English students and B.A. grads

[Night_Lamp]

Anyone who enjoys reading is golden in my books, and this is not meant as snobbery of any sort.

Who among the members have, or currently are, formally studying english? Where did you attend?

I am currently an english major at the University of Western Ontario (UWO) here in London Ontario. In second year at this point.

I am interested to hear your opinions of the program you are enrolled in. UWO is mostly known as a medical sciences and engineering school, but I am finding the english department for the most part to be very good. I attend here because of living locally, not because of the program's reputation.

[JBI]

I started off studying English but have since moved into other specialties, though my discipline is still literature, and specifically poetry - now though I have formal education in 3 other languages and literatures though, so when it comes to grad school things should seem more open.

Quite frankly, if you are planning on doing anything with graduate school to do with English, it is advisable you stick a few more languages under your belt. The specialty of English literature is a rather dead one, and you'll end up needing good French, and perhaps Latin, Italian, Greek, or all three, or perhaps German or another language. Certainly though French is an almost must.


Luckily University of Toronto lets me play around with my majors quite a bit, which lets me now focus predominantly on East Asian Studies, which is a good B.A. to have, as there is a serious growth in scholarship coming out about China in particular, as well as Korea (though Japan seems a pretty American-dominated field outside of Japan).

Just do what you enjoy though, but keep yourself diversified - you may find yourself not working in anything to do with your major in the future, so just try to enjoy things as they happen.

[Lokasenna]

I did my BA in English Literature at the University of Leeds. As for now, I'm doing an MA in Medieval and Renaissance Literary Studies at the University of Durham, and they've already provisionally accepted my PhD proposal, so thats good!

[LitNetIsGreat]

I have got about one year left (from seven) of my BA Hons Degree in Literature and Creative Media in the part-time department of The University of Sheffield. Really though, it has been almost pure literature because I have avoided the creative media aspect of it as much as possible. However, as of late I have had to go with modules of pure history and politics because like all part-time departments across the country it is being ripped apart by the ones in the know.

For my remaining credits, apart from my dissertation, I can see myself being forced to go down the politics/history route too. It is not that I mind at all studying politics/history, they of course compliment literature, but it is just the manner in which I and others have been forced onto such a route which is the problem. Of course the real issue is those coming in behind me who won’t have the opportunities that I have had...

After, I would like to try and do a MA in some aspect of literature, but I think circumstances will force my hand to study a PGCE (teacher qualification) so I can fight it out for real in the secondary schools. Who knows though?

[mayneverhave]

I am currently a semester away from a B.A. in English

[mal4mac]

I have got about one year left (from seven) of my BA Hons Degree in Literature and Creative Media in the part-time department of The University of Sheffield... However, as of late I have had to go with modules of pure history and politics because like all part-time departments across the country it is being ripped apart by the ones in the know.

...circumstances will force my hand to study a PGCE (teacher qualification) so I can fight it out for real in the secondary schools. Who knows though?

Unbelievable! Can't you take drop Sheffield and take literature courses at the Open University, Birkbeck, or elsewhere? You can certainly transfer credits between institutions, so I can't see that being a big problem. That would be taking the fight to Sheffield!

Also, if you want to teach English at secondary school, is taking history courses a good idea?

[Niamh]

I'm Currently in my first year doing a BA (hons) in Literature and the English Language with the Open University. I'm considering taking a couple of 30 point classes in french to help make my 360.

[LitNetIsGreat]

Unbelievable! Can't you take drop Sheffield and take literature courses at the Open University, Birkbeck, or elsewhere? You can certainly transfer credits between institutions, so I can't see that being a big problem. That would be taking the fight to Sheffield!

Also, if you want to teach English at secondary school, is taking history courses a good idea?

I only have 40 credits of choice left and then I am done, so that means just two more classes - aside from my dissertation which I will be working on this year. So of course it is not worth changing anything. If you broke my degree down as it stands I think it would related to about 85-90% literature, and 10-15% media, politics and history so I can easily lead as a literature (English) teacher via a PGCE. Added to the fact that I will have been studying for seven years and have covered much more than the required reading it is sure to be no problem..if I do find myself going down that route which looks likely if I ever want to take my family on holiday again! Of course, I will find a way to do a MA eventually somehow.


I am currently a semester away from a B.A. in English

That's got to be a good feeling. :banana:

[Dinkleberry2010]

I don't know about England or Canada, but if you attend graduate school in the specialty of English in the U.S., you will basically study English literature. You will not study much French, German, Chinese, Russian, Italian, or Spanish.

[JBI]

I don't know about England or Canada, but if you attend graduate school in the specialty of English in the U.S., you will basically study English literature. You will not study much French, German, Chinese, Russian, Italian, or Spanish.

That's true, except there are program requirements - a monolingual scholar is relatively useless since literature is not monolingual, and as such the department recognizes a need for more diverse backgrounding as a means of facilitating scholarship, as well as gaining fuller understandings of a topic.

[Dinkleberry2010]

Most colleges and universities in the U.S. require the study and passing of a second language to obtain a bachelor's degree. I'm not sure if the study of a third language is a requirement to obtain a master's degree in the U.S. It may be.

[OrphanPip]

I'm not sure many science programs require a second language :p.

I regret not taking advantage of university resources to learn a third language while I was earning my degree.