it wasn't exactly easy rolling. It sounds like you pick up new languages easily, so I'm sure you'll do fine. I'd love to hear more about this color research, though! Also, any ideas yet about where you want to apply?

 

Eep, five hours a day?? How many weeks was your class? That's some stamina right there - I'm very impressed, and a bit terrified. Mine is only one hour a day, five days a week, but it's stretched over 4 months - we also have a summer intensive Latin option that is actually 10 units (ack!), and I think that one is a bit more like what you're describing, but I couldn't take that one because of my summer research commitments.

 

I do tend to have a knack for languages, so I'm hopeful I'll survive - but I'm also taking 20 terrifying units this coming semester because I am an idiot/masochist and I thought it would be smart to take a grad seminar on Chaucer (there aren't any OE graduate offerings this semester, so I thought I'd work on my general knowledge) IN ADDITION to Latin, OE, my departmental honors course, and grad apps. *dies* I'm genuinely nervous for my GPA - this is going to test my mettle beyond anything I've had to do so far.

 

That said, I'm happy to babble about my research! I'm basically using a quantitative corpus-based approach to assess symbolic OE color associations by tracking color-referent relationships - so, instead of assuming that read carries the modern English associations of red, or that fealo is just a word for yellowish-brown, I'm looking at where those words get the most use, what they describe, and how these collocational elements can be used to deepen our understanding of Anglo-Saxon color concepts, as well as our analysis of passages in which those colors appear. It's kind of boring during the process - lots of translation, categorization, and percentage calculations - but really exciting when I actually get to APPLY my findings! I'm speaking on read and fealo at my conference in a couple of weeks, and plan on adding another lexemic group to my senior thesis, but I suspect analysis of the color lexicon as a whole will take years. I think it could be really useful to AS scholars in the future, though - so, grad school! Or so I hope.

 

Right now my shortlist is Berkeley, Yale, Oxbridge, U of Toronto, Harvard, and Cornell - but it's not final yet, so we'll see. I'd like to add a few more possibilities to my list, but my mentor has been quite firm that the first five are undoubtedly the best programs for OE, and I would trust her with my life at this point... so when she says jump, I jump! I mean, unless it were off a cliff or something. But even then I might.

[Dr. Old Bill]

I do tend to have a knack for languages, so I'm hopeful I'll survive - but I'm also taking 20 terrifying units this coming semester because I am an idiot/masochist and I thought it would be smart to take a grad seminar on Chaucer (there aren't any OE graduate offerings this semester, so I thought I'd work on my general knowledge) IN ADDITION to Latin, OE, my departmental honors course, and grad apps. *dies* I'm genuinely nervous for my GPA - this is going to test my mettle beyond anything I've had to do so far.

 

I'm totally crashing the Medievalist thread just to say HOLY CRAP to the above.

 

Carry on.

[hreaðemus]

I'm totally crashing the Medievalist thread just to say HOLY CRAP to the above.

 

Carry on.

 

Oh dear. Like, holy crap that's a terrible plan? Or just like holy crap I feel your pain?

 

Also, I am currently filling out a bunch of scholarship applications, and I have to say - I HATE THIS PART. Why must asking for money always entail selling oneself, as if a carefully crafted narrative, and not one's ACTUAL research and competencies, were the product being funded? I have to figure out how to make Anglo-Saxon cultural conceptions of the world relevant to US-UK relations, and really what I want to say is "I need your books, UK! I can't really do what I do without your books, and I promise I will work hard and be smart if you let me visit them!" But I can't say that. Instead I have to make myself sound like a freaking Nobel Prize winner just to enter the competition. Ugh.

[Dr. Old Bill]

Oh dear. Like, holy crap that's a terrible plan? Or just like holy crap I feel your pain?

 

Oh! Just "holy crap" to the workload of 20 credits in a semester, combined with all of the grad application stuff. I take 16 per semester, packed on to two days per week (i.e., five courses on Tuesdays and Thursdays), and have a 100 mile commute...so I'm no stranger to "crazy" levels of work. But there's no way around the fact that 20 credits is a heck of a lot, so yes...I feel your pain!

