Admission Statistics?

[steve3020]

On 1/9/2017 at 11:23 AM, ExponentialDecay said:

Where did you get that impression?

Complit is by nature more interdisciplinary than English, so they do attract students with broader interests, but I haven't seen a program that doesn't *require* its students to do research in two primary languages (ie literatures). The fact that complit programs offer more theory courses rarely reflects on the dissertations of the actual students that they release. National literature department dissertations are these days just as theory-heavy as complit dissertations. If a person enters any graduate literature program without interest in theory, people will look at them askance.

To be honest I'm not too sure where I got this impression because as you said when you look at the courses offered by English and Complit departments there are a lot of overlaps. But it seems like a usual English dept is divided into different eras which necessarily limits a lot of courses to written literature, whereas Complit or 'literature' programmes like Duke are more liberal in terms of the scope of material and more open to different theories. Take NYU: the Eng dept phd course guide says you have to take an exam in three eras of English literature or something, whereas Complit has no such requirements and you are free to choose your field. Personally, as I'm applying to complit courses I also study two national literatures, but to me the main focus is theory. I simply got the impression that if you are more theory-oriented you would fit in better at complit depts than national literature depts. There's a thread comparing Duke English with Literature, and one of the profs there also made clear that such is the case there too. I think it's not even in the level of knowledge in theory that the difference lies but maybe it's a slight difference in methodology. 

[ExponentialDecay]

1 hour ago, steve3020 said:

To be honest I'm not too sure where I got this impression because as you said when you look at the courses offered by English and Complit departments there are a lot of overlaps. But it seems like a usual English dept is divided into different eras which necessarily limits a lot of courses to written literature, whereas Complit or 'literature' programmes like Duke are more liberal in terms of the scope of material and more open to different theories. Take NYU: the Eng dept phd course guide says you have to take an exam in three eras of English literature or something, whereas Complit has no such requirements and you are free to choose your field. Personally, as I'm applying to complit courses I also study two national literatures, but to me the main focus is theory. I simply got the impression that if you are more theory-oriented you would fit in better at complit depts than national literature depts. There's a thread comparing Duke English with Literature, and one of the profs there also made clear that such is the case there too. I think it's not even in the level of knowledge in theory that the difference lies but maybe it's a slight difference in methodology. 

Sooo how does any of this translate to, and I quote, "thinly disguised cultural theory" tho?

[Glasperlenspieler]

1 hour ago, steve3020 said:

To be honest I'm not too sure where I got this impression because as you said when you look at the courses offered by English and Complit departments there are a lot of overlaps. But it seems like a usual English dept is divided into different eras which necessarily limits a lot of courses to written literature, whereas Complit or 'literature' programmes like Duke are more liberal in terms of the scope of material and more open to different theories. Take NYU: the Eng dept phd course guide says you have to take an exam in three eras of English literature or something, whereas Complit has no such requirements and you are free to choose your field. Personally, as I'm applying to complit courses I also study two national literatures, but to me the main focus is theory. I simply got the impression that if you are more theory-oriented you would fit in better at complit depts than national literature depts. There's a thread comparing Duke English with Literature, and one of the profs there also made clear that such is the case there too. I think it's not even in the level of knowledge in theory that the difference lies but maybe it's a slight difference in methodology. 

I'd also be hesitant to use Duke and NYU as representative examples of the field. They are probably two of the most theory-centric comparative literature programs in the country. The program requirements for Harvard, Princeton, UNC, and Berkeley all require comprehensive exams covering a broad historical scope in your literatures of choice (just to name the programs whose program requirements are available on their website and I've read through and remembered).