We live in a rapidly changing world, and as the world changes, our modes of expression change with it. The department’s new concentration in Film, Media, and Culture is designed to help students achieve success in navigating that changing world of expression. The concentration builds on the study of film history and theory to engage students in analysis of the newest forms of media, including graphic texts, digital texts, and video. The concentration focuses on a cultural approach, exploring how such texts reflect and shape our ideas about ourselves and the world around us.
We offer a wide range of courses on film history and analysis, as well as classes that incorporate film and new media. Courses in critical theory and the history of film help students develop a critical expertise and hone their own powers of creativity and communication. The degree in Film, Media, and Culture develops critical thinkers and effective communicators and produces graduates whose skills are in demand by a wide range of employers.
Courses and Capstones
Catalog course descriptions, which provide a general overview of our regularly offered courses, are here.
Class section descriptions, which provide more details of how upcoming scheduled class sections will be taught by specific instructors, are here.
We also offer upper-division special topics courses and single author special topics courses in the major. Recent special topics classes include:
- American Film and the South
- 21st Century American Fiction
- Captivity and Freedom
- Haunting and the Literary Imagination
- Race & Gender in Latin American Literature
- From the Roaring Twenties to Reunification: Berlin through the Ages
Recent single author special topics classes include:
- Don DeLillo
- E. L. Doctorow
- Louise Erdrich
- Herman Melville
- Miyazaki & 19th-Century Literature
- Henry David Thoreau
- Alice Walker
Students complete their program in the Literature Concentration by choosing a Senior Capstone project. Options include an undergraduate thesis, an internship, and study abroad.
What Can I Do with a Degree in English?
The degree in English develops critical thinkers and effective communicators, people whose skills are applicable in a wide range of careers including education, publishing, writing, information and research, media, politics and public service. According to the 2012 census, 23% of English majors have careers in education, training, and library, while 17% go into management, business, sciences, and the arts (Source: ADE&ADFL). The skills you master as an English major could prepare you for a job as a staff culture writer, a professor, a research associate, a nonprofit grant writer, a program officer at a think tank or foundation, or a curriculum designer at an education technology company (Source: MLA Profession). English majors develop written/oral communication skills, listening skills, strong reading abilities, critical thinking and creative problem solving abilities, storytelling, research skills, the ability to work independently, the ability to justify ideas and articulate arguments, respect for deadlines, the ability to learn quickly and accurately, and respect for different cultures and world views.
Employers want and need graduates who can write and communicate well, who can analyze, synthesize, and evaluate information, who have organizational, time management, and teamwork skills, who appreciate diverse viewpoints, and who have a global perspective. The courses and programs in the Department of English, which is the cornerstone of a liberal arts education, will help you to master these skills and become a lifelong learner.
Research Opportunities
The Corinthian: Students work with literature faculty mentors to revise essays for submission and blind review by our university's student research journal. Recently, literature student Teddi Strassburger was the editor of The Corinthian, and three literature students published articles in The Corinthian: Sarah Beth Gilbert, "Veiling with Abjection: Carson McCullers' Reflections in Golden Eye"; Mikaela LaFave, "Mother Knows Best: The Overbearing Mother in Coriolanus and Psycho"; and Hannah Miller, "Whiteness, the Real Intermediary Agent: Harriet E. Wilson’s Medium for Amalgamation in Our Nig; or, Sketches in the Life of a Free Black". Facebook | Web
Student Research Conference: Students work with literature faculty mentors to prepare presentations for the annual event that is organized by MURACE (Mentored Undergraduate Research and Creative Endeavors). Recent presentations by literature students include Elise O'Neal, "Henry James' Turn of the Screw and the Dangerous Ambiguity of Transcendental Belief" and Christian Pontalti, "That's Been Done Before: Tropes and Cliché in The Canterbury Tales." Web
Women's and Gender Studies Symposium: The annual event is organized by the Women's and Genders Studies Program. Literature professors Dr. Mary Magoulick and Dr. Katie Simon serve on the Women's Studies Board. Recent presentations by literature students include Catherine Maloney, "A Southern Girl's Guide to the Apocalypse" and "The Bisexual Ghosts in the Closet"; Sophia DiCarlo, "'Are You My Mother? Assumptions of Femininity and Motherhood in Hudes's Water by the Spoonful" and "Transcendent Familial Roles in Hamlet and A Thousand Splendid Suns"; Matthew Dombrowski, "Motherhood, Misconceptions, and Myth: In the Blood as Welfare Queen Allegory" and "Fetishized Identitites: Orientalism, Authority and Escapism in Jasmine and Hope and Other Dangerous Pursuits"; and Emmie Meadows, "Prostitution: The Road to Empowerment."