Best Universities for Masters certificate program in Comparative Literature

Sample of a recent critical paper written in English (15-25 pages). Optional: Sample of a recent critical paper that is written in a language (other than English) in which the applicant intends to study (15-25 pages). Highly Recommended: Letter of recommendation that focuses on language skills, or a current ACTFL oral proficiency (OPI) certificate. GRE general and subject test scores not required.

At Northwestern University, students pursue a broadly interdisciplinary course of study focusing on the comparative analysis of literary texts and other cultural artifacts. Students will deepen their knowledge of the history of literary and narrative forms across a broad range of national literatures, cultures and historical periods, as well as exploring the complex relationship of literary works to politics, philosophy and the visual arts.

The Comparative Literature offers a Graduate Certificate in Translation Studies that enables graduate students to develop and document expertise in the philosophy, history, and craft of translation.

By certifying skill in translation or translation studies, the Certificate offers a supplemental endorsement for students pursuing academic or non-academic job opportunities that involve translation.

The requirements for the certificate include coursework, a praxis-oriented activity with either a pedagogical or publication or community-oriented component, and the presentation of a version or account of that activity. All submitted work for the Certificate (courses to be counted, the praxis-oriented project, etc.) must be approved by the Graduate Committee of the Comparative Literature.

In their third. The three courses must consist of:.

One course, for which graduate credit is awarded, taught in the relevant language (in the case of languages not supported at Brown, the course may, if approved by the Graduate Committee, be taken at another university).

The activity, which must be approved by the Graduate Committee, will usually take the form of one of the following three options:.

The preparation and submission of a publication-worthy translation (which can be of any length, and can be a translation involving two languages that are not English) or of an essay some issue involving translation, to an appropriate publishing venue: the text to be submitted to the Graduate Committee .

A minimum of 40 hours of community service involving translation practices (e.g., assisting a social service, publishing house, or educational organization): a short personal statement summarizing the activity to be submitted to the Graduate Committee.

In the Comparative Literature at the University of Michigan, we are interested in both the practice and the critical reflection on translation, a term we construe broadly. We believe that translation is.

A vital skill for professional development of graduate students.

Indispensable to the future of community and communities, academic and beyond.

We invite graduate students from a wide array of disciplines to contribute to this shared project.

Requirements are designed to provide students an introduction to various modes of translation, historical and contemporary ones, and to explore disciplinary, institutional, cultural, and historical frameworks for shifting concepts and practices. broadly, the program affords future practitioners and scholars of translation a critical and theoretical understanding of the variety of principles and traditions from which various theories and practices of translation emerge.

12 credit hours required for the graduate certificate are distributed as follows:.

At least one graduate course (3 credits) in translation studies regularly offered by Comparative Literature (COMPLIT 580: Translation Workshop and or COMPLIT 780: Seminar in Translation).

Comparative Literature does not certify students as practitioners of textual translation or real-time interpreting. Such credentialing is governed by specific professional organizations, depending on the field and the kind(s) of translation involved. We can, however, advise students interested in such credentials, and we may be able in the future to contribute funding to certificate graduates who want to pursue certification.

LSA College of Literature, Science, and The Arts University of Michigan.

We in the Comparative Literature Department at UMass Amherst pride ourselves in maintaining cutting-edge standards for our curriculum and classroom approach. By collaborating with other departments and institutions, employing media and communications technologies, and thinking beyond the bounds of the conventional classroom, Comparative Literature is continuously developing and improving our programs through creativity and innovation.

We also continue to build on our international strengths which enhance the educational experience for all our students. Key events in our community include the International Shakespeare Conference, the The Content of the Form: Interventions into the Representation of War sympoisium, and the Multicultural Film Festival. The symposium The Content of the Form: Interventions into the Representation of War, brought together artists and scholars from the United States, Bosnia, and Cataluna and was extremely well-attended by Comparative Literature students and members of the local community. The Multicultural Film Festival, which brings not just films, but directors, producers, and actors from all over the globe, was and is consistently well attended by students from Comparative Literature and many departments. Our journal mOthertonguepublishes creative writing and art by in Comparative Literature and the Five College area.

Cristiano returns to UMASS to take up this position from Century College where he has been the Program Director of Translation and Interpreting. We are very happy to have Cris back in Amherst to design and direct our new program in Translation and Interpreting.

Utopian and dystopian novels. The ability of literature to generate social critique. Readings include works by Huxley, Orwell, Kafka, Atwood, Burgess, Gibson, Piercy, Gilman, Dick, and others.

This course will explore the concepts of Good and Evil as expressed in philosophical and theological texts and in their imaginative representation in literature, film and television, photography, and other forms of popular media. Cross-cultural perspectives and approaches to moral problems such as the suffering of the innocent, the existence of evil, the development of a moral consciousness and social responsibility, and the role of faith and spirituality will be considered. A range of historical and contemporary events and controversies will be discussed in relation to these issues including, immigration, war, gender and sexuality, and new technologies. Honors credit available.

