- Degree Level
- Graduate
- Degrees Offered
- Master of Arts
- Department
- English
- school/college
- College of Arts and Sciences
Master of Arts in English
The Master of Arts in English at Arcadia University affords you the flexibility to tailor a course of study to meet your individual wishes and professional goals. Smaller classes and the dedicated attention of graduate faculty ensure a nurturing environment for personal growth. This highly versatile program offers courses in three areas of emphasis—literary studies, cultural studies, and professional and academic writing. As a full time English, MA student, you are eligible to be GA (Graduate Assistant) each semester that you are enrolled.
Proud of its pioneering role in the nation’s Writing Across the Curriculum movement, Arcadia—and specifically the Master of Arts in English program—stresses the centrality of rigorous critical thinking, argumentation, and refined interpretive skills to the serious study of literature.
Experiential Learning
“I wanted a rigorous, intellectually-stimulating educational experience that would also allow me flexible asynchronous and synchronous options to earn my degree, and I found that at Arcadia. I also chose Arcadia because I liked that their value system seemed in line with my personal convictions.”
How can we help you tell your story?
Most of what we do as scholars of English is read and write stories: narratives of love, loss, and redemption, stories of interpretation and the journey through research to understanding. Whether you are just beginning your journey or looking for a place to grow, Arcadia’s Graduate MA program can help you tell your story.
The program stresses effective writing in a broad array of genres, critical thinking, and interpretive skills, even as it fosters the growth of initiative and self-confidence—qualities much in demand in today’s professional world.
We offer multiple ways to complete the degree, including on-line asynchronous courses, on-line synchronous courses, and in-person courses with the opportunity for remote students to attend through Zoom.
With a Master of Arts in English, you can
- prepare for or advance in a career in instruction
- embark on a professional career as a writer
- pursue an advanced degree in literary study
- work in the non-profit sector
- work in publishing, editing, and technical or professional writing
Requirements
Credits
30 credits of graduate-level coursework are required for completion of the degree program.
Required Foundation Course (3 credits)
- EN 500 Critical Writing for Success
Elective Courses (21-24 credits)
Either seven or eight courses in English and related Humanities disciplines chosen in consultation with the Program Director. These may include a maximum of two graduate-level courses taken among the following Humanities disciplines: History; Philosophy; Religion; International Studies; International Peace and Conflict Resolution; Art History; Music; or Theatre. Students in the program are allowed to take up to two Independent Study research projects (EN 689) under the supervision of qualified and willing professors during their degree work. Application for the approval of independent studies must be made in writing to the Department of English ahead of the semester in which the Independent Study is to be undertaken. Students may not undertake Independent Study during their first semester in the program. Again, a Career Internship in English (EN 670) may be undertaken once in the course of the student’s program, pending the approval of the Director of Graduate Studies in English, who must be consulted prior to the beginning of the internship. As with Independent Study, the Career Internship in English may not be pursued during the student’s first semester in the program. The Internship is a graded course, as are all the other courses offered in the program. No courses are offered on a Pass/Fail basis.
Culminating Activity (3 or 6 credits)
- EN 698 Culminating Project or
- EN 699 Master’s Thesis in English
Additional Information
Students in the program are normally expected to complete degree requirements by undertaking a 3-credit culminating project under the supervision of one or more members of the Department. However, students will be granted the opportunity to write a master’s thesis for 6 credits under the supervision of one or more members of the Department. To undertake a thesis, students must submit a thesis proposal and accompanying documents as required by the Department. Students do not automatically have the right to write a thesis; they may do so only if their application for the thesis is approved.
Students who do not complete the thesis or master’s project at the end of their coursework, or at the end of the semester or session in which they are enrolled in a departmental thesis or culminating project course, are required to enroll in an ongoing non-credit thesis writing course until all work is completed and approved (EN 697). A fee equivalent to 1 graduate credit for a 3-credit culminating master’s project and 2 graduate credits for a 6-credit culminating thesis will be assessed for each semester or part thereof during which the thesis or culminating project is incomplete. (For these purposes, all the summer sessions together will count as one semester.)
Graduate-Only English Courses
- EN 659 Myth and Literature: Verbal Forms of the Unconscious
- EN 670 Career Internship in English
- EN 689 Independent Research
- EN 697 Thesis Research and Writing Variable credits
- EN 698 Culminating Project
- EN 699 Master’s Thesis in English
- EN 640 Special Studies in Literature
- EN 641 British and American Poetry
- EN 642 The Search for Self and Identity in the West Indian Novel
- EN 643 Lawrence, Joyce and Virginia Woolf
- EN 644 Willa Cather
- EN 645 Shakespeare and the Self
- EN 649 World Literature in English
- EN 651 The Harlem Renaissance
- EN 655 Southern Fiction
- EN 658 Tragedy: Forms and Philosophy
- EN 625 American Humor
- EN 626 From Romanticism to Modernism
- EN 633 Shakespeare’s Jacobean Dramas
- EN 634 Crime and Deviance in Renaissance England
- EN 638 The American Short Story
- EN 540 Special Studies in Discourse
- EN 542 Teaching the Writing of Fiction
- EN 543 The History and Teaching of Rhetoric
- EN 546 Teaching Writing
Graduate and Undergraduate Courses
- EN 474 Grant Writing for Non-Profits
- EN 475 Fiction Writing Workshop
- EN 476 Writing for the Web and New Media
- EN 477 Advanced Editing Workshop
- EN 478 Poetry Writing Workshop
- EN 479 Corporate Writing
- EN 486 Creative Writing Workshop
- EN 490 The Text, the Critic and the World
- EN 500 Critical Writing for Success
- EN 510 Theories of Writing
- EN 461 Seminar: Modern Drama
- EN 462 A Few Great Novels
- EN 463 Seminar: Modernism and Postmodernism
- EN 464 Seminar: The Lyric
- EN 465 The Contemporary Moment
- EN 466 Kerouac and His Sources
- EN 468 Tell It Slant: Memoir Writing Workshop
- EN 469 Young Adult and Children’s Writing Workshop (Intermediate Level)
- EN 472 Special Studies in Writing
- EN 473 Writing for the Law
- EN 444 Special Studies Seminar
- EN 445 International Literature
- EN 446 Russian Fiction
- EN 447 Language and Violence
- EN 451 Jane Austen
- EN 452 Alfred Hitchcock’s American Films
- EN 453 Mark Twain
- EN 459 Literature After War
- EN 460 Contemporary American Autobiography
- EN 429 Narrative Form in Fiction and Film
- EN 430 Black Cinema
- EN 433 Teaching English as a Second Language
- EN 434 Introduction to Linguistics and History
- EN 435 Special Topics in American Literature
- EN 437 Disaster, Death and Madness
- EN 441 The Slave Narrative
- EN 442 Ireland in 20th Century Film and Literature
- EN 443 Writing for Children
- EN 414 Writing and Editing for Magazines
- EN 415 Technical Writing
- EN 416 Writing for the Health Industry
- EN 420 Studies in Classical and Medieval Europe
- EN 421 Renaissance and Enlightenment Literature
- EN 422 Modern British Literature
- EN 423 Modern American Literature
- EN 427 Discovery of Adulthood in British and American Fiction
- EN 428 William Faulkner
