T

he program in Modern Studies is designed for students who seek an interdisciplinary approach to the literature and culture of Modernity.  The program offers a rigorous approach to two broadly defined periods, the Modern (1789-1945) and the Contemporary (1945-the present), while it situates the study of literature in relation to adjacent fields such as religious studies, history, fine arts, politics, and psychology. Through small-group seminars, courses in literature and non-literary fields, a fourth-year thesis and extra-curricular events, members of the program participate in an active and collective intellectual life.

Modern Studies is a two-year program. Students usually apply in the spring semester of their second year, though some decide to apply at the close of their first year. Transfer students who arrive at Virginia at the beginning of their third year and who wish to apply to Modern Studies should see the program director within the first week of the fall term.

After being admitted, a student will declare a major in English, which is the departmental home for the interdisciplinary program. The requirements for the program differ sharply, however, from the requirements for a standard English degree. For a Modern Studies major, thirty credit hours in the English Department are required. These must include:

*ENGL 3830 (History of Literature in English, 1900 to the Present)
*ENGL 3810 (History of Literature in English I) or ENGL 3820, (History of Literature in English II)
* One course pre-1900
* Two Modern Studies Seminars

In addition to ENGL3830, students are permitted, but not required, to count a total of five Modern and Contemporary courses (rather than the standard three) towards their major.

Modern Studies Seminars: Each year three seminars (ENMC 4830A, 4830B and ENMC 4840) are offered. Of the first two (Topics in Modern Studies) one is required for third-year students in the program.  The third (ENMC 4840, Issues in Contemporary Study) is offered each fall and required of fourth-year students.
Enrollment in the seminars is guaranteed to members of Modern Studies. Much of the strength of the program derives from the collegiality and intellectual community fostered in these small-group contexts. In addition to offering intensive study of the period and the nature of interdisciplinary work, the seminars provide occasions for students to come to know and to learn from one another. Recent seminar topics include "Crises of Faith," "Faces of the Avant-Garde," and "Women and Modernity."
Interdisciplinary Work: In addition to English courses, students inthe program take twelve further hours of courses outside the department. These courses, chosen in consultation with the program director, reflect a student’s particular interests.  Occasionally, students will take twelve hours in a single department; more often, though, they will pursue “branching courses” in various fields, with the aim of achieving related multiple perspectives on Modernity. In recent years students have designed programs of study on topics such as "The City in Modern Life," "Gender and Modernity," "Post-Colonial Literature," "Crises of Faith in the Twentieth Century," and "Existentialism and the Modern Novel."

Thesis: All students in the program write a Program Thesis, about 20 pages in length, in the course of their fourth-year seminar in Contemporary Studies. This thesis project develops within the final seminar and culminates the student's scholarly work in Modern Studies.

Students who are also interested in writing a thesis in the separate Distinguished Majors Program may in some cases be able to unite these two essays under the same topic. The Distinguished Majors Program requires a 50-page essay written over the course of the fourth year and has its own admission requirements. For more information, please see the Distinguished Majors Program page. [link]

Final Events: Each year in the late spring semester of the fourth year, the program will gather for an annual evening of presentations by the fourth-year students (individually or collectively) that might include a reading, an essay, a performance, or some comparable activity.  Food and conversation will interrupt the proceedings.

For further information and application details, please consult the Modern Studies application page.