Literature

Literature has been called the queen of the arts. It engages the imagination more fully and involves a greater variety of pleasures than almost any other mode of human understanding. Literature can mix together the historical and the fanciful, the conclusions of science and the projections of our fondest wishes like no other form of human expression. Because it uses words, it is the simplest art, and because it combines those words in ways to touch the soul, it is, even more, the most varied and complex art.

MCLA is unusual in providing a variety of ways for studying literature. We are very proud of our literature curriculum, and we think you will find it rich, rewarding, and full of promise.

Below you will find a more detailed and precise description of literary studies, and you will also find a number of related places on the World Wide Web which explore the many connections which literature makes between us and our world.

Students at MCLA find a broad range of literature courses taught in small classes by experienced and highly-educated faculty. The mechanism by which a full curriculum can thrive at a small college is that our courses are taught in rotation: each semester, we offer a different slice of the overall spectrum of courses. But a course gets re-listed every three or four semesters. If you are looking forward to taking a particular subject, be sure and plan ahead so you are prepared when the class appears in the schedule. Your advisor can give you tips on how to mesh your interests our literature offerings.

Foundation Courses 24 credits
Department Electives 6 credits
ENGL 349 Critical Reading 3 credits
ENGL 351 Shakespeare 3 credits
Two Literature Survey courses (In addition to one in Foundation Courses)
ENGL 451 British Literary Survey
ENGL 461 American Literary Survey
ENGL 471 World Literary Survey
Two Literature electives, 300-level or above 6 credits
Choose electives from the following list:
ENGL 340 Literature and Society
ENGL 353 Melville & Hawthorne
ENGL 356 James Joyce
ENGL 357 Virginia Woolf
ENGL 359 Toni Morrison
ENGL 360 Whitman, Williams & Roethke
ENGL 361 John Steinbeck
ENGL 362 Marianne Moore & Elizabeth Bishop
ENGL 366 The Age of Chaucer
ENGL 368 The Age of Milton
ENGL 370 The Romantic Movement
ENGL 371 The American Renaissance
ENGL 372 Arts of Medieval & Renaissance Britain
ENGL 374 Literature & the Environment
ENGL 375 Civil War in Literature and Film
ENGL 377 Developing the Novel
ENGL 378 Sports Literature
ENGL 379 Science, Literature and Gender
ENGL 381 African American Literature
ENGL 382 Harlem Renaissance
ENGL 384 Native American Literature
ENGL 385 Irish American Literature
ENGL 386 Jewish American Literature
ENGL 387 Latino/a American Literature
ENGL 389 Contemporary American Poetry/ Fiction/Drama
ENGL 390 Asian American Literature
ENGL 391 Italian American Literature
ENGL 441 Special Topics in Literature
ENGL 493 Teaching Assistant English/Communications
ENGL 500 Independent Study
Total literature concentration requirements 48 credits