next »

[magistra]

Yes, but the language requirement can be the mandatory academic standard.  History departments may be less stringent, but again, remember that you'll actually need these languages, and trust me, a year or two isn't enough.  You will need to assess whether your primary sources are accurately translated and even handle palaeographic documents which haven't been translated.  So many people with better language training are your competition, and furthermore, you really will need this prep once you're in.  The more you have, the better.

[kbatulli]

I know the hoops seem amazing KTM, and the leaps for an American who comes to the classics late, by which I mean the sophmore year of university studies, are almost insurmountable. Ancient history, in particular, is incredibly international. The types of ancient history programs in the history departments you are talking about recruit from Australia, New Zealand, Germany, Ireland, England, The Netherlands, Canada, Italy, and the US. I am the only American in my ancient history program right now. The other students come from all over the world. In my experience, my collegues who went straight in to classics grad programs from an American BA had done Latin normally since middle school and were taking master's seminars in Latin their junior year. These students thus focus almost entirely on Greek as undergrads and get that language to its third or fourth year before they even apply (normally six to seven formal classes). In the rest of the world, this preparation seems to be a lot more standard, and the international graduate students often have amazing language preparation simply not accessible to most Americans, who did not attend some sort of elite high school. Hence, the post bac, which you will find is often heavily American, and includes many bright people who simply found their love for classics too late by the standard of graduate admissions. You need to think of ancient history admissions therefore more like a checklist to start with. Do you have Latin and Greek? What was your GPA overall?  What was your major GPA? What was your GRE? What is your formal coursework record? Did scholars we respect write your recs? In general if you read admission websites you will find that they include all of these questions as part of the description of their process. In my experience this is generally a checklist and each program sets their checks at different levels. I find that if you can check of all of these things for a program, and each will tell you quite simply the normal levels, then you have shot. Next, they read those that past to determine who fits. Fit is each departments own determination. However, if you want to do Late Antique Prosopography, and you apply to a history department with a Greek historian and a Roman historian who have never done a prosopographic publication , you will never get in. Chances are someone who does work more in their field always applies. I found one of the best resources when I was applying was to look at departments I was interested in and study the type of people they have admitted in the past. Stanford is particularly good for this as they record their Graduate student's preparation rather well, if you look at their community page. It also list their reseach and breaks down the field spread. You can see how many students that they actually accept in the subfield and what those students are actually working on. If you repeat this where you can then you get a sense of where you might fit.

I wouldn't say that this is entirely true. I had 3 years of each language and got into a top 10 program for Classics. I also have many friends in good programs who started the Classics major during their Sophomore year. It's helpful, obviously, to be more experienced, but it's not realistic to have that many applicants with that sort of idealistic background...

[magistra]

But plenty of applicants do have a great deal of language background.  You may get in, you may not.  It depends on a lot of different factors which change from program to program and year to year.  Yet again, the basic message is this: it's hard to get in.  It's hard to succeed.  It's hard to finish.  The more language background (and, yes, other qualifications as well) you have beforehand, the better chance you'll have of getting into the program you want and getting funding, and succeeding once you're there.

Just because you got in doesn't mean he will.  And expectations are usually higher for those with graduate degrees already.

RH's advice is excellent.  Heed it.

[not_a_gradstudent1]

... but for the exam itself, you may have 15 lines of Boethius, plus another 15 lines each of a papal letter, a chronicle, and some fifteenth-century poetry, all to translate in three hours without a dictionary. ...

... The goal of the exam is to show that with the aid of a dictionary, a scholar could produce nearly flawless translations of any medieval Latin, be it 6th century poetry or 15th century prose.

If the goal is to show that one can translate with a dictionary, why can't s/he use one on the exam?

Because if you're ever doing manuscript research in a library that doesn't allow you to bring in books (not uncommon), then it's a terrific waste of time to have to transcribe everything you think might be useful, only to go home and have Lewis and Short (dictionary) tell you it's irrelevant to your research.

And because without a strong natural conception of a language, over-reliance on a dictionary to get the meaning of words for translations is terrificly problematic.

So then the goal of the exam is not "to show that [one can produce nearly flawless translations] with the aid of a dictionary"?

