DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH
POSTGRADUATE DEGREES
General Points
1. The MA involves taught courses and is awarded on the basis of projects and/or
essays, and/or examinations, and class and dissertation. The normal duration is
one year.
2. The MLitt and PhD are awarded on the basis of a thesis. The MLitt usually takes
two years to complete. The PhD usually takes three or four years to complete.
Eligibility
Applicants for the MA should hold one of the following qualifications:
BA First Class Honours in English
BA Second Class, Grade I in English
BA Second Class, Grade II in English and in a second subject
US or Canadian degree with a grade point average of 3.50 or more
Second Class Honours, grade I 62% in the MA qualifying examination (UCD students
only)
Equivalent degree in English (overseas students)
MLitt/PhD Degree
MLitt/PhD are research degrees in that they do not involve compulsory attendance at
taught courses as in the case of the M.A. degree.
MLittt/Phd research is directed towards the presentation of a thesis. Most of the time,
therefore, is spent in libraries and archives. The research is conducted under the
direction of a supervisor whose role is to discuss its findings, read ‘chapters,’ and
monitor progress.
The main differences between the MLitt and PhD are the duration (see General Points
above) and the length of the thesis (60,000 words for the MLitt, and 100,000 words
for the PhD). MLitt students may transfer to the PhD after completing one year of
research subject to the recommendation of their supervisor, and approval by the Head
of Department and the Faculty of Arts.
The doctoral degree is taken solely by dissertation. This should be a significant and
original contribution to scholarly and critical understanding of any area of literary
studies in English. Places are strictly limited and will only be allocated to those who
present a viable thesis proposal which, in the opinion of the department, can be
adequately supervised by one of its members. The dissertation submitted is assessed
by a specifically appointed external examiner and by an internal examiner, both of
whom are chosen for their expertise in the designated areas. An oral examination may
be held.
Current directors of studies include:
Professor Mary Clayton
Dr Catriona Clutterbuck
Dr John Brannigan
Dr Ron Callan
Professor Andrew Carpenter
Dr Neil Cartlidge
Dr Janet Clare
Dr Danielle Clarke
Professor Terence Dolan
Mr Brian Donnelly
Dr Alan Fletcher
Dr Anne Fogarty
Dr Eldrid Herrington
Professor Peter Lucas
Dr Frank McGuiness
Professor Chris Murray
Dr Maria Stuart
Dr Tony Roche
Description of Courses
MA in Old and Middle English Language and Literature
This degree is intended for those who wish to extend their knowledge of Medieval
English beyond their undergraduate degree. It aims to provide a foundation in
research skills as well as an opportunity to study two courses from a range of
specialised options. Candidates taking the degree will be required to follow courses
lasting two semesters and to submit a minor thesis. The minor thesis should be not
less than 15,000 and not more than 20,000 words; the topic should be approved by the
Head of Old and Middle English.
Admission Requirements:
Applicants for entry to this Course will be required to have the normal qualifications
for entry to an MA degree. Other university graduates with qualifications deemed
equivalent may also be considered for admission.
Organisation of Studies and Examination:
The coursework consists of three components. Students must take the course in
Research Skills and two other courses subject to availability. Courses should be
decided in consultation with the department.
Research Skills:
This course is specifically tailored to those studying Medieval Literature and students
study palaeography and editing. The course is assessed by written work; each student
must submit an edition, with apparatus and notes, of a short text or section of text.
Courses in Old and Middle English Language and
Literature:
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Old English Literature
Early Middle English Literature (to 1300)
Fourteenth-Century English Literature
Medieval English Language
Late Middle English and the Transition to Early Modern English
MA in Anglo Irish Literature and Drama
This course aims to provide students with a rigorous introduction to Irish writing in
English from Jonathan Swift to the present. It is taught in a series of weekly seminars
given on the following topics:
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Yeats
Early Theatre Movement
Gender and Nation in Cinema and Prose Narrative
The Novel and the Story
Joyce
Beckett and Contemporary Theatre or Drama in Performance
The Contemporary Novel
Contemporary Poetry
Usually the first four seminars are taught in the first semester, the latter four in the
second. Each seminar will be introduced and led by a course teacher, but by the end of
a semester each student will have taken responsibility for leading a discussion in a
session – this could involve preparing a presentation of 10-15 minutes, handling
questions from the teacher and from classmates, and responding to the widening
debate. This exercise aims to develop the expository powers of students, their research
skills, and their responsiveness in groups. The seminar-work on Yeats and on Joyce is
tested by separate set essays at the close of each semester; other seminars are tested
in a special set of examination papers usually sat in late April or early May.
