Wilkinson College of Humanities and Social Sciences

Roberta Lessor, Ph.D., Dean

Donald Will, Associate Dean

Wilkinson College of Humanities and Social Sciences invites you to explore the liberal arts with our vibrant intellectual community where award–winning faculty and students work together to advance their respective fields of knowledge and to make a difference in the world.

Take part in the collaborative student–faculty research, internships, community service, travel courses and study abroad, student clubs and organizations, and several lecture series that extend learning beyond the classroom. We provide a network of advising and support for undeclared majors during this exciting time of discovery. Wilkinson College community welcomes you to explore how we can support your learning and development.

Department of English and Comparative Literature

Paul Gulino, M.F.A., Chair

Professors: Axelrod, Fite, Gunner, Nakell, Paterno, Ruppel, Schneider, Watson, Yeager;

Associate Professors: Garcia, McNenny, O'Brien;

Assistant Professors: Cobb, Esdale, Ezell, Glaser, Jankowski, Lehnhof, Levin;

Instructors: Blaylock, Hall, Osborn.

Master of Arts in English

Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing

Dual Degree Program: Master of Arts in English and Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing

The mission of the department of English and comparative literature is to exemplify and encourage the ability to think creatively and critically, and to express ideas with clarity and intellectual rigor; to develop a detailed knowledge of several cultural traditions; and to foster the desire to explore related fields of study, such as psychology, history, philosophy, linguistics, sociology, and religious studies. The department provides Chapman students with innovative and rigorous instruction in critical thinking and writing skills, in-depth knowledge of the world's literary traditions, and a basis for lifelong learning in an interdisciplinary context.

Master of Arts in English

Many MA graduates teach composition and literature at junior and community colleges. Others have found the degree an excellent basis for Ph.D. study. Degree candidates must pass the written Comprehensive Examination, which is offered in fall and spring semesters.

Admission to the Program and Prerequisites

Admission to the program may be achieved by the completion of the following requirements:

1. A baccalaureate degree from a regionally accredited institution. If the degree is in a field other than English, the student must meet the prerequisites as determined by the program director and by a faculty screening committee. If prerequisites are not completed at the time of admission, they must be completed within the first year of enrollment.
2. Achievement of the required admission grade point average as specified in the Graduate Admission section. Applicants with a grade point average between 2.500 and 2.990 are required to submit passing scores from one of the following standard admission tests:
   • Graduate Record Examination (GRE): achieve a minimum score on two sections; the minimum score is 490 for the Verbal section and 4.5 on the Analytical Writing section. A score at or above the 60th percentile on any one of the Graduate Subject Tests is also accepted.
   • Miller Analogies Test (MAT): achieve a minimum scaled score of 417.
3. Submission of a writing sample.

Transfer Policy

Students admitted to the master of arts in English degree program with an earned master's degree in literature may transfer up to 6 credits of graduate course work upon approval of a petition by the program coordinator and the dean of the school. (See the Academic Policies and Procedures section for transfer policies.)

Comprehensive Examination

Candidates for the MA degree must pass a comprehensive examination. Please consult with the department for details.

Requirements for the Master of Arts Degree

requirements (6 credits)

ten of the following (30 credits)

Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing

The goal of the MFA program is the completion of a book-length thesis project. Though the program currently emphasizes fiction, theses may be in poetry, drama, or screenplay as well. Many MFA graduates teach creative writing at both two-year and four-year colleges.

Admission to the Program and Prerequisites

Admission to the program may be achieved by the completion of the following requirements:

1. A baccalaureate degree from a regionally accredited institution and submission of a non-returnable portfolio of creative work to be evaluated by a faculty committee.
2. Achievement of the required admission grade point average as specified in the Graduate Admission section. Applicants with a grade point average between 2.500 and 2.990 are required to submit passing scores from one of the following standard admission tests:
   • Graduate Record Examination (GRE): achieve a minimum score on two sections; the minimum score is 490 for the Verbal section and 4.5 on the Analytical Writing section. A score at or above the 60th percentile on any one of the Graduate Subject Tests is also accepted.
   • Miller Analogies Test (MAT): achieve a minimum scaled score of 417.
3. Submission of a writing sample.

