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[aspiringscholar]

First time poster here. If this is the wrong sub-forum for this thread, feel free to move it. Thanks for reading my post.

I'm an undergrad history major, and until this semester I was seriously considering applying to PhD programs for American history. But I've done some research on the crappy job market, and I know the employment prospects for scholars of American history is considered bad even by the standards of the history professor job market in general. So right now I'm considering Middle Eastern and South Asian history (I know, that's too broad to be in one category), and I think there's more scope for growth in this field, i.e. more possible jobs.

I'm only going to do this if I get full funding (I'll be applying this fall), and right now I've been reading about the South Asian history programs at Wisconsin-Madison and Emory. Wisconsin is my home state so I'd love to go back there, but Emory has a great program too, plus one of my mentors at my current school knows a history professor at Emory very well (a South Asian history professor) and says that if I had his friend as an adviser, my career would be taken care of.

So right now I'm definitely interested in Emory and have Wisconsin-Madison as second place in my mind - any responses from grad students from these schools would be great.

Some specific questions:
- how many languages do you typically have to learn? I understand that you'd learn classic written Arabic and one of the spoken dialects as a student of Middle Eastern history, but what about South Asian? Is learning Hindi enough or do you have to learn an Indian dialect?

- how is studying South Asian history or Middle Eastern history at the graduate level a different experience? What do you like about it, what do you hate about it?

- do you typically get similar levels of funding (like with stipends and not having to TA immediately) as other history grad students?

- what is the history department atmosphere like at either of these schools? Is there an atmosphere of competitiveness or spitefulness, or any unsupportive elements? I've heard a lot about grad school departments. The history department at my own school has its share of dysfunctional moments too. I'd like to study at a relatively nice and friendly place.

- where do you typically get hired? For example, would you have a better chance at a university with an established South Asian history program, or at a university that gets good funding but has a small South Asian department (hence opportunity for you to build a South Asian program)?

- And just going off of that for a second, do you find that these students get hired into a tangential job (a foreign languages department, the Middle Eastern studies program in the political science department) rather than a history-focused job?

Sorry for the laundry list of questions. I'm just trying to get the best possible "Big Picture" of what my life will look life if I go ahead with this. I don't trust all of the advice I get from professors at my school, because they seem REALLY optimistic while every grad student I know is the exact opposite, plus I just don't think my professors are all that in touch with the current job market.

[mystictechgal]

Just out of curiosity, do you actually have any passionate interest in either South Asian or Middle Eastern history? (Honestly, it's not sounding like it.) Have you done any previous study of either (other than maybe writing a paper on one or the other in one of your undergrad survey courses)? Why do you want a PhD? More specifically, why do you want a PhD in either South Asian or Middle Eastern history?

If you want honest guidance about what to do, those that can best give it (not me) will be asking. Possibly more importantly, those who might admit you to a program, whether in Wisconsin, at Emory, or elsewhere, will be asking.

BTW, no matter what your field is, and no matter what you do in life--whether in academia, or elsewhere--never believe anyone who says that if you do "x" your career (or anything else) will be "taken care of". There are no guarantees, and even if there were, no one can guarantee something to someone that is based upon the inclusion of a third. Don't make the mistake of only hearing and believing what you'd like to hear and believe. (Since you question the optimism/pessimism you're hearing I'm not suggesting that you do make that mistake; I'm just reinforcing what you seem to, perhaps, already recognize, at least in some forms.)

[hegemony]

The question you should be asking is, "How many jobs in this field are there in the country?  What's the turnover rate?  How many jobs are advertised each year?"

I am also concerned that your knowledge of the field seems quite rudimentary, and so I wonder if you have the background to get into a competitive graduate program in the field.  They will look for evidence that you've studied the subject before and that you know what you're getting into. 

No offense, but the people I know who've succeeded at things like this don't ask, "Is learning Hindi enough or do you have to learn an Indian dialect?"  They ask, "How many Indian dialects will I have time to learn?  How can I add some along the way?"  You seem to be asking about the minimum, where they assume they'll happily learn as many as they can.

I don't know much about this field in particular, but in general you want to go to the most competitive program you can -- somewhere where your chance of getting a job might be as high as 60%, instead of 20%.  It's possible that Wisconsin and Emory are the tip-top places in the country for this field, but it sounds unlikely to me.  You should be aiming as high as you can.  You should definitely find out what percentage of Wisconsin and Emory PhDs in the field are getting tenure-track jobs (and how many they graduate).  I suspect that your chances of getting a tenure-track job are smaller than you think, even though you may have some idea of the state of the job market.

