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Why Major in English at Allegheny College

As an English student, you’ll grow to recognize the ideas and perspectives that shape our lives. Cultivate an understanding of the power of language and engage in deep thinking, insightful analysis, and compelling expression.

Choose from either a creative writing or literature concentration. Through creative writing, explore how writers construct meaning and express the human experience. In literary studies, discover how literature and language shape the world in which we live.

English is also available as a minor. Take creative writing or literary studies courses to complement your major in another area of study.

Concentrations

  • Creative writing
  • Literature

Division

  • Language, Literature, and Culture

Program Type

  • Major
  • Minor

Number of Credits

48 for major24 for minor

Careers in English

A degree in English prepares you for jobs in industries such as:

  • Writing/editing
  • Education
  • Publishing
  • Advertising
  • Public relations
  • Business

English can also be a launching point to an advanced degree in fields such as:

  • Education
  • Writing
  • Literature
  • Business
  • Law

Where English Alumni Work Today

Attorney & Partner

Hunton Andrews Kurth LLP

Fred Eames ‘86

Editorial Director

University of Pittsburgh

Abby Collier ‘03

VP of Marketing

Mamava, Inc

Nicole Micco ‘98

Your Four-Year Journey

Creative Writing

Year 1: Understanding

Start with the basics: study the craft of fiction, poetry, and creative nonfiction, as well as British or Shakespearean literatures. You will also delve into literature from other cultures, including LatinX, Asian-American/Diasporic, and African-America/Diasporic.

Year 2: New Approaches

Take courses devoted to the close study of form throughout fiction, poetry, drama, or nonfiction. You can even explore children’s literature or study the works of a single major British, American, or other Anglophone author.

Year 3: Delving Deeper

Take the required Junior Seminar, which emphasizes frequent discussions and individual research projects in literary studies. You may take more than one seminar, and seminars are open to non-majors with permission of the instructor.

Year 4: The Senior Comp

Typical fourth year courses consist of advanced workshops that will engage you as both a writer and critical reader. You will also complete your Senior Comp in creative writing (poetry, fiction, or creative non-fiction), written under the supervision of an English department faculty member.

Literature

Year 1: Understanding

Our introductory courses, ENGL 110-118, emphasize close reading and the study of at least three literary genres. You’ll engage in meaningful discussion and analysis with your peers and professors.

Year 2: New Approaches

Continue to expand your analytical abilities as a reader and a writer in courses that cover at least two historical periods of literary history (e.g. realism and modernism) and the connections between them.

Year 3: Delving Deeper

Your courses will incorporate secondary research and a consideration of literary criticism. You will refine your ability to ask relevant, independent, interpretive questions of literary texts, encounter relevant examples of literary criticism, and be able to summarize and respond to arguments made by authors.

Year 4: The Senior Comp

Typical fourth-year literature courses build on rigor and will include theoretical approaches to literature. You will continue to hone your skills as a close reader of literary texts, find and evaluate relevant published criticism, and apply critical methods to a focused literary topic. Your studies will culminate with completing a substantial research project that displays a sustained sense of historical and cultural context.

Research and Internships

Internships

 

The real-world experience you’ll gain in an internship will help you successfully transition from college to the workforce.

  • Allegheny students have interned in variety of organizations, including:
  • Smith Brothers Advertising, Pittsburgh
  • Modern Language Association
  • Marketing, Ronald McDonald House Charities of Northeast Ohio
  • Crawford County READ Program
  • Service Learning
  • Meadville Tribune

Senior Comps

The Senior Comp is the culmination of four years of experience, imagination, and study where you’ll research, propose, create, and defend an original creative or critical project. You’ll be paired with a mentor to help oversee this project.

Recent Senior Comp topics from English students include:

  • This Is a Cemetery: Poems
  • The Faerie Plague: An Environmental Faerie Tale about Chytridiomycosis
  • Salome as a Feminist Antihero in Elizabeth Cary’s The Tragedy of Mariam
  • Bruised Fruit: Poems
  • Zephyr: Fiction
  • In Pursuit of Perfection: Essays

On-Campus Experiential Learning

You’ll broaden and refine your abilities through multiple experiential learning opportunities, including:

  • The Campus, Allegheny’s weekly student newspaper
  • Allegheny Review, a nationally-known undergraduate literary magazine
  • Overkill, an Allegheny-specific literary magazine
  • Writing Fellows: trained peer consultants in the Maytum Center for Student Success
  • The Single Voice Reading Series provides students with an opportunity to hear and meet nationally known writers, such as John Updike, Carolyn Forché, Tobias Wolff, and more
  • Student readings and national conferences: share your work with our learning community and beyond

Collaborative Research with Faculty

Many English majors carry out independent humanities research or collaborative research with faculty in addition to the Senior Comp.

Allegheny’s Office of Undergraduate Research, Scholarship, and Creative Activities provides funding for student research during the summer and for travel to regional and national conferences throughout the year.

The Dusty Elias Kirk and William Caroselli Fund offers English majors support for academic conference attendance, professional presentations, summer writing workshops, senior project research, and materials.

Faculty and Staff

Christopher Bakken

Professor

Ph.D., The University of Houston; M.F.A., Columbia University; B.A., University of Wisconsin, Madison

John Miller

Associate Professor

Ph.D., M.A., Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey; A.B., Duke University

Frequently Asked Questions About the English Program

What type of degree is an English major?

Students who major in English at Allegheny College will earn a Bachelor of Arts degree.

Does the English program at Allegheny College host writers-in-residence?

Yes, writers in residence are an important part of the creative writing concentration within the English program. Currently, writer Mari Christmas is in residence at Allegheny College. Her fiction writing and courses focus on American Literature, Black Studies, and Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies.

Are there any clubs and activities available for English students?

Yes, there are multiple campus organizations that can benefit students in the English program, such as Allegheny College Television (ACTV), Allegheny Film and Television (AFTV), The Allegheny Review, The Campus (Newspaper), The Krampus, Overkill Literary Magazine, WARC Radio (90.3), and Book Club. Explore all Allegheny College clubs and organizations.

Program Contact

Jennie Votava

Frederick F. Seely Chair of English Literature; Associate Professor of English

Email814-332-4334