The marks allocated for the essays amount to 175, and for the seminars 525. The
remaining 300 are allocated to a short dissertation (12,000 – 14,000 words approx) on
a subject chosen by the student in consultation with an appointed supervisor. This is
submitted by mid-August. A special external examiner visits in early September and
in collaboration with the internal examiners offers a final assessment of all the work
produced by students. Examination results are usually available by the end of that
month.
A writer-in-residence teaches a special weekly seminar in the spring semester. Recent
occupants of the post have included Claire Keegan, Conor O’Callaghan, Catherine
Phil MaCarthy, John McGahern, Joseph O’Connor, Hugo Hamilton, Nuala Ni
Dhomhnaill, and Paula Meehan..
The M.A. programme imparts a good deal of knowledge about the backgrounds and
contexts of Irish writing, but it foregrounds the texts and authors themselves. Students
are encouraged to develop confidence in the use of appropriate critical methodologies
(from close-reading to post-colonial, feminist to new historical, generic to
performative) which might enrich their appreciation of the forms of Irish writing. The
course offers an ideal grounding in the subject for those who wish to proceed to the
PhD, but is also attractive to teachers on a career break, mature students returning to
college after a lapse of years, or to bright undergraduates who enjoyed those Irish
texts studied on college syllabi and who wish to deepen their understanding of Irish
literary traditions. Graduates of the course may be found in university and secondary
teaching, film and theatre, arts education and arts administration, publishing and
creative writing, and in law, personnel, civil service and journalistic fields.
Admission is highly competitive, owing to the demand for places. Non-UCD
applicants should send a documented example of a recent essay. It is usual for about
half the class to come from Ireland and the other half from overseas – USA, Canada,
Spain, France, England, Germany Italy, Japan, Korea being the main sources.
The Department of Anglo-Irish Literature and Drama takes a leading part in
postgraduate seminars run by the Combined Departments of English and students are
encouraged to attend and participate in these. It also hosts seminars and lectures by
visiting experts in the field.
The members of the teaching team ordinarily:
Dr Catriona Clutterbuck; Mr Brian Donnelly; Professor Declan Kiberd; Dr Gerardine
Meaney; Dr Frank McGuinness; Dr Anthony Roche. Contributors from other sections
of the English Department offer classes from time to time.
MA in American Literature
Teaching Staff:
Dr John Brannigan
Dr Ron Callan
Dr Frank McGuinness
Dr Maria Stuart
The MA in American Literature is designed to examine the range and variety of
literature in the United States of America. We seek to do this in the context of an
energetic evaluation of a range of genre from journals and sermons to novels, plays
and poems. In addition we seek to engage larger theoretical issues as we seek to set
cultural, ethnic, political, racial, and social contexts for the debates about America—
how it is defined and its writers assessed. Units will examine writing from the
Puritans to the present. The emphasis, however, will be on the work of twentiethcentury writers.
The course usually begins in late September and is completed when the minor theses
are submitted in mid August the following year. The American literature option
offers 6 units of course work as in the example below. Each unit consists of 6
seminars scheduled for two hours weekly.
The following list of units is provisional, and is subject to change depending on staff
availability:
Unit 1: Research Methods, Texts, Bibliography
Unit 2: Introduction to Critical Theory
Unit 3: Modernity/Postmodernity
Unit 4: Early American Writing
Unit 5: Modern American
Unit 6: Modern and Contemporary American Drama
Unit one will introduce students to research methods; unit two will examine critical
theories of literature and culture. Four further units will address the literature and
ideas of and about the United States, and provide students with a deeper
understanding of the theoretical and practical issues involved in studying literature at
this level.
Assessment of units 3, 4, 5, and 6 may be by project work, essay or examination. The
combined mark for all assessed units constitutes 50% of the final degree mark.
Students will be required to undertake all assignments and tests. It is expected that
students will achieve a level of competence in the technical courses related to
methodology, bibliography and critical theory, and complete other units to the
satisfaction of the seminar leader.
In addition, students are required to write a minor thesis (15,000-20,000 words). This
should be the result of students’ research chosen from an area of American literature
and approved by the Co-ordinator of the MA. Students will be offered regular
meetings with members of the teaching team between February and June. Theses are
submitted in mid August. Marks awarded for the thesis will constitute 50% of the
final degree mark.
Topics for research may be chosen from any area of American literature, but each
must be approved by the Co-ordinator of the MA. To begin formal research, each
student is required to submit a proposal which identifies a topic for research, and the
focus and range of the thesis. Proposals must also include a Bibliography which
reflects specific areas of interest, and shows competence in the formation and
presentation of a Bibliography. A supervisor will be listed for each student’s thesis.