Transfer Policy

Students admitted to the MFA creative writing degree program with an earned master's degree in literature may transfer up to 6 credits of graduate course work upon approval of a petition by the program coordinator and the dean of the school. (See the Academic Policies and Procedures section for transfer policies.)

Thesis Review and Completion

Students must have a cumulative GPA of 3.000 (B) to meet the minimum eligibility requirements to enroll in the thesis preparation class. (See the Academic Policies and Procedures section for additional guidelines.)

MFA students must prepare and defend a thesis project of publishable, "finished" quality to receive a pass. A copy of the thesis project, and the committee chair's report must be filed with the English office. The thesis project must be completed, reviewed, and accepted before a student may participate in graduation.

Continuous Enrollment Fee

Students who have previously registered for the thesis/project but who have not completed the requirements, are required to submit a continuous enrollment fee for each semester the thesis/project remains outstanding. The fee for continuous enrollment is equal to one credit of tuition charged per program and will allow students to remain in active status as well as enable them to utilize university resources for completion of the thesis/project.

Requirements for the Master of Fine Arts Degree

requirements (18 credits)

six of the following (18 credits)

Dual Degree Program: MA in English and MFA in Creative Writing

The dual degree combines the MFA and the MA. It was created for students who wish to combine the practice and study of creative writing with literary scholarship. The dual degree was specifically designed to meet the needs of students who intend to pursue a career in teaching English and creative writing at the university, community college or secondary-school level.

Dual Degree students must:

1. Be admitted to both degree programs.
2. Be enrolled concurrently in both programs.
3. Complete all requirements for each degree program, including the thesis for the MFA and the Comprehensive Examination for the MA.

• Students already enrolled in either the MA or the MFA must apply and be admitted to the dual degree program before completing a maximum of 27 credits of study.
• Dual degree students wishing to receive one diploma before the other must complete a minimum of 36 credits and the Comprehensive Examination (for the MA) or the thesis (for the MFA).

Requirements for the Dual Degree

Students must complete 54 credits; at least 42 credits must be in residence.

requirements (27 credits)

nine of the following (27 credits)

Course Descriptions - English

ENG 500 Advanced Rhetoric

Prerequisite, admission to graduate standing at Chapman University. In this advanced course on persuasive and expository prose, students investigate methods of invention and models of form and style in readings from discourse theorists as well as from established masters of the essay. (Offered fall semester.) 3 credits.

ENG 503 Techniques in Writing

Prerequisite, admission to graduate standing at Chapman University. Students learn the basic techniques necessary to produce publishable fiction. Course may vary by genre from semester to semester. Techniques of fiction may include plot development, viewpoint selection, three-dimensional characterization, effective dialogue, scene and summary, settings, and theme. Lecture and workshop combined. (Offered every semester.) 3 credits.

ENG 506 Advanced Workshop in Writing

Students discuss, criticize, and evaluate their writing in order to produce a publishable work. Students work within their chosen genre and form, and the guidelines of various genres and forms are examined. May be repeated for credit. (Offered every semester.) 3 credits.

ENG 508 Thesis

Prerequisite, completion of 36 credits in the MFA program, including at least nine (9) credits of ENG 506. The thesis course is designed as the capstone experience of the MFA program and is required of all MFA candidates. The instructor serves as the candidate's thesis advisor during completion of a novel or collection of short fiction. The course includes individual mentoring in addition to class sessions with other MFA thesis candidates. (Offered every semester.) 3 credits.

ENG 509 Literary Forum: John Fowles Center Contemporary Writers Core

Prerequisite, admission to the MA in English, MFA in Creative Writing or the Dual degree program. Literary Forum studies six contemporary authors and their work in conjunction with a lecture and reading series sponsored by the John Fowles Center for Creative Writing. Lectures and/or readings conducted by novelists, poets, critics, screenwriters, and creative non-fiction writers held every year during the spring semester and the reading and analysis assignments are based on the visiting writers' works. This course will focus not only on the series' writers, but on contemporary writing in general both in the Americas and in Europe. May be repeated for credit. (Offered spring semester.) 3 credits.