[betterslac]

a) If you haven't already started learning the languages necessary to enter such programs, you are late in the game. You should decide and get cracking, preferably in an intensive summer program.

b) Stand alone political science departments do not hire people with history PhDs. The methodology and approaches between the two disciplines are very different. You do find mixed history/political science departments where faculty teach across disciplines, but these would be small departments where you would be teaching your specialty once every year or two among the 7-8 courses/year you would be teaching. In that situation, you wouldn't be hired as a ME/SA specialist, but as someone who would be teaching several sections of Western Civ and probably a bunch of disparate non-US history courses.

c) You need to apply to more than 2 programs.

d) +1 to everything hegemony and mystictechgal said.

[janewales]

OP, it sounds to me as if you don't yet have any language base for either field-- my apologies if I've misunderstood. I'm not in the fields you're considering, but my own field requires extensive language training too, so I just wanted to be sure you understand just how much work is involved in fields like this. It is possible to get up to speed after your undergraduate degree, but it would require a great deal of extra work and discipline; we're not talking about a 6-week "useful phrases for tourists" level of skill. Do you like learning languages? Are you good at them?

[aspiringscholar]

Thanks for the replies everyone.

@mystictechgal: I don't have any background in ME/SA history, but I have taken some classes in undergrad, am half Indian and I have some Indian friends. Between the two, I think South Asian history has more scope because it's still kind of "off the radar" for American academics, moreso than Middle Eastern history.

I really just want to find a way to stay in the academy and study what I love (which is history) while still putting myself in a good position to be employed as an academic after my PhD. South Asian history seems to be a decent compromise, and I can see myself enjoying it.

@hegemony: I did want to apply to better programs than Wisconsin-Madison and Emory, but the chances of being fully funded decrease as you go up the rankings. I'm a good student (3.9 GPA, Honors), but I haven't been published yet and I don't have any outstanding, unusual softs, just some above-average softs. I want to apply to U Chicago and U Michigan, but I'm trying to plan realistically about where I might actually end up with funded tuition plus stipend.

I see that I may not have had a very clear idea about what studying South Asian history entails, especially in terms of dialects. I kind of figured that since India has a bunch of languages, you only need to know one or two because then you'll specialize in one particular area of the country...I'll have to do more homework on this one.

@betterslac: is it really that unusual to enter a grad program without knowing the languages? I figured it wasn't so uncommon, especially since we don't know exactly what our specialty will be when we're applying. I know some grad students in Japanese history at my school, one of them learned Japanese after he joined the program. He had already studied Japanese history and politics before that, but he only knew VERY basic Japanese.

I'm half-Indian so I understand a little bit of Hindi, I figured that is a good foundation to start with. No?

@janwales: I do enjoy learning languages. Right now I'm fluent in Spanish, French and I can understand some Hindi even though I can't speak it. I understand that learning a language to a high level is rigorous work, but I've done really well in undergrad so I'm confident that I can pick up a new language quickly if I put my mind to it.

[betterslac]

Thanks for the replies everyone.

@mystictechgal: I don't have any background in ME/SA history, but I have taken some classes in undergrad, am half Indian and I have some Indian friends. Between the two, I think South Asian history has more scope because it's still kind of "off the radar" for American academics, moreso than Middle Eastern history.

I really just want to find a way to stay in the academy and study what I love (which is history) while still putting myself in a good position to be employed as an academic after my PhD. South Asian history seems to be a decent compromise, and I can see myself enjoying it.

@hegemony: I did want to apply to better programs than Wisconsin-Madison and Emory, but the chances of being fully funded decrease as you go up the rankings. I'm a good student (3.9 GPA, Honors), but I haven't been published yet and I don't have any outstanding, unusual softs, just some above-average softs. I want to apply to U Chicago and U Michigan, but I'm trying to plan realistically about where I might actually end up with funded tuition plus stipend.

I see that I may not have had a very clear idea about what studying South Asian history entails, especially in terms of dialects. I kind of figured that since India has a bunch of languages, you only need to know one or two because then you'll specialize in one particular area of the country...I'll have to do more homework on this one.

