Graduate Studies
The English Department at The George Washington University offers Master of Arts and Doctor of Philosophy degrees in English and American Literature and Culture.
Graduate seminars are offered on a variety of subjects and time periods. The PhD program will offer three concentrations starting Fall 2012, in Medieval and Early Modern Studies, American Literature and Culture, and British and Postcolonial Studies . Students and faculty work closely together in the classroom as well as outside, especially through the Medieval and Early Modern Studies Institute, the 19th century studies seminar, the Wang Visiting Scholars series, and special events.
The program offers a comprehensive training in critical theory as well as literary and cultural studies, exposing students to a diversity of texts within a global and transnational context. A large faculty serves a small student body to allow for close interaction and mentoring at every stage of graduate study. Our graduate students have access to extraordinary research archives, such as the Folger Shakespeare Library, Library of Congress, National Archives and libraries connected to the many museums in Washington, D.C.
A Message from the Director
Welcome to the graduate program in English at George Washington University. Our program is all about conversation —conversation between members of our intellectual community, but also conversation across borders of nation, culture, and historical period. Our website provides information for faculty and current students, but also for prospective applicants to the program. Please do feel free to contact me if you have any questions about the graduate program in general and the PhD program in particular. Questions about the masters program should be directed to the MA Coordinator, Professor Kavita Daiya.
Jonathan Gil Harris
Professor and Director of Graduate Studies
Department of English
George Washington University
Bringing Texts to Life
Scholars have observed that the 17th-century Dutch landscape painter Jacob van Ruisdael was so accurate that botanists can identify the flora in his paintings. Graduate student Mike Smith found similar precision and relevance in medieval literary botanical references. In his dissertation, funded by GW's Medieval and Early Modern Studies Institute, he examines topics such as poisonous plants and grafting, shedding light on what he calls “human-plant encounters.”
Who is Dean Wallace?
Fascinated by British culture, Associate Dean of Graduate Students and Professor of English Tara Ghoshal Wallace recently published Imperial Characters: Home and Periphery in Eighteenth-Century Literature. Her book examines how 18th-century British writers inscribed in their texts anxieties about imperialism’s effect on British national character. Her next project will focus on Sir Walter Scott and how his novels construe and construct monarchy.