ENG 520 American Literature before 1870

Prerequisite, admission to the graduate program of the department of English and comparative literature. This course examines the "American Renaissance," with particular attention to critical assessment of major themes and authors: Poe, Thoreau, Emerson, Hawthorne, Melville, Whitman, and Dickinson. (Offered every third semester.) 3 credits.

ENG 522 American Literature from 1870 to 1950

Prerequisite, admission to the graduate program of the department of English and comparative literature, or permission of the instructor. The course will survey the Modernist period (from the late 1800s to the 1940s). Authors studied may include Twain, James, Chesnutt, Dreiser, Wharton, Frost, Stein, Eliot, W. C. Williams, Hemingway, Larsen, Faulkner, O'Neill, West, Hurston, Wilder, Chandler, Wright, and T. Williams. (Offered every third semester.) 3 credits.

ENG 524 American Literature Since 1950

Prerequisite, admission to the graduate program of the department of English and comparative literature. Students study contemporary American fiction, drama, and poetry in the postmodern tradition. Authors most frequently covered include Ellison, Baldwin, Updike, Bellow, Barth, Vonnegut, Didion, Beatty, Piercy, Sexton, Williams, Miller, Shepherd. (Offered every third semester.) 3 credits.

ENG 529 Experimental Course

(Offered as needed.) 3 credits.

ENG 530 Medieval Literature

Prerequisite, admission to the graduate program of the department of English and comparative literature. Students examine late medieval English literature. The course includes selections from Chaucer's Troilus and Creseyde, Piers Plowman, The Pearl, and other poems. (Offered fall semester, alternate years.) 3 credits.

ENG 531 Early Modern Literature

Prerequisite, admission to the graduate program of the department of English and comparative literature. Intensive study of significant themes, genres, and/or authors of the early modern era (ca. 1550-1700). Topics vary by semester, may be repeated for credit with a different focus. (Offered fall semester, alternate years.) 3 credits.

ENG 532 Shakespeare

Prerequisite, admission to the graduate program of the department of English and comparative literature. An intensive study of approximately ten of Shakespeare's major works. (Offered spring semester.) 3 credits.

ENG 533 Restoration and 18th Century Literature

Prerequisite, admission to the graduate program of the department of English and comparative literature. In this study of British literature and its social, political, psychological, and artistic influences from the restoration of Charles II to the death of Johnson, special attention is paid to the ways writers sought to express themselves through existing models, especially those of classical Greece and Rome, and such new forms as the novel. Authors may include: Defoe, Dryden, Addison, Steele, Pope, Fielding, Gray, Boswell, and Johnson. (Offered spring semester, alternate years). 3 credits.

ENG 534 Romantic Literature

Prerequisite, admission to the graduate program of the department of English and comparative literature. In this in-depth study of the Romantic revolution in English literature, such diverse Romantic writers as Blake, Burns, Wordsworth, Coleridge, Shelley, Keats, and Byron and the social, philosophical, and artistic sensibilities that characterize this explosive age are explored. (Offered fall semester, alternate years.) 3 credits.

ENG 535 Victorian Literature

Prerequisite, admission to the graduate program of the department of English and comparative literature. This course examines the intellectual and cultural trends of the literature of Victorian England. Attention is given to such intellectual forces as the Oxford Reform Movement, the Tractarian Movement, Darwinism, and aestheticism. Writers may include Carlyle, Tennyson, Arnold, Browning, Newman, Mill, Eliot, Meredith, Swinburne, Wilde, and Hardy. (Offered spring semester, alternate years.) 3 credits.

ENG 536 Modern British Literature

Prerequisite, admission to the graduate program of the department of English and comparative literature. A study of masterworks of British literary modernism and post-modernism, with emphasis on their origin and development, thematic and formal innovation, and cultural contexts and interchanges. (Offered alternate years.) 3 credits.