Supervisors will advise students on research and writing. However, it is the
responsibility of each student to develop her/his topic.
Aims of the course:
The aim of the course is to provide students with a critical understanding of the
theories and practices of the writing of the United States of America. This will include
an engagement with the ways in which “America” has been theorised and constructed
by its writers and critics. Units will seek to address a broad range of periods and
genre as seminar leaders seek to represent the diversity of the United States.
Requirements of the Course:
Students are required to participate in taught courses and to pursue independent
research work, which together provide a framework of structured study in which
students can gain the confidence to define their own areas of interest, and to learn the
conceptual and methodological skills necessary for postgraduate study.
MA Modern English Literature
TEACHING STAFF
Dr John Brannigan
Professor Andrew Carpenter
Professor J.C.C. Mays
Dr Gerardine Meaney
The MA in Modern English literature is organised to explore the concepts and
practices of ‘the modern and the contemporary’. Stephen Spender distinguished the
‘modern’ as writing which ‘through receptiveness, suffering, passivity, transforms the
world to which it is exposed’, in contrast to ‘contemporary’ writing, which is
‘rationalist, sociological, political and responsible’. This distinction will serve as a
starting point from which to begin our explorations of the theories and practices of the
modern and the contemporary in English literature.
The programme of units offered will examine various aspects of the production and
reception of literature from 1650 to the present, with a special emphasis on the past
100 years. It will provide students with the opportunity to develop research in
understanding and interpreting modes of modern and contemporary writing. Each
course unit consists of six seminars. Unit one will introduce students to research
methods; unit two examines critical theories of literature and culture. Four further
units will address modes of modern and contemporary writing, and will provide
students with a deeper understanding of the theoretical and practical issues involved
in studying modern literature.
2003-2004 SEMINARS
The focus of the MA in 2003/4 is ‘The Modern and the Contemporary: Theories,
Texts, Representations’. The following list of courses is provisional, and is subject to
change depending on staff availability:
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Introduction to Research Methods
Introduction to Critical Theory
Modernity/Postmodernity
The Avant Garde
Postmodern Gothic
Editing Modern Texts
Assessment of units 3, 4, 5 and 6 may be by project work, essay or examination. The
combined mark for all assessed units constitutes 50% of the final degree mark.
Students will be required to undertake all assignments and tests. It is expected that
students will achieve a level of competence in the technical courses related to
methodology, bibliography and theory, and complete other units to the satisfaction of
the seminar leader.
To complete the assessment requirements for the MA, students must research, write
and submit a minor thesis (15,000 to 20,000 words) by mid-August 2004. This should
be the result of the student’s research on a special topic related closely to the subjects
covered as part of the taught programme of courses. Topics for research may be
chosen from any area of modern English literature, but each must be approved by the
co-ordinator of the MA. Students will be offered regular supervision meetings with
members of the teaching team between February and June.
The aim of the course is to provide students with a critical understanding of the
theories and practices of modern writing in English. It will enable students to engage
with contemporary critical debates about the interpretation and contextualisation of
modern and contemporary literature. The course also provides students with the
opportunity to participate in an editing project.
Students are required to participate in taught courses and to pursue independent
research work, which together provide a framework of structured study in which
students can gain the confidence to define their own areas of interest, and to learn the
conceptual and methodological skills necessary to postgraduate study.
Places on the course are limited to a maximum of twelve students. The application
process is administered in stages with offers going initially to the best qualified
national and international applicants. Depending on the responses from the first-round
list, offers are then made to other qualified students.
MA in Early Modern English Literature
This one-year MA course aims to provide an introduction to the field of Early Modern
Literature literary and cultural studies and to offer an overview of the
multidisciplinary and theoretical debates that have enlivened this area in recent years.
The cultural, political, and historical contexts of the literature of the sixteenth and
seventeenth centuries will be studied through representative texts and genres. Special
attention will be given to the peculiar position of Ireland in this period through a
review of the interconnections between the humanist and colonialist texts produced in
the country.
The work of familiar writers - Shakespeare, Marlowe, Spenser, Donne- will be
explored in conjunction with that of lesser-known figures such as Richard Beacon,
Richard Nugent, Mary Wroth, and William Davenant. In examining such texts,
students will be encouraged to consider a variety of critical approaches including
formalist, new historicist, feminist, and cultural materialist. Issues such as censorship,
the prominence of manuscript culture, the intersections between politics and art, and
the porous boundaries between literary and non-literary writing in the Renaissance
period will also be broached. In addition, students will learn about aspects of
humanism and rhetoric and will reflect on the continuities and divisions between the
Continental Renaissance and the political and cultural developments in Ireland and
England.
