Graduate Studies

The English department has three distinguished graduate degree programs: PHD, MFA, and MA.

• Phd Program emphasizes cultural and critical studies

As one of the first to emphasize cultural and critical studies in the nation, our PhD program has been hailed as a leader of innovation in English studies. Recently our program was selected by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching as one of seven participants in the Carnegie Initiative on the Doctorate, a multi-year project designed to rethink the nature of doctoral education in the United States. Our faculty has many distinguished scholars whose strengths include cultural theory and criticism, British and American literary history, composition and pedagogy, and film and television studies.

• MFA in Writing

Our MFA program is one of the oldest in the country, and is ranked among the top programs in the country. With internationally distinguished writers among its faculty, the MFA offers intensive workshops in poetry, fiction, and creative nonfiction, along with readings courses in a variety of contemporary writing.

• MA in English

The MA in English offers students the opportunity to undertake graduate work across a variety of historical periods and representational practices. We seek to examine the relationships across diverse writing practices by close and theoretically informed readings. Students can elect to concentrate their elective work broadly across English studies, or they can focus in the programmatic areas of the department (literature, film studies, composition, and children’s literature)

Announcements:

New for Fall 2009 Admission to the Graduate Program

• Requirements for Applying to the Graduate Program.
  We are now requiring that all applicants submit an application using the Apply Yourself service before sending any other materials including transcripts, writing samples, and letters of
  recommendation.
  
  Over the past several years we have found that materials from potential applicants are received in the English Department Graduate office, but a formal application is never submitted. This is the first, and most important step in the process. In an effort to control the amount of official documents that are sent to us by potential applicants; we are now requiring that your application be submitted on the Apply Yourself online service before you request official supporting documentation be sent to us.
  
  If you have questions regarding this new directive please do not hesitate to contact us.
  
  Phone: 412-624-6549 or Email: mid29@pitt.edu
  
  
• Application Timeline for Fall 2009 Admissions.
  The application period for Fall Admission 2009 will begin on September 2, 2008 and will end on December 12, 2008 at 12:00 midnight (EST).

Certificates:

We also offer graduate certificates in:

• composition: literacy, pedagogy and rhetoric
  • This graduate certificate recognizes sustained, advanced study in composition, literacy, pedagogy and rhetoric at the University of Pittsburgh.
• film studies
  • The Film Studies Program provides an interdisciplinary curriculum, with courses (concerning cinema, television, video, and photography) offered on both the graduate and undergraduate levels. These classes treat the media as both artistic and cultural discourses, and address issues of history, theory, ideology, and aesthetics. Production courses in cinema, photography, and video are offered at the undergraduate level and, occasionally, through graduate Directed Study. The program draws on faculty from the Departments of English, Fine Arts, Slavic, German, French and Italian, Studio Arts, East Asian, and Psychology, among others. It offers an undergraduate major and minor (certificate), as well as two graduate certificates (master's and doctoral).

These certificates are available to any graduate student in the department.

For more information on these graduate certificates and their requirements, please follow the program links on the right side of this page.