No, it is. Say someone is using manuscript sources for her research--looking at charters, various commissions, land grants, papal letters, or any text, really, in a library where she can't bring in any books with her, only paper and pencil--where the end result is to produce a publishable article. She spends the day flipping through fifty or sixty charters looking for ones relevant to her research, the whole time not having access to a dictionary.

After she's transcribed the relevant texts, or paid some outlandish fees to have the ones she needs photographed for her, she takes them home, and with a dictionary produces flawless translations for the article she's submitting.

The Toronto Latin exam (PhD level) is designed to show that one is capable of doing this kind of research; it's obviously not the only way to show it.

I'm really surprised this seems to be confusing. Doesn't this make sense?

The way the research is done makes sense (that's how I work with my foreign-language documents), but I don't see how the exam format corresponds well to that. Actually translating the document isn't really necessary to show that you're capable of gleaning the main ideas from it or recognizing that (or even how) it's important for the purposes of a particular research project without a dictionary on hand.

[roarheels]

KTM, as to your last question. History departments often let you get through with weaker languages, but for what you want to do, you have to remember that scholars are located in certain places. In addition, history PhD's without good language prep do best when applying for jobs in history departments. Success therefore often depends on the quality of the diss. Two recent graduates of my program, both fairly weak in language, have had extremely different trajectories based on publisher's receptions of their work. In short, one is still in the field teaching history and the other is completely done and moved on. One has book coming out in 6 months and the other has a beautiful piece of paper for the wall.
 Yes, it does help to have faculty support but that generally comes only when a professor wants to work with you. Neither of the ancient historians in the history department at Harvard are particularly known for North African Late Antique studies. Rather, on the east coast, Princeton dominates that field, with two scholars who work on those issues. Yet, only one of those professors is actually in the Dept of Hist. The other is located in classics, and works specifically on the issues of prosopography in North Africa. They are linked via a Program that links all participating antique departments for exams and dissertation. So in short, to apply to work with perhaps the best scholar in your field, you would really be most advantaged by applying to Classics at Princeton.  You could do it through history, and use the interdepartmental program, but I can attest that it is often tough to really integrate oneself in another department with its faculty if you are not a paid fellow of that department. These professors have resposibility to their students first, so make sure you know how overloaded or underloaded a prof is if you apply to a different department and hope to work with hu in another department.
KTB, I agree that some people get in with less. I am speaking more of the normative than the exceptional. I am sure all ancient historians have had friends admitted without one of the languages. I have friends who do Hebrew, Coptic, or Demotic and not Latin and have been admitted to programs. Another friend of mine had only year of each language but literally perfect GRE's, good for a university fellowship. Others have extensive statistical backgrounds and amazing mathematical abilities with weak language skills which makes them attractive history departments if they indicate interests in those types of historical approaches. However, I think to say top ten in classics is very misleading. Last I looked there were only 30 or so doctoral programs in the classics in the USA. Thus top 10 is more representative of top 100 in other fields. In actuality, I find ranking less important than advisor. Even in my program, we have different placement rates depending on which of our cadre actually supervises the diss. I really do find that Classics has very little real differentiation at the top because most of the schools supporting PhD programs have great reputations. It takes a combination of department, advisor, student working together to produce a real diss that becomes a book fairly quickly. Thats why fit is so important, and thats why having the languages opens an applicant up to both Classics and History department giving them the shot to find the best advisor possible.

[ktmallon82]

I assure you I know all about the history dept. at princeton! They recruit like Steinbrenner does for the Yankees...but what other dept. are *known* for being strong in North Africa? I really thought princeton was the casbah (ha)

maybe cornell and uchicago?

Well...after the post-bacc, I'll have spanish, french, italian, and then 1 year of official german (maybe more), 3 years of latin, and 1 year of greek (intensive).

Maybe I need a PR team. Hype up my image....

[virmundi]

So Roarheels -- I have another question for you (and anyone else who wants to chime in!)

How do you figure out who the leading scholars are in your field? I'm interested in pursuing medieval history (as I mentioned in an earlier message), but I'm not quite sure how to figure out who the leading medievalists are in the United States. The medievalist whose work I am most familiar with is William Chester Jordan at Princeton, but I'm not really certain how to go about figuring out who the best scholars are specifically in the realm of the social/cultural history of France during the High Medieval period.

I'm just curious to know how people go about making this sort of determination... any thoughts?

Thanks!

