Comparative Literature Programs

[GradSchoolJitters]

Hey all, I just wanted to see if I could find any fellow comparative literature applicants out there! I've applied to University of Toronto's MA program, and PhD programs at Columbia (via the German department), NYU and CUNY. I've also applied to a bunch of schools in Germany, which explains by bizarrely short list of schools. If there are any other comp lit folks out there, I'd love to hear about where you applied, what your interests are in complit, etc. - and for some moral support as we await decisions

[melusine]

Hi there!

I also applied to Columbia and NYU! *snide competitive squint*

We're probably not in that much of a competition though, since my languages are Russian/French/English. My German's waaaaaay down there with Latin.

I'm also trying not beat myself up too much for not applying through French for Columbia. I didn't realize you didn't necessarily have to go through the English dept. until after the deadline. Should've gone through French, but oh well.

Do you have a specific period you're focusing on/people you're excited to work with??

[Nightingalesing]

Hi! I'm also applying to Comp Lit programs this season, but in a very different subfield. My focus is on East Asian languages and literatures and I've done a lot of work with Chinese Opera and theatre in Elizabethan England. I'm crossing my fingers and waiting to hear back from Penn State, WUSTL, Duke, Stanford, UC Davis, and Harvard. best of luck to everyone!!

[BillyPilgrim]

I've applied to NYU as well (Is this the most competitive program?), and UPenn, Stanford, UC Berkeley (where I did my BA), Indiana University, Emory, Johns Hopkins, UConn and I applied to the English programs at Notre Dame, and WashU and French at Vanderbilt.

Where did everyone do their undergrad?

I am interested in the history of Biblical interpretation and its effect on contemporaneous philosophy and fiction.

[TryingAgain]

I am also a Comp Lit person. I applied to UC Davis, UC Santa Barbara, UCI, Indiana, Purdue, Iowa, WashU, Cornell, University of Illinois, Urbana, and then a couple of English programs as well. My focus is on Latin American literature, the African diaspora and political philosophy. I am working on a second BA now, which I will finish in the spring, in Spanish, but I am still worried that admissions committees are going to be unimpressed by my language levels. I am only in second year French. How is everyone else's language skills? Are you all octolingual or something incredibly discouraging (and impressive) like that? Good luck to everybody!

[jvaknin]

I've applied to Comp. Lit. doctoral programs at UC Berkeley, Johns Hopkins, UChicago, Princeton, and NYU, Romance Languages at Harvard, and Spanish/Comp Lit at WUSTL.

Already got an informal, unofficial acceptance email for Berkeley's Comp. Lit. PhD program (pending further notice re: funding, etc.). I'm still waiting to hear back from the rest.

Good luck everyone!

[BillyPilgrim]

On 2/1/2010 at 7:32 PM, jvaknin said:

I've applied to Comp. Lit. doctoral programs at UC Berkeley, Johns Hopkins, UChicago, Princeton, and NYU, Romance Languages at Harvard, and Spanish/Comp Lit at WUSTL.

Already got an informal, unofficial acceptance email for Berkeley's Comp. Lit. PhD program (pending further notice re: funding, etc.). I'm still waiting to hear back from the rest.

Good luck everyone!

Congrats on the UCB acceptance. I got my BA there...I love the campus (I proposed to my wife in front of the campanile), the city and the program. Which professors will you be working with?

I applied there as well but unfortunately they have a reputation of not accetping their undergrads into their grad programs.

[jvaknin]

Congrats on the UCB acceptance. I got my BA there...I love the campus (I proposed to my wife in front of the campanile), the city and the program. Which professors will you be working with?

I applied there as well but unfortunately they have a reputation of not accetping their undergrads into their grad programs.

