Taking My Comprehensive Exams (Part 1) | How I Studied For My PhD Qualifying Exam (And How It Went!) 

I'm glad the video was comforting, and the very best of luck to you with your comprehensive exams!! I find its so helpful to know that we're not alone in this comprehensive exam madness... whether its connecting with people online or leaning on your cohort, there is definitely something comforting about seeing other people go through the experience too.

Thanks so much! I passed this part of the exam :) now fingers crossed for the next one!

I'm glad it was helpful! :) the Notion template is one I made myself, but I think there are similar ones on the app... It's just using the Table function.

That's great! How far along in the program are you?

​@@sarahbestPhD I'm in my extended year, writing my dissertation. T-T

@@amirajiahe460 honestly most people I know have taken at least one extended year... I feel like I will as well. What’s your research on?

@@sarahbestPhD My research is about Islam in China, I examine intermarriage and identity of a Muslim minority group in northwest China.

@@amirajiahe460 Oh cool that sounds fascinating! Did you do fieldwork there?

Of course! What would you like to know?

@@sarahbestPhD Wow, thanks for replying. I'd love to ask what kind of methodology books do you use?

@@amirajiahe460 so for the general exam there wasn’t a specific methodology category... it was separated into theory texts, history texts and case studies. But since by background and methodological interests are in anthropology/ethnography, I focused on ethnographic studies for the most part... so Thomas Tweed’s Crossing and Dwelling was one I used a lot, as well as Pamela Klassen’s The Spirits of Protestantism, Ahmed Afzal’s Lone Star Muslims, Ayla Fader’s Mitzvah Girls and Chad Seales’s The Secular Spectacle. But the theoretical texts I used the most were Tomoko Masuzawa’s The Invention of World Religions, Meredith McGuire’s Lived Religion, and Tisa Wenger’s Religious Freedom... oh and Robert Orsi’s history and presence! That’s a lot haha but none of the exam questions I wrote on focused on methodology too much. I’m curious if there’s any overlap with your comps list or texts you’ve used in your PhD work!

@@sarahbestPhD Wow, this is great, thanks a lot! I’m afraid I didn’t see very familiar names among these books. But I saw Talal Asad in you video, we read that too.

I use Notion for everything! I find it super useful for this kind of thing

It took me around 5-6 months to do the readings and really study

🤗💜