The course will consist of six units which will be taught twice weekly. Two of these
will be introductory seminars, the first of which will focus on the historical and
intellectual contexts of Renaissance literature and contemporary critical reception of
this period, while the second will consider the problems of thinking about and editing
a Renaissance text. A further four units will be devoted to specialist studies of
various periods and topics which reflect the research interests of the Department.
Such courses may include the following:
1. Contexts of Early Modern Drama
2. Fictions of Gender and Power in the Renaissance
3. Shakespeare: The Final Plays
4. Colonial Plots: Representations of Ireland 1581-1625
The course will be examined by means of continuous assessment and of a minor
dissertation of 10,000-12,000 words. The dissertation is an independent study
researched and written under the guidance of those teaching on the course. Examples
of topics chosen by students in recent years include Marlowe's Latin translations,
Shakespeare and Ireland, the political contexts of Edmund Spenser's "Colin Clout's
Come Home Againe", depictions of Turkish culture on the Renaissance stage, the
masques of Anne of Denmark, and the representation of women in the plays of John
Webster. The dissertation accounts for 50% of the final grade awarded for the course.
The members of the teaching team include professor Andrew Carpenter, Dr Janet
Clare, Dr Danielle Clarke, Dr Anne Fogarty, and Professor Christopher Murray.
Fees
Fees are paid annually or in two instalments. The following fees applied in the year
2002-2003 and are for guidance only.
Irish and EU students
MA and MLitt
First and second year
Subsequent years
€2,850
€1,422
PhD
First and second and third year
Subsequent years
€3,012
€1,170
Non-EU students
MA and MLitt
First and second year
Subsequent years
€5,700
€2,844
PhD
First second and third year
Subsequent years
€6,024
€2,340
For up-to-date information regarding the payment of fees for the year 2003-2004 please contact
Fees Office,
Michael Tierney Building,
University College Dublin, Belfield, Dublin 4, Ireland
Telephone: +353-1-7161431 Fax: +353-1-2694409
E-mail: FEES@UCD.ie
Graduate Scholarships
University College Dublin College Awards
These awards are available to University College Dublin graduates on the basis of
their B.A. degree results
Further information from:
Ms. Mary O’Neill
Telephone: +353-1-7161434 Fax: +353-1-2694409
E-mail: mary.oneill@ucd.ie
University College Dublin Open Postgraduate Scholarships
University College Dublin awards open scholarships to graduates of U.C.D. and
graduates of other universities. A number of these are held in the Faculty of Arts.
The scholarships are worth € 2,540 p.a
For further information contact:
Postgraduate Studies Office
Telephone: +353-1-7167618 Fax: +353-1-2691963
E-mail: shirely.redmond@ucd.ie
Government of Ireland Scholarships
Government of Ireland scholarships to the value of €12,400 plus fees, are available
for a period of up to three years to undertake research degrees (i.e. M.Litt and PhD.)
Closing date for applications, Monday 3rd March 2003
Further information from:
The Academic Secretary, Irish Research Council for the Humanities and Social
Sciences Brooklawn House, Shelbourne Road, Ballsbridge, Dublin 4.
Telephone: +353-1-4392188 (for applications) 6603652 (for information)
E-mail: info@irchss.ie
Department of English Application Procedures
All applicants must complete the standard application form and return it by 1st May
2003
In the case of the MLitt and PhD it is essential to discuss a proposal with a relevant
specialist in the English department before submitting the application.
Non-University College Dublin applicants are required to submit the following
documentation
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Two academic references
A birth certificate
A degree certificate or academic transcript. (Where relevant details of Grade
point Averages). If the degree result is pending at the time of the application
this documentation should be forwarded as soon as the result is known.
Application forms should be returned to the following address:
The Administrator, Postgraduate Admissions, Combined Departments of English,
John Henry Newman Building, University College Dublin, Belfield, Dublin 4,
Ireland.
Further Enquiries to:
Helen Gallagher
Telephone: +353-1-7168480 Fax: +353-1-7161174
E-mail: Helen.E.Gallagher@ucd.ie
Accommodation
Contact the Accommodation Administrator, University College Dublin, Merville
Residence, Dublin 4, Ireland.
Telephone: +353-1-7168755 Fax: +353-1-7161154
E-mail: accommodation.office@ucd.ie