[unræd]

Oh! Just "holy crap" to the workload of 20 credits in a semester, combined with all of the grad application stuff. I take 16 per semester, packed on to two days per week (i.e., five courses on Tuesdays and Thursdays), and have a 100 mile commute...so I'm no stranger to "crazy" levels of work. But there's no way around the fact that 20 credits is a heck of a lot, so yes...I feel your pain!

 

I have zero doubt you'll succeed in it, hreathemus, given your past academic success, but I'm with WT as to the sheer dauntingness of it. I've done twenty credits a semester twice before, but not with grad school appcrap on topic of it!

[Dr. Old Bill]

Yes, I agree with Unraed -- I should have mentioned that it's certainly doable. Indeed, one of my biggest pet peeves is when people tell me I'm crazy for commuting such a long distance, taking all my courses on two days, or various other observations on my "unusual" circumstances. Before my first semester at my undergraduate school, the associate dean literally begged me to consider taking only four courses, and he was worried that I'd just burn out and drop out right away. It may have been well-intentioned, but it was annoying, because it undermined my ability to determine what I can handle. And given my academic success since then, it was entirely unfounded.

 

So yes, the bottom line is that YOU are the ultimate arbiter of how much you can handle. Hopefully my comments didn't come across to the contrary!

 

 

 

 

(P.S.: How do you say "foot in mouth" in Old English? )

[unræd]

Yes, I agree with Unraed -- I should have mentioned that it's certainly doable. Indeed, one of my biggest pet peeves is when people tell me I'm crazy for commuting such a long distance, taking all my courses on two days, or various other observations on my "unusual" circumstances. Before my first semester at my undergraduate school, the associate dean literally begged me to consider taking only four courses, and he was worried that I'd just burn out and drop out right away. It may have been well-intentioned, but it was annoying, because it undermined my ability to determine what I can handle. And given my academic success since then, it was entirely unfounded.

 

So yes, the bottom line is that YOU are the ultimate arbiter of how much you can handle. Hopefully my comments didn't come across to the contrary!

 

 

 

 

(P.S.: How do you say "foot in mouth" in Old English? )

 

Oh! Ack! I hadn't thought that's what you were implying, or meant to myself imply that's what you were! Your comment didn't read like that.

 

I think we're all a bit dazed just imagining the thing.

Edited August 13, 2014 by unræd

[hreaðemus]

(P.S.: How do you say "foot in mouth" in Old English? )

 

Oh goodness, your foot's not in your mouth! I question my own sanity sometimes, heh, so I guess I just wouldn't have been surprised to hear someone else question it too - my (admittedly less driven) friends at school all think I'm nuts. (My professors, however, say no such thing, and it's their feedback I value most, so! Here's to us overachievers and "crazy" people.) But I do appreciate the clarification, and the support - it's nice to hear that other people have taken on similar challenges and succeeded.

 

The only thing that really scares me is that I am literally the ONLY person I know with a 4.0 at my school; it just doesn't happen, there's always a stray A- that drags GPAs down - and of course I'm a tiny bit proud of this, since I do work hard and it's nice to feel a bit special. But I'm really not sure how I'll keep it this next semester... I considered taking my Latin class pass/no pass to protect my GPA, but it's 8 units, which would only leave me with 12 graded units, and that is ONE unit too few to get on the Dean's List, which I would really like to do. What's the point of a 4.0 if you still don't get to be on the special list? I've been excluded every semester because I've always had 12 units of classes and then 2-3 research units, which are pass/no pass... bleh. I don't know, I suppose I'm just rambling now.

 

But! To get back on the medievalist track, I suspect the answer to your question is fot on muþ - does that seem right, Unræd? Again, I'm still just teaching myself, so I'm better at translating than composing - I know very little about word order. But that would be my best guess!

Edited August 13, 2014 by hreaðemus