<p>What are the top colleges for a major in Classical Languages? Or, for that matter, the Classics department as a whole?</p>
<p>Harvard, Princeton, Stanford, Columbia, Duke, Penn, Brown, Cornell, Yale.</p>
<p>Amherst, Williams, Swarthmore, Wellesley, Bryn Mawr, etc.</p>
<p>At research universities, you’ll have greater and more frequent exposure to research. At the liberal arts colleges, you’ll have a stronger grasp on the reading of the languages themselves.</p>
<p>Both research experience and language proficiency are necessary, but, whereas you can cover your butt with regards to the latter, you will be expected to demonstrate that you have the former.</p>
<p>That is to say, if you claim to have read so-and-so, graduate schools won’t call you out on the truthfulness of your claim. What they will look at will be a writing sample and statement of purpose, both of which you can BS if you have had research experience.</p>
<p>I have heard that UCB has an excellent program. Does it rank up with Harvard and Stanford’s departments?</p>
<p>Berkeley, UNC - Chapel Hill, and Michigan all have top Classics programs.</p>
<p>However, class sizes at state universities tend to be unmanageable. You’re not going to learn to read well in classes whose enrollment exceed a dozen or so. This may not be the case with regards to upper division courses–can someone provide course enrollment statistics for Berkeley?</p>
<p>Regardless, an institution like Berkeley may be desirable for developing that sought-for research experience.</p>
<p>I very much doubt that classics courses in any university are going to be “unmanageable.” The really big lecture courses at Berkeley, Cornell, etc. are going to be either in fields where students don’t need any prior background (e.g. psychology) or in fields required for preprofessional study (e.g. chemistry, required not only for chemistry majors but for biologists, premeds, engineers, and so on.) Classics courses fulfill humanities distribution requirements but they are never the only way of doing so, and rarely the easy/preferred way for the vast majority of students.</p>
<p>In fact, the typically small size of classics departments might be a reason to look at bigger schools with well-established graduate programs, since these are likely to have a healthy-sized community and a reasonable number of faculty.</p>
<p>^^ That’s absolute nonsense. kwu, you implied that Classics majors at public universities don’t learn to read the languages well, and you pretty much stated that if students had research experience, they could BS their way through an SOP or writing sample for grad school. Also, research universities are not the only place a student can do good research.</p>
<p>OP, here’s a rough ranking of university classics depts.:
Stanford, Harvard, Duke, Princeton, Berkeley, Cincinnati, Penn, Michigan, Bryn Mawr, Columbia, UCLA, North Carolina, Brown, Cornell, Yale, Ohio State, Chicago, Texas, USC, JHU, Iowa, UCI, UCSD, Minnesota, U Washington, Indiana, Missouri, Buffalo</p>
<p>That’s based on grad rankings, which might indicate programs with stronger faculty research, but they don’t tell you a whole lot about the quality of undergrad teaching.
There are many other departments as well in which you could get a solid education in Classics.</p>
<p>kwu, although I never took Classics and Classical Languages at Michigan, I know for a fact that classes in those majors seldom attract more than 20-30 students. Typically, classes will have fewer than 15 students. Let us face it, those aren’t exactly the most popular majors. In recent years, only 14 students (average annually) graduated with a BA in Classical Civilizations and only 6 (average annually) in Classical Language and Literature. Those 16-25 students had access to one of the top 10 Classics faculties in the United States. That’s 35 leading professors in the field devoted to two majors that, combined, do not exceed 25 students per graduating class. </p>
<p>I am fairly certain the same applies to Cal.</p>
<p><a href=“Office of Budget and Planning”>Office of Budget and Planning;
<p>[Department</a> of Classical Studies](<a href=“http://www.lsa.umich.edu/classics/aboutus/facultyandstaff]Department”>http://www.lsa.umich.edu/classics/aboutus/facultyandstaff)</p>
<p>Not to sound rude or small-minded, but what does one do with a degree in Classical Languages?</p>
<p>My aunt studied classic languages in college. She went to UMass Boston for two years, then transferred to UMass Amherst. She got into UBC for grad school over people who went to Harvard/Yale/Cornell etc. for undergrad, and she was told that it was because she went to UMass Amherst, and the admissions department/professors thought they had the better program.</p>
<p>@Jason: My aunt went to grad school for classics, and now she does people’s taxes. ^^ She says you study it because you love it, but the only real career is academia, and she didn’t want to become a professor.</p>
<p>^^^
Classics is a liberal arts major. Like any other liberal arts major, it provides an education in writing, critical thinking, and other skills that can be useful in any number of careers. </p>
<p>Though you might need to meet certain other prerequisites, it’s good preparation for any number of graduate and professional fields:
Graduate prep: Classics, certain areas of: history, philosophy, religious studies, art history/archaeology, linguistics, history/philosophy of science, folklore & mythology, museum studies, political philosophy, ancient near eastern studies, comparative literature, writing, etc
Professional school prep: Law, theology, medicine, library science, MBA, public policy, education, etc. </p>
<p>[List</a> of Famous Classics Majors](<a href=“http://canes.creighton.edu/FamousClassicsMajors.htm]List”>http://canes.creighton.edu/FamousClassicsMajors.htm)
[Classics</a> Majors Find Their Future in the Past | Psychology Today](<a href=“http://www.psychologytoday.com/node/39052]Classics”>Classics Majors Find Their Future in the Past | Psychology Today)
[Branding</a> and Marketing the Classics Major | Psychology Today](<a href=“http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/career-transitions/201003/branding-and-marketing-the-classics-major]Branding”>Branding and Marketing the Classics Major | Psychology Today)</p>
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<p>No, I was implying that Classics majors who have to suffer through large classes do not learn how to read well. The stereotype prevails, that public universities experience difficulty managing class sizes. Mindful of this stereotype, one might reasonably conclude that classics majors at public universities have less reading aptitude than their counterparts at institutions where enrollments may be more favorable. That you feel the need to qualify my observations as “nonsense”–I don’t know how that reflects on the truth value of this stereotype.</p>
