2013–2014 The Bulletin - USS at Tufts - Tufts University

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dations of the faculty who have taught them. On
the basis of this appraisal the department will
recommend whether or not the candidate should be
granted the master of arts; it will also determine
whether or not the candidate should be admitted to
candidacy in the doctoral degree program.
The required reading knowledge of a foreign
language must be demonstrated to the satisfaction
of the Graduate Committee (usually by an examination
taken at Tufts University) in order to
complete the requirements for the master of arts
degree.
Doctor of Philosophy
Admission to the doctoral degree program is open
to students who have completed with distinction
the master’s degree in English, either at Tufts or
another university. Students who enter with a
master’s degree from another institution will enroll
in three graduate seminars per semester during
their initial year. At the end of that year, their work
will be reviewed by the faculty, who will determine
whether each candidate should continue in the
program; upon receiving a positive recommendation,
candidates who came to Tufts with a master’s
degree in hand will pass into the third year
program. Students who successfully complete the
master’s degree at Tufts will enter their second year
of the program, receiving mentoring as teaching
assistants in both literature and composition courses
while taking three courses each semester, one of
which will be a proseminar offering training in various
aspects of the profession.
During the second and third years, doctoral
candidates will increase their comprehensive knowledge
while beginning to concentrate on one
particular area or subject. Normally, the courses
they take will be chosen from among the graduate
seminars in the department, but advanced-level
undergraduate courses or independent studies may
be counted with the approval of the director of
graduate studies. During the third year of the
program, all candidates will complete their
coursework by taking two courses in the fall
semester. At the same time, they will begin to teach
one course per semester in the First-Year Writing
Program; they will normally continue teaching
through the fifth year.
At the end of the third year, each student will
take a two hour oral comprehensive examination.
The examining committee will consist of three
faculty members, one of whom, the chair, has been
selected by the student as someone familiar with
the student’s work in class. In most cases, the
graduate student will already have spoken with this
faculty member about serving as director of her or
his dissertation.
No standardized list of texts is issued for this
examination. The graduate program is small and
one advantage of its size is that students’ individual
interests can be accommodated. It is not the
purpose of the examination to have everyone do the
same thing. Instead, it seeks to test each student’s
range and breadth of knowledge. Therefore the
following guideline of periods and areas of concentration
is to be used by each student to generate a
foundation list of works in each period or area for
which he or she will be responsible. This list is not
intended to be exhaustive or exclusive; not everything
the student has read will show up on the list.
Critical works on periods and texts will be included
on each list. This list of specific titles should be
arrived at in consultation with individual faculty
members and with the director of the graduate
program. The list must be submitted to the director
of the graduate program in English at least three
months before the oral examination.
Periods and areas of concentration for the
doctoral degree comprehensive examination are the
following: Old English, Medieval Literature,
Sixteenth-Century British Literature, Seventeenth-
Century British Literature, Eighteenth-Century
British Literature, American Literature before 1820,
Nineteenth-Century British Literature, Nineteenth-Century
American Literature, Twentieth-
Century British Literature, Twentieth-Century
American Literature, Contemporary World
Literature, and Literary Critical Theory. Each
candidate also has the option of constructing, in
consultation with the chair of the committee, one
special topic focused on his or her particular area of
interest, in preparation for the dissertation.
Candidates will select eight of the periods or areas
for particular development for the comprehensive
examination. Two of those fields will be fulfilled by
course work completed in graduate school. The
other six will be the focus of the comprehensive oral
examination. Students who do not pass the oral
examination, in whole or in part, may take the
examination again at a later date.
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