[vagarh]

The way the research is done makes sense (that's how I work with my foreign-language documents), but I don't see how the exam format corresponds well to that. Actually translating the document isn't really necessary to show that you're capable of gleaning the main ideas from it or recognizing that (or even how) it's important for the purposes of a particular research project without a dictionary on hand.

I think I understand where you're coming from, but my experience has been that a lot of medievalists without very sound Latin training don't know Latin nearly as well as they ought to, and, more importantly, as well as they think they do. This leads to some really awful situations when someone is delivering a paper and mistranslates (horribly) a document to argue their point, or worse, produces a scholarly edition with horrifying errors.

I think that people that only know a language well enough to glean the main idea from a document without understanding the details, without a dictionary, shouldn't necessarily be trusted to render a flawless translation for the purpose of a scholarly edition, with one.  The assumption for the test is that if someone can't render a 70%+ accurate translation of 60 lines of Latin in 3 hours, they can't render something ~100%+ accurate in any reasonable period of time, regardless of outside aids.

For those students who don't plan on ever producing a scholarly edtion of a text, the idea is that they can rest assured that they'll never be completely out of their depth with a Latin document, and that even if it's something especially odd, they'll have enough grammar internalised to know the right questions to ask of a real Latinist.

[magistra]

KTM -- Proper capitalization will also help!

Lordy -- Go to Medievalist message boards and ask.  You can try posting your own thread here; we have a Medievalist or two, but I'm not sure whether they'd know that subspecialty.  Google for conferences and see who's presenting, moderating, etc.

Check out the literature.  Find the top journals in your field.  Who publishes on what topics?  Who's the most active?  And in particular, do you like what they have to say?

Once you've done some basic research, e-mail professors you think you'd like to work with (as discussed above).  If you're early in your search, come right out and tell them you'd like to work on X and you think you'd like to come to their school and work with Y, but are there any other programs they'd recommend?  Some will blow you off completely, but some will be amazingly generous with their information.  They want you to be somewhere you'll find a good fit, too.

And something else to consider... Make a list of programs and check their websites.  Do they have a scholar active in your area?  But also -- what other programs or faculty could support your research? This is important.  If your one person is overworked, or you wind up not getting along with him, or he leaves, even just on sabbaticals, you can be screwed.  You'll want to know that this is a department you can still be happy in (or at least finish).  Also, think about what other opportunities a program can offer to make your CV more attractive, like a dig you can participate in.

A school's library holdings is also an interesting way of finding more about a place, but that's a different topic.

[kbatulli]

KTM, as to your last question. History departments often let you get through with weaker languages, but for what you want to do, you have to remember that scholars are located in certain places. In addition, history PhD's without good language prep do best when applying for jobs in history departments. Success therefore often depends on the quality of the diss. Two recent graduates of my program, both fairly weak in language, have had extremely different trajectories based on publisher's receptions of their work. In short, one is still in the field teaching history and the other is completely done and moved on. One has book coming out in 6 months and the other has a beautiful piece of paper for the wall.
 Yes, it does help to have faculty support but that generally comes only when a professor wants to work with you. Neither of the ancient historians in the history department at Harvard are particularly known for North African Late Antique studies. Rather, on the east coast, Princeton dominates that field, with two scholars who work on those issues. Yet, only one of those professors is actually in the Dept of Hist. The other is located in classics, and works specifically on the issues of prosopography in North Africa. They are linked via a Program that links all participating antique departments for exams and dissertation. So in short, to apply to work with perhaps the best scholar in your field, you would really be most advantaged by applying to Classics at Princeton.  You could do it through history, and use the interdepartmental program, but I can attest that it is often tough to really integrate oneself in another department with its faculty if you are not a paid fellow of that department. These professors have resposibility to their students first, so make sure you know how overloaded or underloaded a prof is if you apply to a different department and hope to work with hu in another department.
KTB, I agree that some people get in with less. I am speaking more of the normative than the exceptional. I am sure all ancient historians have had friends admitted without one of the languages. I have friends who do Hebrew, Coptic, or Demotic and not Latin and have been admitted to programs. Another friend of mine had only year of each language but literally perfect GRE's, good for a university fellowship. Others have extensive statistical backgrounds and amazing mathematical abilities with weak language skills which makes them attractive history departments if they indicate interests in those types of historical approaches. However, I think to say top ten in classics is very misleading. Last I looked there were only 30 or so doctoral programs in the classics in the USA. Thus top 10 is more representative of top 100 in other fields. In actuality, I find ranking less important than advisor. Even in my program, we have different placement rates depending on which of our cadre actually supervises the diss. I really do find that Classics has very little real differentiation at the top because most of the schools supporting PhD programs have great reputations. It takes a combination of department, advisor, student working together to produce a real diss that becomes a book fairly quickly. Thats why fit is so important, and thats why having the languages opens an applicant up to both Classics and History department giving them the shot to find the best advisor possible.