ENG 545 Major Author(s)

Prerequisite, admission to graduate standing at Chapman University. Students concentrate on the writings of either one significant author or a group of authors who can be profitably studied together. Examples of major figures include, but are not limited to, Chaucer, Spenser, Milton, Pope, Swift, Johnson, Keats, Dickens, Hawthorne, Melville, Pound, Eliot, Woolf, Joyce, Proust, Kazantzakis, and Faulkner. (Offered fall semester.) 3 credits.

ENG 546 Special Studies in Literature

Students concentrate on one area—such as Restoration and 18th century drama or the epic poem. Credit may be arranged with an instructor for travel in a foreign country while studying the literature of that country. The travel-study courses, Literary London and the London Tour, are offered for ENG 546 credit. (Offered every year.) 1-6 credits.

ENG 547 Topics in Comparative Literature

Prerequisite, admission to the graduate program of the department of English and comparative literature. In this course, students investigate significant themes or movements in comparative literature. Recent themes have included Poetics of the Novel; Writers Writing from the Margin; Women in Love and Other Emotional States. Courses that treat different themes may be repeated for credit. (Offered alternate years.) 3 credits.

ENG 550 Theory of Fiction

Prerequisites, ENG 503, 506. The course will challenge the student not only to read both experimental fiction and theory, but to respond/react/write about the texts in experimental ways. The course is both a creative reading and a creative writing course. (Offered fall semester.) 3 credits.

ENG 556 Literary Theory and Critical Practice: 1920-Present

Prerequisite, admission to graduate program of the department of English and comparative literature. Focusing on important critical questions (the social and political role of literature; the formation of a literary canon), students explore modern critical theories and methodologies, including New Criticism; Structuralism; Feminism, Gender and Sexuality Studies; New Historicism; Marxism; Psychoanalysis; Deconstruction; Multicultural and Post-Colonial Studies (Offered fall semester). 3 credits.

ENG 580 Teaching Composition

Prerequisite, admission to graduate program of the department of English and comparative literature. Participants will practice various techniques for helping student writers compose rhetorically persuasive discourse, perfect diagnostic and editing skills, design whole courses and individual programs for improvement and enhancement, and validate students' progress. Students may visit current composition classes and/or observe writing tutoring sessions overseen by experienced Writing Center tutors. (Offered every semester.) 3 credits.

ENG 581 Theory and Practice of Writing Tutoring and Conferencing

Prerequisite, admission to the English MA, MFA, or MA/MFA programs. English 581 focuses on the theory and practice of writing conferences and writing center tutoring. Students in 581 will explore such topics as collaborative learning, social constructivist theories of composition, conference dynamics, tutoring strategies, the writing process, reflecting on writing conferences, discipline-specific writing, grammar as a rhetorical issue, responding to student writing, and the writing center's role in the university. As part of the course, students will observe and participate in work at Chapman's writing center. In addition to preparing students to tutor in a writing center, this course will also benefit students planning to teach composition in schools and colleges. (Offered every year.) 3 credits.

ENG 590 Intern Program

Students gain experience in the fields of business, industry, or academe. Work assignments will relate to the major and may take place in law, editing, and business offices, print production and retail firms, newspapers, libraries, schools, or brokerage companies. P/NP. (Offered every semester.) 1-6 credits.

ENG 594 Seminar: Problems in Literary Analysis

Prerequisite, admission to graduate program of the department of English and comparative literature. Designed to introduce students to the exciting variety of advanced forms of literary study of particular authors, this course will demonstrate the uses and limitations of scholarship, criticism, and aesthetics as tools of literary understanding. (Offered every semester.) 3 credits.

ENG 596 Seminar: Film and Literary Studies

Prerequisite, admission to the graduate program of the department of English and comparative literature, or permission of instructor. In this advanced study of the processes by which literature is turned into film and in which film is examined as literature, students might study representative screenplays by such screenwriters as Dudley Nichols, Jules Furthman, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Robert Towne, Dorothy Parker, and William Faulkner, and the films of directors such as Welles, Fellini, Ford, and Hawks. (Offered fall semester.) 3 credits.

ENG 599 Independent Study in Literature or Language

Directed reading and/or research designed to meet specific needs of graduate students. (Offered every semester.) ½-6 credits.