Thanks! I hear great things about Berkeley and the Bay Area, though I've never been out West. I'm mainly interested in postcolonial Caribbean and North African literatures in Spanish, French and English spanning the 20th Century, as well as U.S. lit. from Modernism to the present. I'm not too sure who I'll be working with yet (if I end up at Berkeley, that is), but Karl Britto, Juana María Rodriguez, Estelle Tarica, Susan Schweik, Soraya Tlatli all seem like great faculty in my fields of interest

[vertige]

I see that a number of you applied to Penn (UPenn as some have called it) for Comparative Literature - brava! I have my B.A. in Comparative Lit. (with French and Russian) from their "Program" (yea, it's *not* a department, they def avoided some issues with admin politics by performing that little sleight of hand).

I took French lit, German lit, Hispanic Studies, Italian lit/film, French Film, lit theory/English, grad, undergrad, all sorts of classes there. I even took some philosophy classes in their horrid, Wittgenstein-obsessed Philosophy (of Science-ish) Department (sorry to casual browsers who might see that - I had a horrible experience with a History of Modern Philosophy T.A. who basically gave me a D on a paper specifically because he found out I was a Comparative Literature major . . .not cool).

Penn is dreamy for Comp Lit, I would really recommend it. And if you're interested in theory, take courses with Jean-Michel Rabate and Rita Copeland. They're magnificent. (Heather Love and David Karzanjian do good theory/queer studies stuff, too, in English). Some great French folk do poco (I took a course on La France Postcoloniale with Lydie Moudileno . . . she's v. cool) and the Hispanic studies dept is very poco as well, as far as I understand.

Well, that's my spiel for Penn. When I was a senior there and got into grad schools, the Chair of Comp Lit invited me to come meet prospective grad students and attend little house parties because I was good at selling Penn. One thing: it is pretty rigorous, and in the good middle-Atlantic spirit, as with Columbia and Princeton and NYU, there can be a lot of pressure to 'know your stuff' - the nice thing with Penn, I noticed, is that grad students do get treated with respect - someone can disagree with you fervently, and still respect you as a person. There's less of the melodrama there than what you see in other rockstar-filled departments.

OK enough of my rambling. Just figuring out ways to procrastinate.

[jvaknin]

I see that a number of you applied to Penn (UPenn as some have called it) for Comparative Literature - brava! I have my B.A. in Comparative Lit. (with French and Russian) from their "Program" (yea, it's *not* a department, they def avoided some issues with admin politics by performing that little sleight of hand).

I took French lit, German lit, Hispanic Studies, Italian lit/film, French Film, lit theory/English, grad, undergrad, all sorts of classes there. I even took some philosophy classes in their horrid, Wittgenstein-obsessed Philosophy (of Science-ish) Department (sorry to casual browsers who might see that - I had a horrible experience with a History of Modern Philosophy T.A. who basically gave me a D on a paper specifically because he found out I was a Comparative Literature major . . .not cool).

Penn is dreamy for Comp Lit, I would really recommend it. And if you're interested in theory, take courses with Jean-Michel Rabate and Rita Copeland. They're magnificent. (Heather Love and David Karzanjian do good theory/queer studies stuff, too, in English). Some great French folk do poco (I took a course on La France Postcoloniale with Lydie Moudileno . . . she's v. cool) and the Hispanic studies dept is very poco as well, as far as I understand.

Well, that's my spiel for Penn. When I was a senior there and got into grad schools, the Chair of Comp Lit invited me to come meet prospective grad students and attend little house parties because I was good at selling Penn. One thing: it is pretty rigorous, and in the good middle-Atlantic spirit, as with Columbia and Princeton and NYU, there can be a lot of pressure to 'know your stuff' - the nice thing with Penn, I noticed, is that grad students do get treated with respect - someone can disagree with you fervently, and still respect you as a person. There's less of the melodrama there than what you see in other rockstar-filled departments.

OK enough of my rambling. Just figuring out ways to procrastinate.

I totally agree! Penn is great (I'm finishing up my Comp. Lit. undergrad major there now). I've taken courses with Lydie Moudileno, and am currently taking one with Heather Love-both of whom are excellent and engaging professors.

[melusine]

I see that a number of you applied to Penn (UPenn as some have called it)

I always thought that's what people call it to make the distinction with Penn State...? Then again, I have no clue.

[cleisthenes]

I always thought that's what people call it to make the distinction with Penn State...? Then again, I have no clue.

