Rough draft of SoP applying for Ph.D in Sociology

[hydy]

Hello all!

I'm a first time poster, and a new member as well. I just graduated from Rutgers University, and double-majored in English and Visual Arts. I'm applying for a Ph.D program in Sociology for next fall.

This is the first rough draft of my statement of purpose (word count: 979), and I'm not quite sure if I wrote it correctly, so please come at

Comments

[brittdreams]

In a nutshell, there is way too much about you (and your personal life) and far too little about the research you want to do as a graduate student. The interests you do present seem very unfocused. What kind of coursework will you take as a doctoral student? What will be the areas you take your qualifying exams? Who will you work with? What might your dissertation be on? Answers to those questions are better than more general statements about all the things in your life that have made you think about people and/or culture and their differences.

[hydy]

I'm baffled at how quickly you got back to me. Thanks for being so prompt!

[brittdreams]

Eh, I didn't actually read the whole thing. It was obvious from the way each paragraph starts and ends that you're writing about yourself and not why you are pursuing a PhD.

If you're as unfocused as your last paragraph sounds, I'd look for some funded MA programs and pursue those so you can take more sociology courses and refine your research interests further.

[hydy]

I was actually afraid of sounding too focused, which is why I included the last paragraph. At the moment, I'm actually most interested in the immigration and acculturation topic mentioned in the essay.Do most students go into Ph.D programs knowing exactly what they want to study already? (my god I sound insecure)

I'm no expert, but...

[hejjhog]

Okay, I agree with all of the above, BUT I wanted to add

-In my junior year I became involved in a Brazilian martial art called Capoeira, and this became a very definitive part of my life. It was first developed 400 years ago by African slaves who disguised the fighting secretly in dance to rebel against Portuguese slave masters. I became the vice-president of the Capoeira Club in Rutgers and attended training four times a week for the past two year. I was taught perseverance, patience, camaraderie, flexibility, and respect. Art imitates life; as I learned to dance and fight, I also learned how to live strong. Capoeira does not attract any particular type of person, and through it I became friends who are Egyptian, Russian, real-estate agent, school principal, Zoroastrian, Coptic, transvestite, just to name a few. It is an amazing blessing be part of something that draws people from all walks of life, and it shows me that people need not be divided by their differences, but come together to bring brilliance into one another's lives

Re: I'm no expert, but...

[hydy]

I included the non-sociology related content because I've read SoPs that included extracurricular activities unrelated to sociology as a way of showing my different experiences and diversity. I'm not really sure how to relate everything I put in this essay to sociology...

I mentioned how I didn't use to love sociology to explain why I didn't major in it in college, so should I make it clearer that I love it now?

I related a lot of my topics of interests to my life because some professors I've spoken to told me that it is OK to have a strong personal connection to the issues. I'm wondering why you think it's not good to relate it to my family?

And yeah, I've decided to cut out the sucking up at the end because it does make me sound needy and pretentious.

Thank you so much for your thorough input. I'll be posting up the second draft at some point this week.

Re: I'm no expert, but...

[fullofpink]

Graduate SOPs tend to be really focused and highlight a few prominent things: 1) your interest in the program (i.e. why this program) 2) your qualifications 3) what you intend to do (goals). There are quite a few SOPs tagged here that you can read and get a good idea.

Unergraduate SOPs on the other hand do exactly what you did here. They are personal statements with a focus on what life experiences have shaped your worldview and kinda-sorta touch on your interests in your field. This should almost never be done for a grad program UNLESS someone asks fora personal statement. :)

Re: I'm no expert, but...

[hejjhog]

I mentioned how I didn't use to love sociology to explain why I didn't major in it in college, so should I make it clearer that I love it now?
I meant that you should definitely NOT START with that in your introduction! And you should make it clear that you love acculturation etc now, not just sociology!

As everyone said, this is your SOP, not CV or personal statement - less you, more research interests...

I related a lot of my topics of interests to my life because some professors I've spoken to told me that it is OK to have a strong personal connection to the issues. I'm wondering why you think it's not good to relate it to my family?
It IS good to relate to family, but you don't mention any specific research interests anywhere! What are you interested in studying? What developments in your field fascinate you? Why?

[tisiphone]

OK, first of all you don't need to apologize for switching fields or even mention it. People switch fields all the time in grad school - some things you can't even study in undergrad! Most social sciences programs are set up so that if you have the necessary prerequisites (which are usually things like mathematics or statistics, or some coursework in the field or a related field), you'll be given the foundational work in your first semester or two along with more complex stuff, in order to deal with gaps in your knowledge. Those can occur even with a sociology undergraduate major, so you don't need to focus on that

[hydy]

Thanks for pointing out a lot of stuff to me. I wonder how people dealt with grad school admission before they can go on the internet and ask people for help.

The comments I've gotten have all been really helpful in giving me a clearer picture in what I need to do, so hopefully the second draft will look more like a proper SoP.

[circumfession]

advisers. Mine handed back the first draft of my SoP, practically dripping with red ink.

[hydy]

Yeah, I definitely don't have a full research proposal ready.

And I'm totally relieved to hear that I made a mistake and included too much extracurricular, because I do want to write more about my research interests. As I've already told another replier, I kind of mixed up personal statement and statement of purpose a bit (fatal mistake, I know, but at least I didn't mail this out, right?).

I am kind of wondering how I could make it known that the specific program I'm applying for is right for me because I feel like I don't know enough about these programs to talk about them. I can look at course lists and read up on faculty, but in the end I still don't know how they work together. Should I write to some of the students or professors and ask?

[tobiahawk]

What others have said. It's fine to mention your family's impact on your research interests, but I'm left wondering about you from a scholarly perspective. What work have you done in regards to research, especially in this area? These programs are looking to admit people who are not only interesting and nice but who also show promise as scholars in the field of sociology.

Good luck!

[hydy]

I'm on it!

(btw I loved Animorphs as a child, so I <3 your LJ handle)

[tobiahawk]

Thanks. So I did, obviously! (And I'm surprised anyone caught the connection)

[hydy]

Y'know, I really didn't have a clear enough understanding of the difference between personal statement and statement of purpose until I posted here. It's a pretty embarrassing mistake, but I'm happy to have made it relatively early.

I don't mind working at this as hard as I can until I get it right.

I wonder how people who switch fields in grad school prove themselves worthy against people who are continuing the field they have already majored in?

[tobiahawk]

Can you draw a connection between anything you did in English (Chinese/acculturation/immigrant literature, perhaps?) and sociology? They might be a good transition--I did something similar to describe my transition between different subfields in psych.

[captiv8ed]

I have struggled with PS versus SOP also. One of my programs actually uses both terms interchangeably, which has added to my confusion!