The M.A. Literature program attracts students from Montana and across the nation (and even further afield). Since we do not have a Ph.D. program in English, we are specifically set up to meet the needs not only of students who aspire to a doctorate—our M.A. students have gone on to Ph.D. programs at a variety of top-tier schools—but also of those who wish to continue their literary studies and see where their interests take them. Many of our students go on to further studies, but many see the M.A. as their terminal degree, a stepping-stone to careers beyond the academy. Whether you hope one day to earn a Ph.D. and find a university teaching position, or want to see if grad school is for you, or simply desire to continue your studies, this may be the perfect program for you.

We offer courses in everything from medieval to contemporary literature, from Chaucer, Milton, and Wordsworth to Baldwin, Atwood, and C. D. Wright. Seminars frequently taught include Contemporary Poetry, Ecophenomenology, Autotheory, The Literature of Globalization, and Atlantic Passages, as well as courses on a range of major authors. Professors are prepared to supervise theses in all major periods, and in many different fields, from Medieval Poetics to Modernist Poetics, from Cultural Studies to Irish Studies, from Native American Literature to Literature and the Environment, among many others.

Our department also offers an innovative option in Ecocriticism. This option provides students with an opportunity to undertake concentrated study in new fields like ecofeminism, social justice ecology, queer ecology, Native American ecologies, and posthumanist ecologies. A more detailed description of the option can be found here: MA in Literature: Ecocriticism

Ours is a thriving program and we invite you to look over the range of fields we cover. We have expertise in Anglophone literatures around the world (British, Irish, American, Canadian, and Caribbean) and, as a university in the Rockies, particular strengths in Ecocriticism, Native American Literature, and Literature of the American West.

We hope that once you’ve consulted our website, you will decide to Apply to our program and join a community of scholars here in the Rocky Mountains of western Montana, one of the most beautiful regions in the nation.