<p>In consideration of the nature of the learning process in the Classics–the exchange of translation and criticism, the constant give-and-take of feedback–small classes are essential if the goal should be that every single person in these classes will have been able to participate fully and meaningfully in the process.</p>
<p>I was stating that if one attends a research university, one will have written many papers as a part of one’s course requirements, and at least one of these papers will be respectable enough to be presented conveniently as a writing sample. Exposure to research gives one many opportunities to reflect on possible interests to pursue in graduate school. Interests change, as we all understand, the most eccentric interests are looked upon favorably this day and age, and one needs to paint a colorful portrait of oneself for the admission’s committee–hence, “BS.” </p>
<p>Before you issue the Edict of Nonsense from your high throne, Zapfino, I will make you aware that I am operating on the assumption that, at research universities, virtually all of one’s professors will be, more likely than not, leading researchers. As such, but also according to the mission of a research university, these professors will want to impart their skills to undergraduates, thus making research universities particularly desirable destinations for doing research.</p>
<p>I apologize for not having been more clear.</p>
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<p>20-30 students - absurdly difficult to manage
15 students - difficult to manage</p>
<p>Consider the personality of your typical Classics professor. Consider the discrepancy in competence and motivation among students. Consider how many lines one must read, and how little time one has every session to get through them.</p>
<p>You’re going to have absolute chaos.</p>
<p>kwu, let me put it another way. I doubt you are going to find smaller classes in the Classics than you are going to have at Michigan.</p>
<p>Unmanageable?! Haha! I think you’ve been totally brainwashed by the “smaller class is better” crowd. We’re talking college-aged adults, not rambunctious kindergartners.</p>
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For classical languages, they are all roughly equal. Including classical archaeology and civilization, Berkeley beats out Stanford, and both are much stronger than Harvard. When one includes greater Mediterranean studies, which I personally believe one should, Berkeley blows Stanford and Harvard out of the water. Harvard lost several of its best Near Eastern people to Texas, and the rest plan to retire soon due to animosity in the department; Stanford has no professors in that area at all.</p>
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For introductory courses, a class with more than 12 students isn’t so bad. One of my ancient languages (not Greek/Latin) was acquired abroad in a class of about 30 students, and most of us picked up quite a bit. The professor was German (the best for languages!) – very exact, very demanding, and also very humorous. </p>
<p>I agree with the others who said that classics departments tend to be very small, even at universities. I’m familiar with the classics program at UNC and can personally vouch for it. The first year sequence of Greek and Latin has up to 30 students (though usually 15-20), and courses after that are capped at 12 students (usually 5-10). UNC also has things like weekly reading sessions of Latin (e.g. Ovid when I was there), recitation and composition competitions, etc., that encourage mastery of languages. Anyone who says that universities don’t result in as much mastery of Greek and Latin as LACs is full of beans.</p>
<p>Furthermore, universities usually have far more resources at their disposal for their classics students than LACs do (Bryn Mawr is, as always, an exception). I had the opportunity of taking a papyrology seminar as an undergraduate that used the university’s papyri, for example – it’s all well and good to learn neatly printed Greek in the classroom, but you’d be surprised how many students stumble when they have something actually written in Greek. :rolleyes:</p>
<p>
Interestingly, classics seems to be one of the unusual fields in which professors at LACs do not seem to be more dedicated to undergraduates than those at universities. </p>
<p>For one, few people actually major in classics. UCLA, for example, currently has 2 Greek majors, 5 Latin majors, and 6 Greek/Latin majors – total, mind you, not per year. Only two other classics majors graduated with me at my own university.</p>
<p>For another, jobs in classics are so scarce that classicists will take virtually any position they can get, regardless of the type of college. Indeed, the two worst classics professors I have ever come across were professors at LACs primarily concerned with their digs and little else. (Not to bash LAC professors - the classics professors at my sister and boyfriend’s LACs are absolutely wonderful.) The professors at UNC absolutely bent over backwards helping me get research experience, find funding, writing letters of recommendation, finish my thesis, etc. I was not even a student there, so I would imagine UNC students get at least as much support.</p>
<p>In fact, all but three of the winners of the Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching Award by the AIA are university professors - Minnesota (2), UNC, NYU, Arizona, GWU, Missouri, Texas A&M, Michigan, and Boston U. Quite a few university professors are represented in the similar award given out by the APA.</p>
<p>[American</a> Philological Association](<a href=“| Society for Classical Studies”>| Society for Classical Studies)</p>
<p>In any case, yes, research is quite useful for graduate school preparation. It also helps to have professors known by graduate admissions committees, given the absolutely insane degree of competition for admission to even rather subpar programs. There are certain LACs with good track records for graduate school placement (Wellesley, Reed, Franklin & Marshall, Oberlin, and others), but in general a letter from, say, Mastronarde at Berkeley is going to carry much more weight than one from a professor who hasn’t published anything of note in a few years.</p>
<p>Haven’t seen anyone mention the University of Toronto, but for classics they are way up there.</p>
<p>Might look at Holy Cross which has a great Classics Department.</p>
<p>don’t forget UT!!</p>