English, B.A., Literature

Kate McCarthy-Gilmore, Ph.D., Chair

The English program offers majors in Creative Writing and Literature, and many students choose to double major in both. The program also offers minors in English and in Rhetoric & Public Writing.

Double Major in Literature & Creative Writing (B.A.):

Students must complete 33 literature credits plus a Senior Literature Capstone, as well as 18 creative writing credits plus a Senior Thesis Seminar. They also must defend both a Literature Capstone paper, and a Creative Writing Thesis.

Student Learning Outcomes - English: Literature

1. Demonstrate critical reading skills required to articulate a persuasive and insightful close reading, and a persuasive and insightful formal or structural analysis of a literary text (Goal #1 common to all Literature/Writing majors).
2. Demonstrate the rhetorical skills required to make a persuasive and insightful written argument using evidence from a literary text. (Goal #2 common to all Literature/Writing majors).
3. Integrate source material from literary research accurately, smoothly, and usefully into an argument, citing sources according to prevailing conventions.
4. Demonstrate a clear understanding of the elements of literature, including plot, structure, character, setting, ideas, point of view, imagery, metaphor, symbolism, allegory, and prosody.
5. Articulate how a work of literature may be understood in its social context, including such contexts as biography, psychology, gender, ethnicity, race, class, religion, nationality, or sexuality, as well as political, social, religious, intellectual or cultural history.
6. Articulate how a work of literature may be understood in the context of literary history (including such concepts as the Renaissance, Romanticism, or Modernism), as well as the context of the history of aesthetic movements (including such concepts as classicism, romanticism, realism, naturalism, or surrealism), and the context of literary traditions (including such concepts as genre, sub-genre, myth, archetype, or mode).
7. Orally articulate their composition and revision processes, and explain how the study of literature and individual authors provides them with models and an understanding of literary conventions and traditions which informs their own writing.