MA English Studies

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Our robust MA program offers you a chance to pursue an advanced path in literary or writing studies, providing both experience and training in teaching and research in the humanities. Interdisciplinary and global in its scope, our program meets the goals and needs of a variety of graduate students.

For those whose goals include teaching at the community college level, we offer advanced courses in the theory and practice of composition and rhetoric and the teaching of writing.

For those who eventually want to apply to Ph.D. programs, we provide a solid and critically up-to-date curriculum that encompasses a range of rigorous scholarly methods and theoretical approaches to the study and teaching of literature, cultural studies, and film & media studies.

For a graduate student following a typical course of study, the program takes two years to complete.

Program Requirements: 55 credits for a thesis option OR a non-thesis option

REQUIRED COURSE: (5 credits)

  • English 501: Literary Theories and Practices

CORE COURSES: (25 credits total, each course is 5 credits) in literature, composition/rhetoric, critical theory

  • English 513 (Teaching Composition; for Graduate Teaching Assistants only)
  • English 510: Seminar: Topics in Rhetoric (repeatable)
  • English 515: Studies in Literary and Critical Theory (repeatable)
  • English 540: Studies in Global Literatures (repeatable)
  • English 550: Studies in American Literatures (repeatable)
  • English 560: Studies in British Literature (repeatable)
  • English 565: Studies in Post-Colonial Literatures (repeatable)
  • English 570: Topics in Cultural Studies (repeatable)
  • English 575: Studies in Women’s Literature (repeatable)
  • English 580: Studies in Film (repeatable)
  • English 520: Studies in Poetry (repeatable)*
  • English 525: Studies in Fiction (repeatable)*
  • English 535: Studies in Nonfiction (repeatable)*

*These courses may be taken as either literature or elective credits (depending on the nature of your final project). Only 5 of the 25 total/combined credits can be taken in an ENG 500 Directed Independent Study course.

ELECTIVES: for the non-thesis option (20 credits total, each course is 5 credits) or for the thesis option (15 credits total, each course is 5 credits) in literature, composition/rhetoric, English language, creative writing, or pedagogy. Any of the above courses, plus:

  • English 502: Seminar in the Writing of Fiction (repeatable)
  • English 504: Seminar in the Writing of Poetry (repeatable)
  • English 505: Seminar in the Writing of Nonfiction (repeatable)
  • English 506: Seminar in Creative Writing: Multigenre (repeatable)
  • English 509: Internship in Writing, Editing and Production (repeatable)
  • English 594: Practicum in Teaching (repeatable)
  • English 598: Research in the Teaching of English (repeatable)

THESIS COURSE (for thesis option): (5 credits)

  • English 690 Thesis Writing*

*Thesis credits count as elective credits.

Note: A student may, with permission, take up to 10 credits in 400-level courses. You may have only 10 credits TOTAL of 400-level and/or 500 (Independent Study) credits.

ADDITIONAL REQUIREMENTS:

  1. Fulfillment of the English Graduate Program Language Requirement.
  2. Successful completion of the English Studies Graduate Exam.
  3. (optional) Successful Thesis, with a critical preface, approved by the student’s Thesis Committee and the Graduate School.