JD/MA in Literature

The Literature Program is not comparatist in the traditional sense but theoretical in focus, dedicated to the understanding of cultural history and the reshaping of literary studies in the context of contemporary thought. The program acknowledges the challenges posed by the emergence of non-Western literatures and also by the increasing importance of non-canonical, "marginal" or oppositional cultures within the West. Working with a wide range of contemporary theories or approaches--feminism, Marxism, cultural criticism, discourse analysis, reader-response theory, media theory, the analysis of power and the social function of ritual and symbolic action--the Graduate Program in Literature stresses the historicity of such discourses, and of the cultural phenomena they set out to investigate. Our courses also register the increasing significance in the academy of theoretical developments in cultural theory and film theory, as well as other media such as electronic literature, digital art, art and architecture. We also explore the connections between literary study and innovations in other disciplines--anthropology, psychoanalysis, linguistics, art history, religious studies, the history and philosophy of science, computer science, and law--which already share some of literature's investment in narrativity, structure, communication, digital culture and interpretation.