French Studies, fall 2010

[ornithology]

I thought I'd start a thread for those of us who are applying to French studies PhD programs (or Romance depts in general)... has anyone received any news? The earliest I expect would be UPenn which says they will inform applicants of their decision at the end of January.

Maybe I'm the only one out here? Hello?

[dflanagan]

Not exactly French Studies, but I'm applying to the NYU joint PHD in French Studies and history... more of a historian myself, though. Did you apply to NYU from French and French Studies?

[val]

Oh finally, I thought I was the only person on the board applying for French.

I haven't heard anything yet, but I'm not expecting anything untill end of Jan. Especially since I am an international student, applying mostly to State Unis.

What are your research interests? and where did you apply?

[dflanagan]

I'm interested in the political history of France, especially the right wing during and after the Vichy period, but pretty much anything in French history after 1870 is of interest to me. I might want to stick some colonial history in there- I'd love to write something about collaborators and resisters in the colonies, especially Syria, Lebanon, or North Africa. NYU is the only French studies program I applied to, then 9 regular history programs. I'm writing about Francois de la Rocque, the French "fascist" leader, and his role in the resistance for my senior thesis. How about you?

[BillyPilgrim]

I applied to mostly all comp lit programs but I did apply to the French Program at Vanderbilt. The comp lit program at Vandy is not accepting for Fall 2010 but their English and other language programs boast an interdisciplinary approach. The French program and faculy lined up better with my interests than did the English program. The possibility of studying French in the south strikes me as very odd for some reason.

[ornithology]

hi, actually i think it makes sense to study French in the South. Vanderbilt's not Louisiana but it's a lot closer to New Orleans than Stanford.

has anyone heard back from schools? I haven't heard anything yet--although I submitted my last application four days ago.

I'm hoping it will be easier to get into French programs, because schools are in need of cheap labor for the intro classes. But who knows? I'm also a little nervous because I'm applying straight from undergrad & am a native English speaker (but have spent almost 3 years, including a semester of study abroad in France).

Let me know if you guys hear anything--and I'll do the same.

[BillyPilgrim]

I saw on the results page that someone was invited to Vandy's interview weekends...wonder if that mean my app didn't make the cut.

The reason I applied to Vandy's French dept is because they actually contacted me and sort of sold me on the program...now it looks like they don't want me. Disappointing.

I too am a native English speaker with only two years of French under my belt. I did my undergrad at Berkeley and their French program is very intense. By my last semester I was taking upper division literature classes and did well in them.

[ornithology]

salut.....unfortunately, UVA has had its interview weekend. you may be on the wait-list though!!

does anyone know of any reliable rankings for French programs? I could only find this list which seems so outdated

http://whichuniversitybest.blogspot.com/2009/08/best-french-doctoral-programs.html

(really? duke is so much higher than Cornell? and i didn't think that Penn was number five either! and harvvard doesn't even make the list (even though they have tom conley?!)

i have also looked at phds.org which puts Penn State as number 1. Which seems just silly!

[ornithology]

oh one more thing, do you know if Berkeley has made its offers yet??? i applied and it's my top choice! i have spent the past year on the west coast and don't want to leave!!

[val]

I saw on the results page that someone was invited to Vandy's interview weekends...wonder if that mean my app didn't make the cut.

The reason I applied to Vandy's French dept is because they actually contacted me and sort of sold me on the program...now it looks like they don't want me. Disappointing.

I too am a native English speaker with only two years of French under my belt. I did my undergrad at Berkeley and their French program is very intense. By my last semester I was taking upper division literature classes and did well in them.

I'm just curious, since you mentioned that you studied at the French department at Berkeley, would you mind sharing your impressions? It's one of my top choices and I’d like to know what the atmosphere is like over there, and how are professors and students?

[BillyPilgrim]

I'm just curious, since you mentioned that you studied at the French department at Berkeley, would you mind sharing your impressions? It's one of my top choices and I’d like to know what the atmosphere is like over there, and how are professors and students?

I know as an undergrad the French dept is very rigorous. I don't know what other universities do, but at Cal all lower division classes are taught in French with absolutely no English allowed...it's the sink or swim method. A lot of students sink (drop the class or don't continue past French 1A) and a few climb the ladder to the upper division classes. The dept does have a reputation for being demanding. The GSIs that taught my lower division classes were sometimes very on edge. I surmised it was because of their workload plus the responsibility of teaching their classes. But for the most part I had a positive impression of them (a few, however, were notoriously difficult to work with).

