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[meowmacka]

Hello everyone,
I am considering applying to PhD programs in Communications and Culture and Communications.  I have two Master's degrees (Journalism and Comparative Literature) and have been teaching as an adjunct for several years and have been writing professionally for more than 10 years.

I am interested in hearing from anyone who is familiar with more creative dissertation PhD programs.  So far, I find them mostly in the UK.  I am trying to find a program where there is freedom to form the dissertation research into a book (and not necessarily a purely academic one).

Thanks for any and all info.

[traductio]

Could you explain a bit more what you have in mind as far as your dissertation goes? Also, what do you hope to do after you finish your PhD? Just for context, I have a PhD in communication, and I have more than a passing familiarity with a PhD program in English that allows for creative dissertations, but I am not familiar with programs of that type in communication.

[mfaer]

Hello everyone,
I am considering applying to PhD programs in Communications and Culture and Communications.  I have two Master's degrees (Journalism and Comparative Literature) and have been teaching as an adjunct for several years and have been writing professionally for more than 10 years.

I am interested in hearing from anyone who is familiar with more creative dissertation PhD programs.  So far, I find them mostly in the UK.  I am trying to find a program where there is freedom to form the dissertation research into a book (and not necessarily a purely academic one).

Thanks for any and all info.

I'm completing a PhD in English w/ a Creative Writing (Fiction) Dissertation. I've only heard of "creative dissertation programs" existing for creative writers. Do you write fiction, poetry, or creative non-fiction? Unfortunately, most places would require you to have an MFA to even be considered, or an MA w/ a concentration in creative writing.  There are only a few such programs and the competition for slots is fierce. Some programs only admit a few students per genre each year and almost all of the students are already publishing in national literary journals.

Frankly, the only reason to pursue this degree is to improve your chances at an academic job--to qualify yourself as a literature generalist who can teach a broader range of courses than the typical MFA grad.

[lohai0]

Hello everyone,
I am considering applying to PhD programs in Communications and Culture and Communications.  I have two Master's degrees (Journalism and Comparative Literature) and have been teaching as an adjunct for several years and have been writing professionally for more than 10 years.

I am interested in hearing from anyone who is familiar with more creative dissertation PhD programs.  So far, I find them mostly in the UK.  I am trying to find a program where there is freedom to form the dissertation research into a book (and not necessarily a purely academic one).

Thanks for any and all info.

I'm completing a PhD in English w/ a Creative Writing (Fiction) Dissertation. I've only heard of "creative dissertation programs" existing for creative writers. Do you write fiction, poetry, or creative non-fiction? Unfortunately, most places would require you to have an MFA to even be considered, or an MA w/ a concentration in creative writing.  There are only a few such programs and the competition for slots is fierce. Some programs only admit a few students per genre each year and almost all of the students are already publishing in national literary journals.

Frankly, the only reason to pursue this degree is to improve your chances at an academic job--to qualify yourself as a literature generalist who can teach a broader range of courses than the typical MFA grad.

Maybe the OP is talking about alternative form dissertations. There have been some really out there dissertations (art, plays, interpretive dances) in my broad field (education) but NOT in my subfield. If this is what you meant OP, a word of caution. The people on the search committee have to believe what you did in your creative program is research, and will have to be ok with with creative research counting for tenure.

[meowmacka]

Thanks for the replies.  mfaer:  I am talking about doing a non-fiction creative dissertation.  I already have an MA in Journalism and have been published in national and international publications.

I have found one program at Royal Holloway/Univ. of London, a "practice based" PhD. 

[mfaer]

Good publications + a background in comparative lit and journalism would make you attractive to some PhD CW programs that offer CNF. I should've mentioned above that CNF tends to be more flexible than fiction and poetry.

Assuming you're doing this to improve your chances on the academic job market, I would recommend you look at English departments that offer the PhD in CW. Here's a list of the top programs published by P&W recently. In my opinion, Ohio U. is the place to go for CNF (Dinty Moore teaches there).

http://www.pw.org/content/2012_creative_writing_doctoral_program_rankings_the_top_fifteen?cmnt_all=1

[zharkov]

Although I'm not in communications, my program allows students to write dissertations that do not follow the standard format.  More "book like" if you want to call it.  But whatever the form, the dissertation must be a scholarly work, not a journalistic one.  I also tell students that doing a dissertation in an alternate form is probably more work than following what has become a standard template.  It is not unusual, generally speaking, for PhD grads to "convert" they dissertations into books.  That might be a better tack.

[pink_]

It really depends on what you intend to do with the degree once you have earned it.  If your long-term goal is to get a job teaching at a college or university in the US, the London program, great as it might be, will be a double disadvantage.  Not only is it very difficult for UK candidates to get jobs in the US for a whole slew of reasons (not the least of which is lack of teaching experience during graduate school), but having a non-traditional dissertation will compound that issue.

[traductio]

The advice you've received here is sound. I have sat on search committees in communication (I work at a so-so RU/H), and we would have looked askance at a journalistic dissertation. On the other hand, with a conventional scholarly dissertation and your professional experience in journalism, you would have stood out -- rare are the people who can bridge the professional/academic divide.

Also, different PhD programs will encourage different types of scholarly dissertations. I converted mine to a book with little effort (new intro, new conclusion, some updates of the body chapters), but it certainly follows the generic conventions of the monograph.

If you have more specific questions, feel free to send me a PM.

[meowmacka]

Thank you for the very informed and informative advice, everyone.  It seems writing a scholarly dissertation and then making it more journalistic is the way to go.  If anyone has further thoughts I would appreciate them.  When it comes down to it, I would rather spend several years writing a well-researched non-fiction book than a dissertation, so I may reconsider the PhD.  The main reason for me to get the degree is to get a full-time teaching job or good think tank job - I do not have lofty notions about the experience at this point.