I think you have a very good point! But I do believe that Classics is pretty unique, and there are good classicists spread out over 20 schools or so. I can easily think of 10 top schools in Classics which are top 10 universities in general--Stanford, Berkeley, Chicago, Princeton, Columbia, Michigan, Brown, Penn, Harvard, UT Austin and so on...all of them have a solid team of instructors.

So top 10 in Classics doesn't necessarily equate to top 100 for other disciplines...they're all good qualities programs!

[roarheels]

KTM, I agree that outside of Princeton its a bit tough, but I really think you need to release yourself from a US based mentality. Oxford is a really great place to study ancient documents, epigraphy, etc... This seems to be what you are in to and they have many professors who work on a wide variety of Late Antique questions. I would also suggest Toronto which has a long history of supporting fantastic research on Late Antiquity. Toronto's graduate scheme is almost exactly like the US, with full funding etc... In addition, Toronto seems more patient with languages and offers a real chance for ancient historians to catch up during their program. However, the program demands progress in return, but you said you were good at ancient languages. Cornell and Chicago are of course wonderful programs with some scholars surrounding your interests, but Chicago's ancient history program at least in the history department seems to be only supported by one directly appointed prof who works on Greek issues. I think you will find this in a lot of places. One of my profs is appointed to lead a different program right now not located in the history department and thus his graduate admissions are sent via that program rather than the history department. Consequently, history admissions, at least the two that have happened recently have been in a specific culture and period even though from our website it would make it appear that we accept in all periods of classical antiquity. You have to figure these issues out by writing the departments and going to see them. I did visits to all of my schools and they are incredibly illuminating. You will learn immense amounts by just asking grad students what they do and who they work with. It will give you a sense of who takes students, via what department, and how often that happens. In addition, you can gain some sense of the type of applicant admitted. Most departments I have dealt with are happy to have prospectives come by and sit in on classes and have lunch with some grad students. They may not be very formal with you if you have not applied, but you can figure out really quickly if you feel like you would fit in.

[ktmallon82]

Question: concerning Oxford - how does funding work? And is Oxford representative of other programs in the UK?

Happy Friday! (although there isn't any real difference between weekdays/end for me...but it is good to see *everyone else* excited for the weekend)

 

[roarheels]

Oxford and Cambridge are both tricky to figure out. First you apply to the faculty you want to work with. If they admit you, your application is advanced to your college choices for consideration. Funding generally comes out of the college (unless you apply and win a Rhodes, Marshall, or other internation fellowship). The application is pretty short and they expect real research proposals that are cogent. Colleges for graduate students can be structured in all sorts of ways. Some are graduate only and lack formalities. Others are very structured with formalities that abound from full acadmic dress to common room divisions. In my experience, it is the more traditional colleges that have research monies for oversees graduate students.  However, some will refuse to fund the M. Phil, though Oxford seems to accept MA as credit for an MPhil, and will let you go on to dissertation work as a doctoral candidate.  Basically, applying to Oxford requires real research as does Cambridge. In addition, since Americans do not hold commonwealth status, tuition and funding are rigged against you unless you can decifer the system. I was admitted to one of the Oxbridge schools but made horrendous college choices and was offered no funding. Because I was admitted to my first choice college which was quite well known, for many years, I just assumed all colleges at Oxbridge refused to fund Americans (Ancient history admissions are maddening enough to make you think crazy things). However, I have recently met three Americans who managed to secure MPhil and DPhil funding from an Oxbridge college directly without holding an international scholarship. This leads me to believe that it can be done with good research, which all of these people said that they had done before selecting their college. I would contact the school and see if they have any American working in their program with whom you could converse over email to see what the options are.