Lecture and Discussion. Fantasies provide escape into strange realms where time and space are not our own. Class reading focuses on fantastic voyages to explore human desires, dreams, and fears, as well as the realities they grow out of. Texts range from early tales from Arthurian literature and A Thousand and One Nights to contemporary stories and films. International and interdisciplinary perspectives on fantasy and the forms it takes. Honors credit available.

234 Myth, Folktale Children Literature (Gen Ed AL).

Lecture and Discussion. Major writers, works, themes, and critical issues comprising the literature of the Holocaust. Exploration of the narrative responses to the destruction of European Jewry and other peoples during World War II (including diaries, memoirs, fiction, poetry, drama, video testimonies, and memorials).

Irish Writers and Cultural Contexts is a lively introduction to the cultural content of a particular literature providing a lens to explore the interdisciplinarity inherent in literature, and cross-cultural comparison in literary and artistic expression. Grounded in Irish writers of distinction, we will examine the representation of cultural renaissance, social stratification and memory. Designed for complexity as well as fostering and exercising critical thinking, this course also examines the intersections of myth, religion, art, gender, nationalism, identity in cultural creative expression both in Irish particularity and in comparative study. Works include those by writers, poets and dramatists such as W.B.Yeats, James Joyce, Oscar Wilde, Roddy Doyle Patrick Kavanaugh, Eavan Boland, Brian Friel, Patricia Burke Grogan, and Marina Carr.

Translation, Cross-cultural Communication, and the Media is an introductory seminar on translation theory and practice that is grounded in fundamental questions, ideas, and methods of analysis in the humanities, specifically language and culture. Students engage with a wide range of texts including, literature, song lyrics, film and television subtitles, painting, photography, journalism and advertising. By examining different translation theories and methods, students are exposed to a plurality of perspectives, creatively analyzing the problems of translation and applying critical methods to solve those problems.

This class will explore mystical literature of various religious traditions Reading these texts as literary expressions of union or contact with the transcendent, we will analyze the ways in which they seek to capture what is usually considered to be an inexpressible, non-verbal experience. Readings will draw from the mystical traditions of Islam, Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism, Taoism, and Buddhism.

355 Modern African Literature (Gen Ed AL, DG).

Writing matters. In both academic and professional situations, including internships and future employment, you need to communicate effectively. This course teaches you valuable advanced writing skills and gives you the opportunity to practice formal and informal public speaking and the delivery of formal and informal presentations. You will learn approach texts from various genres and media through the lens of different literary theories as well as through the careful reading and analysis of examples of effective writing and presentation. You will organize your findings into a research paper or similar project, and present your work in a professional setting. You will also learn translate this acquired knowledge into employment skills or in preparation for graduate school.

The question we will address in this course is not so much whether cannibalism as a practice really existed (or still exists), but the fascination this topic has exerted on people minds. The purpose of the course is twofold: first, to introduce the student to the study of the textual and iconographic representations of American cannibalism from the 16th century until the present: chronicles, literature, legal discourses on the one hand, and map sheets, single drawings, book illustrations and films on the other. The second objective will be to discuss the research produced by literary critics, anthropologists and within colonial postcolonial studies during the last two decades on cannibalism as a trope and as a discursive practice within colonialist discourse.

Ghosts, apparitions, and messengers from the beyond have always played a role in the literary imagination. From religious visions of the Middle Ages to twenty-first century psychological thrillers, from medieval werewolves to the unexplained phenomena of an Edgar Allen Poe story, literature of the supernatural pushes us to rethink what we know and how we know it. In this course, we will explore dreams, visions, and apparitions in medieval and modern literature. Readings will include medieval romance and dream vision poetry works by Mann, Gogol, Poe, Dinesen, and Waters and selected films.

A seminar on literary criticism and theory, from the European classical period (Plato, Aristotle, Longinus) to major trends in the twentieth century, including: new criticism, structuralism, deconstruction, postcolonial theory, feminist theory, and new historicism. Questions explored throughout the semester include: what constitutes art and beauty in verbal expression What is the purpose of literature Who may have access to literature What are sacred and canonical texts, and how shall they be approached What is the connection between literature and truth, literature and morality What is the function of the study of rhetoric What is the role of an author What are the proper techniques for composing literatures of value Satisfies the Integrative Experience Requirement for Comparative Literature and Russian East European Studies majors.

Graduate Courses (500-level courses are open to advanced ).

Introduction to the exciting world of translation and multilingual computing. The course covers a range of technologies that are useful for students of all languages, helping them expand their international communication skills. Technologies covered include multilingual word processing, desktop publishing, proofing tools, Web translation and design, video subtitling, and the transfer and translation of sound and image files. Open to graduate students and advanced . Readings with discussion, experiments with latest technology, practice in lab.

