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Application FAQs

Here you will find answers to frequently asked questions related to application materials and structure of the Divinity School. To make sure you receive additional resources and guidance, please fill out this Request More Information form and/or start your application.

How do I know which degree I should apply to?

  • We recommend reading through the information on this website, including program FAQs and program handbooks (MA/AMRS, MDiv, or PhD). If you’re still not sure, contact divinityadmissions@uchicago.edu or request a virtual meeting or campus visit to meet with faculty, staff, and students, who can help you discern your next steps. All of our degree programs are highly academic and intellectual in nature, but, broadly speaking, the MA and PhD are more research focused, the MDiv prepares students particularly well for religious leadership, and the AMRS suits those looking for a more general foundation in the academic study of religion or who need a part-time program that can be completed while advancing in another career.
  • Application to the PhD program requires the completion of a master’s degree by the time of enrollment in the program. Due to the highly selective and research-focused nature of our doctoral program, students are rarely admitted without clear evidence of their ability to carry out the course of study they propose in the application (e.g., significant background in the study of religion from schools with strong research profiles). Applicants who are transitioning between fields or who came to their projects relatively late in their master’s training should consider applying to the Divinity School’s MA or AMRS instead and explain clearly why an additional master’s degree is necessary for their professional or academic goals. Applicants can also opt to be considered for referral to the MA as part of the application, but admission through referral is relatively rare.

In the guidance for Candidate Statements, it states that I “should convey a sense of [my] project and indicate [my] preparedness to undertake it.” What does it mean by “project?”

  • Your “project” is not your dissertation, per se, let alone a formal research proposal. Rather, we are interested in your “intellectual project”: what questions, concepts, interlocutors (historical or contemporary), contexts, places, timeframes, languages, etc., are guiding your pursuit of graduate study?
  • While the specifics are, of course, subject to change as you learn more and refine your ideas, the candidate statement should make clear three larger points.
    1. Where your questions and knowledge of how to pursue them stand currently;
    2. What kinds of prior soundings have you made so far, and
    3. Which topics, authors, populations, locations, et al. make sense as the next investigations during your study at the Divinity School (with possible culmination in a dissertation project for doctoral students). In theory, your “intellectual project” will carry you beyond your time at the Divinity School, even as you will complete substantial manifestations of the project during your degree.

How does the candidate statement differ for the MA/AMRS, MDiv, and PhD?

  • To start with, what unites them, successful applicants to the Divinity School articulate a clear understanding of the academic study of religion, convey a coherent trajectory of pursuing the questions and interests that compel their desire to study at the Divinity School, and express convincingly how the resources, opportunities, and communities here will help them reach their goals. While candidate statements for PhD applicants should be the most focused, in-depth, and specific regarding their Area of Study or specific research projects, applicants to all programs should situate their reasons for pursuing graduate study within larger sets of interests, questions, and goals.
  • MA and AMRS applicants, for instance, might explain how the program's curricular flexibility allows them to explore their interests broadly through distribution requirements in the four committees and narrowly through courses with faculty both inside and outside the Divinity School. MDiv applicants might indicate how the MDiv colloquia and field work requirements will help them integrate their academic interests into their practical and vocational development. While specific professional goals and outcomes are welcome, there is more than one way to connect your pursuit of the academic study of religion to longer-term goals.

How strict is the 15–25 page guideline for the writing sample?

  • Applicants are strongly encouraged to keep writing samples within this range. Writing samples that fall within 15-25 pages approximate common genres of academic writing (term papers, articles, book chapters) and thus provide faculty with the most unmistakable evidence of an applicant’s ability to carry out a scholarly analysis and academic argument. Submissions longer than 25 pages often make the evaluation of an applicant’s likelihood of success in graduate study more difficult because they do not illustrate an applicant’s ability to scope and pursue a research question properly. Furthermore, faculty may not read portions of writing samples longer than 25 pages to preserve fairness.

Does the 25-page limit include a cover page and/or bibliography?

  • Generally speaking, yes. While writing samples that exceed 25 pages due to a cover page or bibliography are unlikely to be disqualified, applicants are encouraged to keep all elements within 25 pages and to edit their sample accordingly.
  • For writing samples which are excerpts from longer works such as a BA or MA thesis (or even published books!), applicants should consider re-working the selection into a coherent and discrete paper so that a) the sample can present a single argument rather than part of a larger argument and b) the bibliographic elements of the sample connect to the sample itself rather than a larger project. While not a requirement, revising an excerpt into a distinct paper often helps applicants demonstrate their writing and analysis more clearly.

What are “areas of study” at the Divinity School, and how do they differ from departments or subject areas?

  • You can think of an area of study as an intellectual or methodological “home” within the Divinity School. Like any home, you should occasionally leave it, so the Areas are not restrictive. Nearly all faculty and students work interdisciplinarily across areas and even across University Divisions (e.g., in the Arts and Humanities or Social Sciences). The 11 Areas of Study are further grouped into four core committees within the Divinity School.
  • The Divinity School’s areas of study are organized in different ways: some focus on tradition or corpus, while others center on methodological approaches, suggesting common questions, interpretive principles, and trajectories of thought. PhD applicants unsure of the best area of study for their particular research questions should consult the Area of Study pages above and contact faculty members in those areas with specific additional questions. In any case, the faculty committees are mutually interactive, allowing the same subject to be studied from various vantage points.
  • Students interested in doing coursework and research in a particular religious tradition might do so through one or more areas of study in the Divinity School, depending upon the nature of one’s research interests and questions.

Can I apply to more than one Area of Study?

  • Doctoral students should select in the application the area of study within which they have primary interest in pursuing their research and defend that choice in their candidate statement. Applicants with research that crosses areas, such as research in Buddhist Studies, should be especially clear about the choice from methodological and faculty guidance perspectives. However, applicants to the doctoral program who think a second area of study should review their application may designate one in the application.
  • MA, AMRS, and MDiv applicants do not formally declare an area of study. However, they may indicate interest or intended focus during their degree (especially if they are planning to apply to the PhD program at the Divinity School).

Does the University of Chicago Divinity School do Admissions Interviews?

  • Yes, but only for admission to the doctoral program. After reviewing applications, they interview a short list of applicants to follow up on points of interest, address concerns, and connect through scholarly inquiry. Formats and expectations vary by area (and will be communicated to interviewees in advance). Still, applicants should be prepared to speak on their research interests and how they would utilize specific resources and opportunities provided by the Divinity School. Most importantly, faculty interviewers are evaluating what an applicant might be like to have in class or as an advisee. Accordingly, rigorous preparation, self-knowledge, intellectual humility, curiosity, and critical engagement are tantamount.

I have additional questions about the application process. Who should I contact?