The English Department at CGU is characterized by small seminars, multidisciplinary study, and independent learning in a student-centered environment. The department‘s objectives are to impart to students the ability to write clearly and effectively; an understanding of research in their field; a sense of the fields and subfields that shape primary and related disciplines; and the ability to undertake independent research and make an original contribution to their field.
The academic program emphasizes the breadth of American and British literatures, as well as critical theory, the development of research skills, and area expertise at the master’s and doctoral levels. Along with the interdisciplinary concentrations offered in the School of Arts & Humanities—American Studies, Early Modern Studies, Hemispheric & Transnational Studies, Media Studies, and Museum Studies—students may tailor distinct courses of study in cultural studies, gender studies, religion and literature, hemispheric Americas studies, U.S. Latino/a culture and literature, the graphic novel, and more.
As a result of its close ties to other Arts and Humanities departments, the English Department encourages transdisciplinary inquiry in graduate study. All degree tracks allow students to integrate topics in other humanistic disciplines with research in literature and the critical, cultural, and historical context of literary texts. Our program is particularly strong in interdisciplinary and transnational approaches to literature and culture.
CGU’s close-knit community nurtures an atmosphere of lively intellectual engagement while retaining the resources of a large, well-appointed university through membership in the Claremont University Consortium—with world-class professors and libraries and an active calendar of humanities-focused speakers and events.
Chair: Lori Anne Ferrell
831 N. Dartmouth Avenue • Claremont, CA 91711 • 909-621-8612 • Fax 909-607-9587
John D. and Lillian Maguire Distinguished Professor in the Humanities
Chair, English Department
Director, Early Modern Studies Program
Director, Kingsley & Kate Tufts Poetry Awards
John D. and Lillian Maguire Distinguished Professor in the Humanities
Chair, English Department
Director, Early Modern Studies Program
Director, Kingsley & Kate Tufts Poetry Awards
Associate Professor of Cultural Studies and English
Chair, Cultural Studies Department
Director, Africana Studies Program
Pomona College
James Joyce, Rock & roll, Modern British literature, Modern Irish literature, Popular culture, Cultural studies
Scripps College
Protest writing and rhetoric, American literature and culture, Disability literature, Prison writing, Short story and experimental fiction writing, Punk rock literature and subcultures, Writing pedagogy, Feminist theory, disability theory, queer theory, theories of race and class
Claremont McKenna College
American culture, American literature, American poetry, Eastern European literature, History of science, Literary criticism, Science and literature
Pomona College
Italian Renaissance art and architecture, Italian Baroque art and architecture, Medieval art history, History of cities, palaces, villas, and gardens, History of Genoa
Pomona College
Dramaturgy, Shakespeare in performance, Contemporary theater
Scripps College
Nineteenth-Century American literature, African-American literature, the Transatlantic Eighteenth Century, History of the novel, Novel theory, Gender and sexuality, Historicism, and American Modernism
Scripps College
Contemporary American literature; Asian American literature
Claremont McKenna College
Milton, Renaissance literature, Shakespeare
Pomona College
18th- and 19th-Century British literature, History and theory of the European novel, Jane Austen