As far as the profs go, they are all top notch. All of us undergrads adored them all. They're a great group of people.

What is your focus?

Also, the French and Comp Lit are kind of joined at the hip...they share the same floor of offices and coordinate very well together. Sometimes the departments would put together potlucks or other get-togethers for the students....a very friendly and welcoming place.

Edited February 14, 2010 by BillyPilgrim

[val]

I know as an undergrad the French dept is very rigorous. I don't know what other universities do, but at Cal all lower division classes are taught in French with absolutely no English allowed...it's the sink or swim method. A lot of students sink (drop the class or don't continue past French 1A) and a few climb the ladder to the upper division classes. The dept does have a reputation for being demanding. The GSIs that taught my lower division classes were sometimes very on edge. I surmised it was because of their workload plus the responsibility of teaching their classes. But for the most part I had a positive impression of them (a few, however, were notoriously difficult to work with).

As far as the profs go, they are all top notch. All of us undergrads adored them all. They're a great group of people.

What is your focus?

Also, the French and Comp Lit are kind of joined at the hip...they share the same floor of offices and coordinate very well together. Sometimes the departments would put together potlucks or other get-togethers for the students....a very friendly and welcoming place.

Thanks for the information. I also had the impression it's a very demanding program (which is of course a good thing)

I'm focusing on Early Modern Literature. Have you by chance taken any classes with Professor Hampton? And if so, what was your impression?

[ctf22]

Thanks for the information. I also had the impression it's a very demanding program (which is of course a good thing)

I'm focusing on Early Modern Literature. Have you by chance taken any classes with Professor Hampton? And if so, what was your impression?

The wait for Columbia's French killing anyone yet? It looks like last year they sent decisions this week, but... no dice!

Also, have any of you considered applying to facultés in France? ENS has a séléction internationale, but only 20 students are admitted each year (of which 2 were from the US last year!). The problem is that a) there's little fundung and you have to go to France near the end of summer to take the entrance exam (le concours). I'm really tempted to take that chance, because frankly I don't know if I want to be stuck in US institutions for the next 6 years with just the slight hope that I'll spend a year abroad, even if it is a year at the ENS.

Good luck!

Colin

[mugojoe]

The wait for Columbia's French killing anyone yet? It looks like last year they sent decisions this week, but... no dice!

Also, have any of you considered applying to facultés in France? ENS has a séléction internationale, but only 20 students are admitted each year (of which 2 were from the US last year!). The problem is that a) there's little fundung and you have to go to France near the end of summer to take the entrance exam (le concours). I'm really tempted to take that chance, because frankly I don't know if I want to be stuck in US institutions for the next 6 years with just the slight hope that I'll spend a year abroad, even if it is a year at the ENS.

Good luck!

Hey, thought username111 rang a bell - and the ENS thing helped me figure it out : you were the exchange student taking that CNRS seminar on Proust manuscripts last year, right ? I sat next to you once (it's ok if you don't remember So you're applying to PhD programs for the fall ? where ?

To all : I only applied to French at UPenn and CompLit at Yale - obviously got rejected from the latter; hoping to get over it with the French program at Penn. I went to the interviews weekend in early Feb, but haven't heard from them since.

Picking up on Ornihtology's question about French programs ranking : what's the general impression in the US about the major programs ? What would you guys think ?

[rooibos]

I applied to two French Studies programs, too-- at Tulane and LSU, mostly because of location. I just heard that I was accepted to Tulane for their PhD this week, so I'm really stoked about that.

[mikazukipie]

I'm coming from somewhere a little different, since I applied to French Linguistics programs (accepted at IU and UT Austin, STILL waiting to hear from UIUC, but as someone so aptly put it in the Linguistics forum, I no longer care). Most people outside the field I've talked to have never even HEARD of French linguistics programs, so it's even tougher to make a decision.

[Matt from Philly]

Hello everyone. Someone had asked about the rankings for French studies graduate programs.

The only thing I have ever found was a survey done by the NRC. It ranks a lot of different graduate programs of various disciplines from 1 to 45.

In addition to ranking them, the NRC also gives them some kind of numerical grade (0 to 5, 5 being the highest). I am unsure as to how they determine these numbers, but I believe the NRC website may have information on the methodology used. If you're really interested, I suppose you could look it up.

Also, I think this study is somewhat outdated. It's either from the mid 1990s or the early 2000s. I'm sure it's not completely useless, though.

Here's a link to the list:

NRC Rankings in French

I hope this proves helpful.