The English Department offers courses that focus on critical methods, on interpretation of texts, and on the nature of literary genres. Students encounter both recent developments in critical theory and traditional practices of close reading. Some texts are studied as aesthetic objects, others in relation to their social, intellectual, economic, and historical contexts.

The English Department aims less for extensive coverage than for an intensive examination of particular authors, works, genres, periods, and problems. Approximately sixteen to twenty-four courses are offered by the English Department each year. Introductory courses in fiction, poetry, and drama are offered every year, as are certain standard courses at the upper-division level. Courses not offered in the current academic year will normally be offered during the next two academic years.The department recommends that all majors take at least one course in each of the principal literary genres: poetry, drama, and fiction.  200-level courses are intended primarily but not exclusively for sophomores.

With course work primarily in English and American literature, the curriculum maintains a balance between the standard courses offered yearly--such as Studies in Poetry, the Novel, and Medieval or Renaissance Literature--and courses offered according to topical interests of faculty and students--such as seminars in feminist criticism, painting and poetry, autobiography, and allegory. These courses on special literary topics occur under the following rubrics: Under the rubric "Studies in Fiction," the English Department offers every year a course focused on some topic, subgenre, or period in fiction, or on selected novelists. Under the rubric "Studies in Shakespeare," the department offers at least one course each year, usually with a focus on the comedies, the tragedies, or Shakespeare in performance. Under the rubric "Poetry and History," the department offers at least every third year a course that studies poetry (sometimes with other genres as well) in its historical and cultural context. Students may register for more than one course under the same rubric, provided that the subject matter differs.

Featured Student

Bradley Wagner
Junior / BS

Hometown
Atlanta, GA

Many of the toughest challenges we face cannot be solved by science and technology alone. Language gives us the power to engineer solutions that combine the complexities of human society with the advances of the 21st century: the power to change the lives of others.