@betterslac: is it really that unusual to enter a grad program without knowing the languages? I figured it wasn't so uncommon, especially since we don't know exactly what our specialty will be when we're applying. I know some grad students in Japanese history at my school, one of them learned Japanese after he joined the program. He had already studied Japanese history and politics before that, but he only knew VERY basic Japanese.

I'm half-Indian so I understand a little bit of Hindi, I figured that is a good foundation to start with. No?

@janwales: I do enjoy learning languages. Right now I'm fluent in Spanish, French and I can understand some Hindi even though I can't speak it. I understand that learning a language to a high level is rigorous work, but I've done really well in undergrad so I'm confident that I can pick up a new language quickly if I put my mind to it.

Yes, not only do grad school applicants specializing in specific regions have background in languages, but the successful candidates to the best programs have experience on the ground in the geographical regions in which they plan to specialize. No language skills + no in-country experience + no prior coursework in the area puts you at a severe disadvantage for places like Chicago or Michigan. Just as an example, I was initially going to focus on Russia as a political science comparativist back in the mid 1980s. I wasn't able to get to Russia as an undergrad (much more difficult during the Cold War than now), but I had 24 hours of Russian history and politics, 27 hours of language, plus a summer of intensive language preparation at Indiana's Slavic Program. I got into a top program, but with only a tuition waiver. If I were applying with that background now, without in-country experience, I probably would be less competitive than I was then.

Serious applicants to the best programs do know what their specialty will be. That is why there is a statement of research interest you must fill out. That doesn't mean you are wedded to a particular area and can't change, but serious applicants don't just apply to be trained in a discipline in general.

You appear in need of some serious mentoring in terms of grad school applications and thinking about the grad school experience as a whole. It is not enough to "love academia" and want to stay in it by finding something that might get you a job ticket. That ticket might not be forthcoming. You have to love research (and teaching) and your area of specialization and be convinced that working in that area is what you want to do for the rest of your life (even if it turns out that it won't be). That's what gets you through the difficult times in grad school (and those difficult times are galaxies worse than the difficult times as an undergrad), working on a dissertation and fighting it out on the job market.

[westcoastgirl]

I would not start a PhD in Middle Eastern studies without significant Arabic or Persian training (insert languages). It sounds like you want a well-paying, guaranteed job at the end. That's not going to happen, even if you are a superstar.

What you need to do is enroll in an MA program in a "Center" (Center for Middle Eastern Studies/Center for South Asian Studies). Figure out if you can learn the requisite languages and do the work. If you perform well, apply to a PhD program.

If you want a guaranteed job, you should look beyond the humanities.

If you want to do Middle Eastern Studies/Islam, you should be applying to Princeton, Chicago or Michigan, in that order. Princeton only takes a couple folks a year. Chicago takes a few more. Michigan, even more.

[alleyoxenfree]

Apart from your family background, have you traveled in either area - in any area of these large areas?

I suggest you take a year off to go backpacking in both areas.  Fly to Hong Kong or Tokyo or Australia, hit Indonesia and Bali, go to Vietnam and Cambodia, try to get into Bhutan or Myanmar, visit extended family in India, then fly to somewhere in the Middle East and repeat.

That will also give you a sense of which area you'd love to work in if you do NOT become an academic.  For instance, once you have the language skills, you could become a hot commodity to businesses that work in those areas.  Or to the U.S. government.  But would you rather find yourself in Mumbai or Dubai?  In Morocco or Myanmar or Indonesia?

You seem to have that undergraduates' sense of interest where you just need more info - especially info about yourself.  You don't know because you don't know.

Go out and see what cultures and countries float your boat.

[stanwyck]

@mystictechgal: I don't have any background in ME/SA history, but I have taken some classes in undergrad, am half Indian and I have some Indian friends. Between the two, I think South Asian history has more scope because it's still kind of "off the radar" for American academics, moreso than Middle Eastern history.

Maybe I'll come back and reply to this in more detail later, but I'll give you my instant reaction as a South Asianist currently on the job market--good luck with that. The jobs aren't there, no matter what people are telling you about it being "the next hot field." I can't really comment on corporate jobs, but I wouldn't count on being employed in academia with a South Asian history Ph.D.

For what it's worth, I started my language training in Hindi my first year of grad school. Did three years of Hindi on campus, plus two intensive summer semesters in India. I've got a background in linguistics, so it was on the easier side of things for me. Even so, I'd say my Hindi is only "advanced" at this point. I also took Urdu while doing dissertation research in India, plus I taught myself an 18th-century dialect through sheer stubbornness. But, in terms of necessary language acquisition, it also depends on what part of the country you'll be working in. There's no point in learning Hindi if you'll be spending the rest of your life in Chennai.