In the parlance:

Penn = UPenn

Penn State = Penn State

[BillyPilgrim]

Thanks! I hear great things about Berkeley and the Bay Area, though I've never been out West. I'm mainly interested in postcolonial Caribbean and North African literatures in Spanish, French and English spanning the 20th Century, as well as U.S. lit. from Modernism to the present. I'm not too sure who I'll be working with yet (if I end up at Berkeley, that is), but Karl Britto, Juana María Rodriguez, Estelle Tarica, Susan Schweik, Soraya Tlatli all seem like great faculty in my fields of interest

I am Bay Area born and bred so if you end up going to UCB feel free to contact me for any reason. Karl Britto is a great professor and a very nice man. I took one class with him and saw him in office hours a few times... a stand out guy.

Good luck with everything.

[jvaknin]

I am Bay Area born and bred so if you end up going to UCB feel free to contact me for any reason. Karl Britto is a great professor and a very nice man. I took one class with him and saw him in office hours a few times... a stand out guy.

Good luck with everything.

Thank you! I'm visiting in March, and am really looking forward to it. =)

[GradSchoolJitters]

Hey all, does anybody know if Columbia/NYU/CUNY do interviews for comp lit applicants, or when they send out notifications? I've been telling myself that if I don't hear about an interview by the end of February I might as well write them off and prepare for a big move to Germany, but I'm not quite sure where I got that idea from (probably while browsing GradSchool forums).. I am SOOOOOOOOOO TIRED of waiting, I feel like I've been stressing about grad school details since I took the GRE last spring - argh! Hope everyone else is hanging in there

[Aquinaplatostotlestine]

I've been wondering about comp lit at NYU also (I didn't apply to CUNY or Columbia), so far I haven't heard so much as a peep... but the high # of interviews--for English--posted on the results page has made me a little nervous. Has anybody heard anything from the Comp Lit department at NYU?

Cheers.

[BillyPilgrim]

I too have heard nothing from NYU. My guess is they are a step or two behind in the process.

[jvaknin]

I too have heard nothing from NYU. My guess is they are a step or two behind in the process.

That's what I'm hoping, as well. I applied to Spanish/ Comp. Lit. @ Columbia, so I'm guessing my application goes through the Spanish department first.

[titaniasummer]

I too have heard nothing from NYU. My guess is they are a step or two behind in the process.

Hello!

Someone seems to have got an acceptance from NYU on 11 Feb. I'm guessing this means it's nail-biting-result-week now.

As for my stats, I'm more of an (South) Asian Literature person than a Comp Lit one. I'm a native speaker of Hindi and Bengali, I also received my BA and MA from Indian Universities. I worked for a few years as a journalist at a major Indian daily and worked in an NGO that works towards bettering primary education in rural India before I moved to London on an International fellowship to read for a second masters in Comparative Literature at the School of Oriental and African Studies. I have a reading knowledge of French and a few other Indian languages. I have applied for comp lit programs at NYU, UPenn, UCSB and Purdue and for Asian Studies at a few others. Currently, I have been turned down by the California schools but I've been accepted with fellowships into the more modest programs on my list, i.e. Purdue for comp lit and UWashington and UMinnesota for Asian Literatures. I am not too hopeful of getting into the rest of my Comp Lit options, but I do hope for an offer or two from the remaining South Asian studies departments.

Good luck to everyone else here!

[Lise]

I'm also CompLit applicant! And also playing the endless waiting game =/ I So far I haven't heard back from any universities which causes me to be more & more stressed-out...

[memyselfandi]

Has anyone heard from Columbia French/Comp. Lit?

[Lise]

Seems that NYU has waitlisted someone according to the admissions results. So strange since only one person was accepted so far...

[titaniasummer]

Seems that NYU has waitlisted someone according to the admissions results. So strange since only one person was accepted so far...

[titaniasummer]

I think that means all the results are out only rejections now

[Lise]

I wouldn't be so sure about that. So far only one acceptance has been posted, quite odd considering that NYU has a large program.