Arthur F. Holmes Professor of Faith and Learning,
Clyde S. Kilby Professor of English,
Professor of English and Dean of Humanities and Theological Studies,
Associate Professors , , , , ,Miho Nonaka
Assistant Professors , Jeffrey Galbraith, ,
The Department of English seeks to prepare students to pursue their chosen vocations with competence and versatility. Its goal is that graduates will enjoy good literature and write clear, coherent prose. The department endeavors to instill within each student a knowledge of major English and American authors, together with pertinent continental and non-Western ones, and a comprehension of the various critical approaches essential to a mature understanding and evaluation of literary achievement. We consistently endeavor to discover the relation of literature to biblical truth.
Current lists of requirements are available in the department office or on the department website.
The English major with Literature Concentration (40 hours) enables students to build on the common core of foundational courses (ENGL 215, Classical and Early British Literature, and ENGL 225, a topical seminar that focuses on critical research and writing). Students will also take 4 hours in Pre-1800 British Lit (ENGL 331, 336, 337, or 338), 4 hours on Post-1800 British Lit (ENGL 355, 361, 364, or 365). Students will also take 6 hours in American Lit (ENGL 341, 342, 343, and/or 381, 382, 383, 391, 392, 393) and one figure course (ENGL 384, 385). Beyond that students are invited to explore various interests from among a wide range of elective offerings in world literature, theory, genre, figure courses, advanced writing, and special topics (a list of electives available in the English Department.) They complete their study with an integrative senior seminar, ENGL 494.
The English major with Teaching Concentration (40 hours) offers students a clearly-articulated curriculum leading to state licensure in teaching English. (Students must also declare a second major in Secondary Education in the Education Department.) The Teaching Concentration has a core of 24 hours that has been adapted to licensure requirements and common secondary education teaching experiences and includes the foundational courses (ENGL 215, Classical and Early British Literature, and ENGL 226, a topical seminar, which for Teaching Concentration students will focus on a topic related to Shakespeare). Students in this concentration will take 8 hours in two different periods of American lit (ENGL 341, 342, 343) and 8 hours in Post-1800 British Lit (ENGL 355, 361, 364, 365; Romantic and Victorian are recommended). Beyond the core, students take up a specialized curriculum that includes courses in Topics in Global Literature (ENGL 285), Adolescent Literature (ENGL 327), History of the English Language (ENG 271), Composition Theory (ENGW 471), English Methods (ENG 324), and Senior Seminar (ENGL 494). Each student will be individually mentored by one of the members of the English Department who has previously taught at the secondary level.
The English major with Writing Concentration (40 hours) offers students the opportunity to immerse themselves in the close study of writers across the centuries and is grounded in the same core courses as the other concentrations. This core includes foundational courses (ENGL 215, Classical and Early British Literature, and ENGL 225, a topical seminar that focuses on critical research and writing). Students will also take 4 hours in Pre-1800 British Lit (ENGL 331, 336, 337, or 338), 4 hours on Post-1800 British Lit (ENGL 355, 361, 364, or 365). Students will also take 6 hours in American Lit (ENGL 341, 342, 343, and/or 381, 382, 383) and one figure course (ENGL 384, 385). Beyond the shared core, students take up an intense study of the craft and theory of various forms of writing, including essays, short stories, poetry, and novellas. Students would take 2-6 hours in 200-level course (ENGW 213 or 214), 4-8 hours in Upper Level Writing Courses (ENGW 332, 335, 336, 471), and 2-4 hours in Special Topics courses (ENGW 444). We encourage students to sample widely in various genres. Students in this concentration take a specialized Senior Seminar (ENGW 494), which focuses on the interrelationship between writing and the Christian faith.
All English majors must take the Departmental Exam and submit a departmental portfolio as part of the graduation requirements. Full details are available at www.wheaton.edu/Academics/Departments/English/Majors/Portfolio.
The department offers an honors program for outstanding junior and senior majors who want to undertake independent research. Details are available in the department office or on the department website.
Requirements for a minor in English are 20 hours, including either ENGL 101 or 215, either 105 or 216, and one American literature course (ENGL 341, 342, 343). Other courses are at the student's discretion, except that if a student takes neither ENGL 215 nor 216, one of the remaining courses must be a course in British literature.
ENGL 101. Classics of Western Literature. Selected masterpieces from ancient times through the Renaissance, including Homeric epic, Greek tragedy, Dante's The Divine Comedy, Shakespearean tragedy, and Milton's Paradise Lost.