I'm also not sure about your belief that "the chances of being fully funded decrease as you go up the rankings." The South Asianists I know who went to Chicago and Harvard definitely received better funding packages than the ones who went to state schools.

And yes, go spend some time in India before you decide to commit your future to it. I started out in Soviet studies ages ago because I had the language skills. Unfortunately, I hated living in the Soviet Union and had to regroup at a time I should have been finishing a Ph.D. Don't do that to yourself.

[larryc]

I think there's more scope for growth in this field, i.e. more possible jobs.

See, I don't think that is true. There are fewer people specializing in these fields, but also far fewer jobs, so I think your odds would not be any better than terrible. I might be wrong though, do we have any forumite historians who specialize in these areas here?

[marlborough]

You should only pursue a history PhD if it is the only thing you can think of doing and cannot live without it.

You should only pursue a field you are enthralled with--not the one you think will get you a job.  That consuming, dysfunctional passion has to get you through the scut work and the 14 hour research days and the writing.

Depending on which part of Asian or Middle Eastern history you do, you'll have to learn different packages of languages.  Probably a minimum of 3-4, plus dialects and paleography if you're reading archived documents in handwriting.

Forget "building an Asian Studies program".  Are you willing to move to Compass Point State as one of a department of five people (1 Europeanist, 2 Americanists, 1 part-time anthro person who teaches the History of Mexico and you)?  While there, are you willing to teach the World History survey, general ed classes or a major specialty course like The Historian's Craft, General Asian surveys and an upper level course in your field every semester?

No matter what your adviser tells you, his or her colleague at the grad program will not "take care of you" and your career.  Getting in and working for the right person is step 1 of 3,456 to having a shot.

Seriously, do a MA first and see if you even have the stuff for this (and if not, you've got an advanced degree and some flexibility to explore other things--government work, business in Asia, editing, etc.).  A straight to PhD program is throwing yourself in the deep end. 

Also, sit down and have the Talk with a professor you trust about what we actually DO.  Students loooove the history stories and the idea of teaching, but don't really have a firm grasp on the research and the writing and publishing and teaching and all the academic administrative things we do (advising and committees and curriculum....)

[lettersandnumbers]

You're getting some really good advice here. By the way, you should know that a lot of us went through a similar stage of optimism, excitement, and not knowing enough about how the field really works - it doesn't mean that you're wrong for this career path, only that you will need to build a bit more perspective if you are going to start on this path and succeed.
I would say: don't apply for a PhD unless you want it so bad that you would do it even if you had an iron-clad guarantee that you would NOT get a job at the end of it. You might not be in a situation where you can know that kind of thing about yourself yet. The suggestions already on this thread (a year backpacking in the areas you're considering, a summer of intensive language study, an MA program) are excellent ways to find out. I think you should do at least two of the three. All three would be best. You don't have to see it as a year or two away from your chosen path - this is the best way to achieve your chosen goals.
Afterwards, if you still want a PhD, apply to the very best schools in the field.

[westcoastgirl]

I think there's more scope for growth in this field, i.e. more possible jobs.

See, I don't think that is true. There are fewer people specializing in these fields, but also far fewer jobs, so I think your odds would not be any better than terrible. I might be wrong though, do we have any forumite historians who specialize in these areas here?

Yes. I can vouch for this since one of these is my specialty and the specialty of many of my friends and some family members.

Just look at the pages on Wiki. And there's more and more people studying these disciplines now since it has become hip to do so.

I'm guessing there's around forty jobs this year? Maybe thirty. I applied to four of those (and a few post docs and one CC). You wouldn't believe the competition. There are people on this market that have more publications than senior professors and they still aren't getting any bites.


Studying Middle Eastern history will require you to achieve fluency in say, Arabic and Persian. You will also have to learn French and German as research languages. 

[tinyzombie]

I think there's more scope for growth in this field, i.e. more possible jobs.

See, I don't think that is true. There are fewer people specializing in these fields, but also far fewer jobs, so I think your odds would not be any better than terrible. I might be wrong though, do we have any forumite historians who specialize in these areas here?

I don't get how the OP thinks he/she can see this.

I'm not snarking. I honestly can't imagine that OP, as an undergrad without any experience in his/her chosen field, would be able to tell what's going to happen to that field.