Is it OK to specify your school next to your "Ph.D.": in your email signature, in the title of your web site, etc.
For example,
John Smith, PhD (Harvard)
Edit: added united-states, because I think there might be some cultural differences.
Is it OK to specify your school next to your "Ph.D.": in your email signature, in the title of your web site, etc.
For example,
John Smith, PhD (Harvard)
Edit: added united-states, because I think there might be some cultural differences.
From Crazy Ex Girlfriend, season 1 episode 2:
Valencia: Wow, did you, like, go to Harvard or something?
Rebecca: Um, yeah, but I don't like to talk about it, 'cause people get weird.
Valencia: Your shirt says Harvard.
Rebecca: That way I don't have to talk about it.
I couldn’t find a video clip of the whole scene, which sort of answers OP’s question in the best way possible. But here is a snippet.
I will be more straightforward than the other answers.
No, this is not done in the US and would look strange.
One of the key points of the university system as it grew up in c13 Western Europe was that there was no such thing as a Paris degree or a Cologne degree or a Toulouse degree. A master was a master was a master. A doctor was a doctor was a doctor.
I can’t speak for the USA and, on the other side of the Atlantic, Germany is a bit of an outlier. But in the UK, putting D.Phil (Oxon) is definitely saying “look at me, I’m important.” As such it says “I am unimportant enough to need to boost my importance in this way.”
The information about where you got the doctorate might well be relevant and so should be findable. CVs, which list your whole educational history, might well include it. But in terms of your name, on business cards, letter headings, email signatures, it seems out of place.
Would you be asking this question if your qualification were PhD (Possum Trot)?
If you sign off your emails as "XY, Ph.D. (Minnesota State University)", this will be unusual, but probably will not make a negative impression on the recipient.
If you sign off as "XY, Ph.D. (Harvard)", this will be interpreted by quite a few people as showing off and attempting to piggyback on the prestige of your institution. Therefore, it could very well be seen negatively.
I would personally interpret it, rightly or wrongly, as implying that "Ph.D. (Harvard)" is worth more than a plain Ph.D. – otherwise, why bother emphasizing that you got your Ph.D. from Harvard as opposed to Minnesota State? That would probably make a negative impression on me.
In particular, it would make me guess that either (i) you don't understand that that's not how science works, i.e. that the value of your Ph.D. is determined by its content rather than the institution it was done at, or (ii) you do understand how science works but still want people to partly judge you based on your institution rather than your work. In the latter case, it would make me wonder whether this is because you want to get ahead at all cost (including hamfisted appeals to institutional prestige) or because are not very confident about the quality of your work.
PhD
is worth anything, a Harvard one is worth even more. Even when people can evaluate your work based on its merits, their first impression will be "Harvard", and their second and third impressions are subject to the confirmation bias.
I know some professors who list the degrees/qualifications they have and the universities they attended on their websites. Personally speaking, I think it is completely normal (professionally) as long as your purpose is not to show off (or even worse, expecting other people to think about you the way you think about you). It would be annoying if John Smith always signed off his Facebook posts with John Smith, PhD in Mathematics (Harvard).
The place to display such details about your academic history is your CV, not your signature line.
People in situations where they need to evaluate your academic performance will examine your CV. People who need to know your current title and position will look toward your signature line.
In academics, like in many fields, your performance will be constantly reviewed, for many reasons. One aspect of that will be your continuous productivity. While a PhD from Harvard can be considered an accomplishment, think about how including that info in an email signature will look in 10 years. The recipient won't be thinking "Wow, Harvard!!" -- it's more likely they'll be thinking "I wonder if that's the sender's last major accomplishment??"
If academics from universities that were not conspicuously prestigious commonly did this, then there would be no perceived subtext to doing so. However, I don't think they do - I wouldn't write "Dikran Marsupial PhD (Essex)", except in mild self-deprecatory humour. So if you are from a prestigious university and you do this, e.g. John Smith, PhD (Harvard) you would first need to work out what your intended subtext actually was, and secondly what subtext the reader is likely to assume/perceive. If you have no subtext, then why are you doing it when it is not a common custom? Assumed subtexts are likely to be related to academic snobbery (either that you are an academic snob, or that you think they are an academic snob). I don't think I'd bother, but the key is why do you want to write it?
[I have some difficulty in picking up subtext, so it is something I have to actively think about - it is quite important in social communication, for instance applying for a job]
Funny thing is: Despite being very unusual in English some people in German-speaking countries have started doing that e.g. Msc (WU) or BSc (TU). This looks also very weird to German native speakers ...