ENGL 105. Modern Global Literature. An introduction to multiple literary genres, such as novels, short stories, poems, and plays selected from the last three centuries and drawn from multiple diverse cultures in Asia, Africa, the Americas, and/or Europe. Literature will be written in or translated into English. Diversity course.(4)
ENGL 225. Topical Seminar. A topical seminar that introduces students to terms and techniques of literary analysis, important questions within the discipline, and the research process. (Open only to majors and minors.) Pre-requisite:
ENGL 226. Topical Seminar: Shakespeare. A topical seminar that introduces students to terms and techniques of literary analysis, important questions within the discipline, and the research process. This course will focus on William Shakespeare. (Open only to majors and minors.) Required for students seeking teacher licensure. Pre-requisite:
ENGL 285. Topics in Global Literature. An introductory survey of a literature outside the Western tradition, e.g. the literature of Africa, Latin America, India, or the Far East (China and/or Japan). Diversity course. (2)
ENGL 326. Children's Literature. A chronological survey by genre of books written for children, preschool through grade six. (Does not count toward general education requirement or English major.) (2)
ENGL 327. Adolescent Literature. Critical analysis and evaluation of contemporary novels for adolescents in grades six through twelve. (Does not count toward general education requirement. Counts toward the 40 hr. minimum only for teaching concentration students.) (2)
ENGL 341. American Literature: Beginnings through Romanticism. Early American literature from the writings of exploration and colonization through Romanticism. Writers may include Edwards, Franklin, Douglass, Emerson, Thoreau, Whitman, Melville, Hawthorne, Dickinson.
ENGL 342. American Literature: Realism to Modernism. Literature from the Civil War to the Great Depression. Writers may include Twain, Wharton, Chopin, Dreiser, Frost, Eliot, Hemingway, Fitzgerald. Diversity course.
ENGL 343. American Literature after 1945. American Literature from 1945 to the present. Writers discussed may include Baldwin, O’Connor, Miller, Kerouac, DeLillo, Carver, Levertov, Morrison, Cisneros, Wilbur, Robinson. Diversity course.
ENGL 361. Victorian Literature. The poetry, fiction, prose, and drama of the Victorian era (1832-1901), including major works of Tennyson, Browning, Arnold, Hopkins, the Brontës, Dickens, Eliot, Hardy, Carlyle, Ruskin, and the Pre-Raphaelites.
ENGL 364. British Modernism: 1900-1939. An exploration of some of the key authors and themes of 20th century British Literature, with particular emphasis on High Modernism: Joyce, Yeats, Woolf, and their contemporaries. (4)
ENGL 371. Modern European Literature. Poetry, fiction, drama, and non-fiction prose from 1850 to the present. Writers may include Flaubert, Dostoevsky, Ibsen, Mann, Kafka, Bonhoeffer, Mandelstam, Levi, Mulisch, Dinesen, and Milosz.
ENGL 378. Studies in Literary Genre. Each offering of this course will investigate one of the major literary genres—novel, epic, tragedy, lyric, drama, essay, and so on—investigating its characteristic features and tracing its development over time.
ENGL 379. African American Literature. A survey of the African American literary tradition from Phillis Wheatley and the slave narratives to Toni Morrison. Other writers include Chesnutt, Hurston, Hughes, Wright, Baldwin, Baraka, and Clifton. Diversity course.
ENGL 381. American Authors: Beginnings through Romanticism. In-depth study of one author or a small number of authors from American literature beginnings through romanticism. (2 hour parallel to ENGL 341.)
ENGL 382. American Authors: Realism to Modernism. In-depth study of one author or a small number of authors from American literature realism to modernism. (2 hour parallel to ENGL 342.)
ENGL 383. American Authors After 1945. In-depth study of one author or a small number of authors from American literature after 1945. (2 hour parallel to ENGL 343.)
ENGL 391. American Authors: Beginnings through Romanticism. In-depth study of one author or a small number of authors from American literature beginnings through romanticism. (4 hour parallel to ENGL 341.)
ENGL 392. American Authors: Realism to Modernism. In-depth study of one author or a small number of authors from American literature realism to modernism. (4 hour parallel to ENGL 342.)
ENGL 393. American Authors After 1945. In-depth study of one author or a small number of authors from American literature after 1945. (4 hour parallel to ENGL 343.)
ENGL 431. Christianity and Fantasy. An exploration of the complex interrelations of Christianity and the fantastic, primarily in twentieth-century literature. Authors studied will likely include George Macdonald, G.K. Chesterton, J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, J.K. Rowling, and Philip Pullman.
ENGL 433. Varied Literary Topics. Selected topics, studied with a view to giving added breadth and depth to the understanding of special areas of literature. Where appropriate, this course may be substituted for listed requirements. (2 or 4)
ENGL 434. Modern Literary Theory. An introduction to the most influential modern theories about what literature is and how we experience it, with particular emphasis on deconstruction, feminism, New Historicism, and post-colonial criticism.
