The English Department houses over 30 full-time tenured and tenure-track faculty members and over 50 graduate students enrolled in MA and PhD programs with emphases in critical theory and all the major literary periods, including Medieval, Early Modern, Restoration and 18th Century, Romantic, Victorian, American to 1914, and Modern and Contemporary.
We have concentrations in Creative Writing, Literature, and Language and Linguistics (MA only). MU offers interdepartmental graduate minors available in Women's and Gender Studies, Medieval and Renaissance Studies, College Teaching, and others listed here.
We have a number of initiatives, programs, courses and colloquia in place to ensure that students are integrated into the vibrant life of the department as colleagues (see our department calendar for a selection). The English Graduate Student Association (EGSA) has representatives on all major departmental committees, and its officers work closely with English Department officers on matters related to graduate education.
The MA program is a two-year program with 30 hours of coursework, including at least 15 hours in graduate seminars at the 8000-level. Coursework builds on a student's Bachelor's-level knowledge of her or his field to provide a broad perspective on literature and culture while allowing for specialization and advanced research work. All MA students are expected to provide external funding, either paid by themselves or by another organization. This means that MA students are not eligible for teaching or research assistantships funded by the department.
The MA program provides students with the opportunity to complete coursework within an adaptable, individually personalized timeline, students may attend courses full-time or part-time and have the option of completing a low-residency program. The part-time option is especially convenient for working professionals.
The philosophy of the Creative Writing Program at MU is that imagination stimulates progress, and in our classes, we inspire and challenge our students to imagine inner landscapes of their own. By using sound and symbol to build new worlds and characters, to evoke images and tell stories, students who study Creative Writing learn to elevate language to an artform.
The University of Missouri's Creative Writing Program is known for its commitment to literary study as an essential component of literary production. The department offers the B.A. with a Creative Writing depth of study, an Undergraduate Minor in Creative Writing, as well as the M.A. and Ph.D. in English with a concentration in creative writing.
Professor William Peden founded MU's Creative Writing program in 1946, with the vision of combining creative writing and serious literary scholarship. His mission continues today. Our M.A. program has been in existence since the 1970s, and the Ph.D. with an emphasis in creative writing was established in 1988.
