The Major – English – Carleton College

Major Requirements

Seventy-two credits in English, including the following:

1. Foundations: One designated 100-level course that develops skills of literary analysis and introduces the concept of genre

ENGL 100: Inventing the Past
ENGL 100: Drama, Film, and Society
ENGL 100: Literary Revision: Authority, Art, and Rebellion
ENGL 100: Novel, Nation, Self
ENGL 112: Introduction to the Novel · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 114: Introduction to Medieval Narrative · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 115: The Art of Storytelling
ENGL 116: The Art of Drama: Passion, Politics, and Culture · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 118: Introduction to Poetry
ENGL 120: American Short Stories · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 131: Speculative Fiction
ENGL 135: Imperial Adventures
ENGL 137: Terrorism and the Novel · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 144: Shakespeare I
ENGL 187: Murder · not offered in 2024-25

2. Historical Eras: 36 credits in literature courses numbered 200-394 (excluding 220 and 295) which must include:

Group I: 12 credits in literature before 1660

ENGL 202: The Bible as Literature
ENGL 203: Other Worlds of Medieval English Literature
ENGL 205: “Passing Strange”: Shakespeare’s Othello and its Modern Afterlives · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 206: William Shakespeare: The Henriad · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 207: Princes. Poets. Power · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 208: The Faerie Queene · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 209: Project Course
ENGL 210: From Chaucer to Milton: Early English Literature · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 214: Revenge Tragedy · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 216: Milton · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 219: Global Shakespeare · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 244: Shakespeare I
ENGL 281: Living London Program · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 310: Shakespeare II · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 381: Living London Program · not offered in 2024-25
THEA 209: Project Course

Group II: 12 credits in literature between 1660 and 1900

ENGL 211: Haunting the Margins of American Literature
ENGL 213: Being Queer in Nineteenth-Century America
ENGL 217: A Novel Education · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 218: The Gothic Spirit · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 221: “Moby-Dick” & Race: Whiteness and the Whale · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 222: The Art of Jane Austen
ENGL 223: American Transcendentalism · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 224: Cruel Summer, 1816
ENGL 225: ‘Public Offenders’: Pre-Raphaelites and Bloomsbury Group · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 229: The Rise of the Novel · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 239: Democracy: Politics, Race, & Sex in Nineteenth Century American Novels · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 319: The Rise of the Novel · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 323: Romanticism and Reform · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 324: Cruel Summer, 1816
ENGL 327: Victorian Novel · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 328: Victorian Poetry · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 338: Dickinson, Moore, Bishop

Group III: 12 credits in literature after 1900

3. English 295: Critical Methods

4. English 395: Advanced Seminar

ENGL 395: Frankenstein’s Progeny
ENGL 395: Postcolonial Novel: Forms and Contexts

5. English 400: Senior Integrative Exercise (A senior may choose one of the following):

Colloquium Option: A group option in which participants discuss, analyze and write about a thematically coherent list of literary works.
Research Essay Option: An extended essay on a topic of the student’s own devising. Open only to students who have completed their Advanced Seminar by the end of fall term senior year.
Creative Writing Option: Creation of a work of literary art. Open only to students who have completed at least two creative writing courses (one of which must be at the 300 level) by the end of fall term senior year.
Project Option: Creation of an individual or group multidisciplinary project.

Of the 72 credits required to complete the major:

1. at least 6 credits must be taken in each of the following traditions:

T1: Literature of Ireland and Britain

T2: Literature of North America

AFST 325: Slavery in the Africana Imagination · not offered in 2024-25
AMST 269: Woodstock Nation
ENGL 120: American Short Stories · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 211: Haunting the Margins of American Literature
ENGL 213: Being Queer in Nineteenth-Century America
ENGL 215: Modern American Literature
ENGL 221: “Moby-Dick” & Race: Whiteness and the Whale · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 223: American Transcendentalism · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 227: Imagining the Borderlands
ENGL 228: Banned. Censored. Reviled.
ENGL 230: Studies in African American Literature: From the 1950s to the Present
ENGL 233: Writing and Social Justice
ENGL 234: Literature of the American South · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 235: Asian American Literature · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 236: American Nature Writing · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 239: Democracy: Politics, Race, & Sex in Nineteenth Century American Novels · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 241: Latinx Voices in the Age of Trump · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 247: The American West · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 248: Visions of California · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 255: The Poetics of Disability
ENGL 258: Playwrights of Color: Taking the Stage · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 288: California Program: The Literature of California · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 329: The City in American Literature · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 332: Faulkner, Hemingway, and Fitzgerald · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 338: Dickinson, Moore, Bishop
ENGL 352: Toni Morrison: Novelist · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 395: Senior Seminar · not offered in 2024-25
THEA 255: August Wilson: History and the Blues · not offered in 2024-25

T3: Global Anglophone Literatures

ENGL 238: African Literature in English · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 245: Bollywood Nation
ENGL 246: Film, Literature, and Culture in Mumbai and Seoul Program: Beyond Bollywood · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 250: Indian Fiction 1880-1980 · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 251: Contemporary Indian Fiction · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 252: Caribbean Fiction · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 272: Film, Literature, and Culture in Mumbai and Seoul Program: Representing Mumbai · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 281: Reading Multicultural London
ENGL 350: The Postcolonial Novel: Forms and Contexts · not offered in 2024-25
ENGL 359: Contemporary World Literature
ENGL 381: Reading Multicultural London
ENGL 395: Postcolonial Novel: Forms and Contexts

2. at least 24 credits must be in courses numbered 300-395

3. up to 6 credits may be in literature other than English in the original or translation

4. up to 12 credits may be in creative writing

Double-majors considering completing the integrative exercise during the junior year will need written approval from the departmental chair.

Workshops in Writing

The Department of English offers workshop courses in the writing of fiction, poetry, and creative non-fiction. Students are encouraged to submit their work to college publications such as The Second Laird Miscellany, the Clap, and The Manuscript.

Writers on the Carleton faculty include poets Gregory Hewett and Susan Jaret McKinstry and fiction writer Gwen E. Kirby. The department invites writers (most recently Jane Hamilton, Kao Kalia Yang, Aisha Sabatini Sloan and Sun Yung Shin) to teach workshops in creative writing. In addition, the department brings writers to campus for readings and lectures. Recent visitors have included Teju Cole, Edwidge Danticat, David Henry Hwang, Sarah Vap, Jaswinder Bolina and Jesmyn Ward.