ENGL 435. History of Literary Criticism. Key documents in the history of Western thought about literature, from Plato’s banishment of the poets to the advent of Modernism. Other authors studied include Aristotle, Augustine, Dante, Sidney, Kant, Coleridge, Arnold, Nietzsche, and Marx.
ENGL 485. Studies in Wade Center/Special Collections Authors. An in-depth study of a single author or a small number of authors included in the Wade Center and/or in Buswell's Special Collections. Students will be introduced to archival research as they explore authors such as C.S. Lewis, J.R.R. Tolkien, G.K. Chesterton, Dorothy L. Sayers, Charles Williams, George MacDonald, and Owen Barfield. (2) (Open to Majors only, does not count for general education.)
ENGL 486. Studies in Wade Center/Special Collections Authors. An in-depth study of a single author or a small number of authors included in the Wade Center and/or in Buswell's Special Collections. Students will be introduced to archival research as they explore authors such as C.S. Lewis, J.R.R. Tolkien, G.K. Chesterton, Dorothy L. Sayers, Charles Williams, George MacDonald, and Owen Barfield. (4) (Open to Majors only, does not count for general education.)
ENGL 494. Senior Seminar. Selected subjects, such as a group of writers, a literary form, or a theme, studied with a view to critical concerns and the integration of faith and learning in literary study.
ENG 271. History of the English Language. A study of the development of the English language with attention given to an understanding of semantics, syntax, morphology, phonology, and diversity in language use. Required of all English majors seeking secondary education licensure. Offered in alternate years. (2)
ENG 324. Methods of Teaching English. Content will address the issues of planning, teacher/student interaction, literacy skills, pedagogy for various genres of literature, technology and instructional aids, assessment and grading procedures. Required of English majors pursuing secondary education licensure, prior to student teaching. Open to all English majors interested in teaching. Prerequisite: Acceptance to the Wheaton Teacher Education Program (WheTEP) or the instructor’s approval. (2)
Believing that the ability to write well is one of the marks of educated men and women, the English Department offers to students in all departments of the College opportunities to study and to practice various types of writing. Successful completion of the freshman writing requirement is a prerequisite for enrollment in any upper division writing course.
Students should fulfill the writing requirement in their first year so that they will be introduced to ideas and skills that will be crucial for their progress through their liberal arts education. All students must complete the writing requirement by the end of their sophomore year. Since writing is a life-long skill, students are encouraged to take additional writing courses beyond Composition and Research.
Meeting the Writing Requirement
You may satisfy the writing requirement by takingand earning a grade of C or higher.
You may satisfy the writing requirement by takingand earning a grade of C or higher if:
You score a 3 on the LANGUAGE/Composition Advanced Placement.
You score a 10, 11, or 12 on the SAT Essay or ACT Writing Test subscore.
Options to Fulfill the Requirement with Academic Credit
If you score a 4 or 5 on the LANGUAGE/Composition Advanced Placement exam, you earn 4 semester hours of writing credit and have completed the writing requirement.
If you score a 3 on the LANGUAGE/Composition Advanced Placement exam, you earn 2 semester hours of writing credit. You may complete the 4-hour requirement by taking ENGW 104 (2 hours) or passing the Writing Competency Exam ($30 charge for the exam) that is given each semester to freshmen or transfers only during their first year at Wheaton. No academic credit is given for passing the exam.
Option to Fulfill the Requirement without Academic Credit
Freshmen and transfer students in their first year at Wheaton may take the Writing Competency Exam to fulfill part or all of the writing requirement without academic credit. Students must pass the first part of the exam (Library Research Skills) to qualify to take the second part of the exam (Research Essay). Students must pass both parts of the exam to fulfill the writing requirement.
ENGW 104. Composition and Research. Practice in methods of research; in the writing of persuasive, clear expository prose; in critical thinking and reading; and in foundational editing skills. Credit not given in addition to . Prerequisite: placement test scores as stated under . (2)
ENGW 444. Special Topics in Writing. Selected topics or genres, studied with a view to giving added breadth and depth to the understanding of special areas of writing. Open to writing concentration students or with permission of the instructor. Prerequisite: completion of at least one 200-level writing course. (2 or 4)
ENGW 471. Composition Theory, Practice, and Pedagogy. A survey of composition theory, grammar, and approaches to the teaching of writing, along with extensive practice in expository writing. Required for English majors pursuing secondary education licensure, prior to student teaching. Open to English majors interested in teaching writing and elementary education majors with a language arts concentration (with the instructor's approval). Prerequisites: completion of general education writing requirement and junior status.
ENGW 494. Senior Seminar in Writing. Selected subjects or genres in writing, studied with a view to critical and professional concerns and the integration of faith and learning in issues of writing. Open only to writing concentration students.
Revision Date: July 1, 2014
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