Graduate

Concentrations

The English Department offers the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in these eleven concentrations:

The program of work consists of 24-33 hours beyond the M.A., including the 9 hour core requirement, and satisfactory completion of the foreign language requirement (see "Satisfying the Foreign Language Requirement".) Students are urged to complete this requirement early in their program of study.

Qualifying Procedure

To proceed into the Ph.D. program, students must pass the Qualifying Examination QE). Students who began their graduate work at the University must pass this examination in the spring semester of their second year of graduate study in English. With the consent of the graduate adviser, students who enter the program with a Master of Arts in English from another university may be exempted from the examination; such students who have not been exempted from the examination will normally take it in the first spring semester of graduate work in English at the University.

The qualifying examination will consist of an evaluation of students' progress in their graduate study and their preparation for completing the doctoral degree. This review will be based on a portfolio that students will compile before the beginning of the semester in which they must pass the examination and that they must submit to the graduate office on or before the first class day of that semester.

Program of Work

After passing the Qualifying Exam, students complete approximately 24-33 hours of coursework requirements for the Ph.D. beyond work done during the first two years. Students entering with graduate coursework from other institutions may petition the Graduate Advisor to accept up to 6 hours of applicable coursework from other institutions, but no coursework more than six years old--either from U.T. or another institution--may be submitted on the application for doctoral candidacy.

The application for doctoral candidacy is filed after passing the QE, satisfying all remaining coursework requirements (see below), passing the Ph.D. 3-Area Examination (see next section), and submitting an approved dissertation prospectus--usually by the third year of doctoral study.

24-33 hours beyond the first two years, to include the following:



3-Area Examination

When approaching the completion of coursework requirements for the Ph.D. (including foreign language proficiency), students register for Credit/No Credit conference course hours to prepare for the oral Ph.D. 3-Area Exam and for writing the dissertation. For the Ph.D. 3-Area Exam, students are required to produce three separate bibliographies that pertain to the subject on which they have decided to work and a draft of the dissertation prospectus. Each bibliography should survey an area of expertise--for example, a period, author, genre, or theoretical issue--directly related to the proposed topic of the dissertation.

While students will develop their reading lists and their ideas for the dissertation concurrently, preliminary mastery of the bibliographical materials is essential to focusing and defining the dissertation topic for the prospectus itself. The dissertation prospectus, submitted with the bibliographies in advance of the 3-Area Exam, should declare the argument of the dissertation and its research focus, explain how the work expands or revises existing scholarship on the subject (collectively defined in the three bibliographies), and present an account of methodology and a specific plan of analysis. Most dissertation prospectuses are between 20 and 30 pages.

3-Area Exam Procedures

An 3-Area Examination Committee of two members and a chair will be selected in consultation with the Graduate Advisor. The proposed supervisor of the dissertation (usually the supervisor of the CR/NC conference hours with whom the student has been working to prepare the exam materials) should also be the chair the 3-Area Examination Committee. When the student and advisor have determined the committee, the student must poll the committee for an exam date and time. The graduate coordinator will schedule a room for the exam. Bibliographies and a draft of the dissertation prospectus must be presented to the Graduate English Office prior to the examination date.

A student must take the examination within two years of passing the Qualifying Examination, and before submitting an application for doctoral candidacy to the Office of Graduate Studies.

A student may petition the Graduate Advisor and Graduate Studies Chair for permission to take the examination a second time, but approval is not automatic and under no condition may the examination be taken more than twice.

The examination will last approximately two hours, and the chair should report the results of the exam in writing to the Graduate English Office. The committee may require revisions to the prospectus before the student may apply for doctoral candidacy.

Candidacy

When students have fulfilled all Ph.D. coursework requirements (including foreign language proficiency) and successfully passed the 3-Area Exam and submitted a revised, approved prospectus, they may file for doctoral candidacy and begin registering for the dissertation course.

The application for doctoral candidacy (available from the Office of Graduate Studies, Main 101) formally appoints a dissertation supervisory committee, outlines the program of coursework applied to the degree, and describes the dissertation project. It must be approved by the dissertation director, the English Graduate Advisor and Graduate Studies Committee chair, and the Graduate Dean.

Supervisory Committee

In consultation with the Graduate Advisor, the student selects a chair of the dissertation committee (co-chairing is possible) and at least four other committee members (or three others, if the committee is co-chaired). At least three members must be members of the Graduate Studies Committee in English, and at least one member must be from an outside department or program.

An off-campus scholar may be appointed to a committee if the application for candidacy is accompanied by the scholar's curriculum vitae and a letter stating that the person is willing to serve and that the University will not pay travel expenses or provide recompense for such service. If later changes to the committee are necessary, requests must be filed with the Office of Graduate Studies through the Graduate English Office.

Dissertation

The supervisory committee must approve the topic and plan of the dissertation before the student begins research. A copy of the final draft of the dissertation reviewed for technical and grammatical correctness by the supervisor should be submitted to each member of the dissertation committee not less than four weeks before the date on which the student intends to defend the dissertation� (see the Graduate School Catalog for further details).

Defense

A Request for Final Oral (obtained in Main 133) must be signed by all supervisory committee members and submitted to the Graduate Dean's Office at least two weeks before the examination is to be held.

The defense consists of a one-hour oral examination on the dissertation and the future research plans.

At least four members of the supervisory committee must participate.

In the interests of reinforcing a sense of professional community, the Graduate Dean and the English Graduate Advisor urge that the defense be given in an open forum, allowing the participation of interested members of the University.

Time Limits

A student's Ph.D. candidacy will automatically be subject to review three years after admission to candidacy and yearly thereafter.

This review is conducted by the supervisory committee for the Dissertation, which makes specific recommendations to the Graduate Advisor, the Graduate Program Committee, and the Graduate Studies Chair, who, in turn, make a recommendation to the Dean of Graduate Studies.