Comp Lit 581 is the first part of a two-semester certificate course in the study of interpreting and translation students who enroll are not required to take the second course unless they are interested in receiving the Certificate in Translation and Interpreting Studies. This course is open to upper level and graduate students. While no prior experience in interpreting or translation is necessary, students must have a strong command of English and at least one other language. The course will introduce students to research in the field of interpreting and translation studies and to a number of practical skills required of professional interpreters and translators. Interpreting and translation will be viewed throughout the course as socio-cultural activities as well as linguistic ones. The social, cultural and ethical complexities of the role of interpreters and translators will therefore be an important focus of the course. Students will work with written and spoken texts to develop an understanding of micro-textual elements and macro-textual structures and patterns and understand analyze both written and spoken texts. They will begin to develop consecutive and simultaneous interpreting skills using recorded spoken texts in the language lab. Role plays will be conducted to familiarize students with the triadic nature of interpreted communication. Professor Moira Inghilleri.

Comp Lit 582 is the second part of a two-semester Certificate in the study of interpreting and translation across a range of contexts. In this course, students will continue to build on the knowledge and skills they acquired in the previous semester. Students will work on understanding the institutional and discursive structures of particular institutional domains, gain relevant vocabulary in English and other languages and practice translating, sight translating and interpreting a variety of relevant texts. This course is a designated Service-Learning course and endorsed by the office of Civic Engagement and Service-Learning (CESL) at UMass. A part of the course has been designed to provide opportunities for students to engage in a service project outside the classroom that is guided by appropriate input from a community partner and contributes to the public good. The CESL component of this course reflects the view that interpreting and translation are socio-cultural activities as well as linguistic ones. Your experiences of serving the community will increase your understanding of the social, cultural, and ethical complexities of the role of interpreters and translators. It will give you first-hand knowledge of the significance of interpreting and translation (and its absence) for members of communities for whom English is not their primary language. All projects will involve some additional reading of relevant literature. Successful completion of this course is a requirement for the Certificate in Translation and Interpreting Studies for . Professor Cristiano Mazzei.

Selected medieval European women writers from the point of view of current theoretical perspectives. Writers include Marie de France, Christine de Pizan, Mechthild of Magdeburg, Marguerite Porette, Margery Kempe, and others. Themes to be discussed include love and desire in women’s writing representations of women in medieval literature and philosophy gendered representations of sanctity and critical approaches derived from Marxist and feminist theory.

The professional seminar considers both practical matters and theoretical and historical concerns for new and current graduate students in Comparative Literature. Within the practical, we will consider the institutional roles and functions of Comparative Literature alongside World Literature, Translation Studies and Cultural Studies Programs worldwide within the dynamic setting of the humanities. We will discuss practical matters such as the writing and presentation of conference papers, using databases and electronic resources, working with bibliographic software and visual presentations, the politics of the job market and publishing. Within the historical sphere, we will examine the origins and evolution of Comparative Literature as a discipline, and within the theoretical, we will consider some of the leading debates within the field over the past twenty-five years, from Postmodernism, Deconstruction and Gender and Sexuality studies to Translation Studies and Globalization, Culture and Empire in the 21st century.

This graduate course explores topics in Comparative Literature and the cultural politics of the Global South, taking as a point of departure the history of decolonization and theoretical writings on the postcolonial condition. We will begin by considering the relationship between anticolonial nationalisms and literary culture, the impact of print-colonialism on the grounds of comparison, and debates on the third world and the postcolonial as both political and literary designations. Interdisciplinary approaches to the question of uneven development and cultural progress will be further explored through readings on globalization and world systems analysis, theories of cosmopolitanism and literary transnationalism, and comparative writings on the terms of modernity and the stakes of lit erary modernism. The final segment of the course emerges as an outgrowth of critiques of modernity and global theories of uneven development: the assertion of (temporal) alterity, literary incomparability, and cultural exceptionalism within the Global South will be explored through readings on linguistic difference, secularism, and the sacred investigating the question of literary circulation through the prism of translation and the prospects of linguistic untranslatability.

This course offers a hemispheric and comparative approach to the study of Anglo and Latin American literature and culture from the late fifteenth until the eighteenth century, from the age of exploration to the late colonial period. We will look at a wide variety of texts produced in the wake of European imperial expansion in the Americas (e.g. letters, journals, natural histories, ethnographies, captivity narratives and travel accounts) that chronicle the creation of the so-called New World. How has exploration and travel writing produced the Americas for a European readership and what were the epistemological challenges authors were facing when writing the New World ? How did non-Europeans (e.g. indigenous and Creole writers) react to these representational practices and what revisionist accounts did they provide How was culture contact portrayed and how were racial ideologies constructed These are just a few of the questions this course will address.

This graduate seminar will offer an introductory of the broad field of ecocritcism and its interaction with literature. What is environment In what ways do we interact with it How does the environment figure in literature What are implications of the environment on our language, actions and policies In the light of these preliminary questions we will read critical environmental theory and diverse works of literature, exploring the ethnical, political, social, creative and aesthetic reverberations of these texts.

Introduction to teaching Comparative Literature: designing syllabi, teaching students to compare texts in written assignments and discussions, grading comparative analyses, and class management.

A many-sided consideration of the practical problems and theoretical issues raised by translation. Consideration will be given to recent research on the role of translation and translated literature in the history of literary development special attention will be paid to the politics of translation also. Practical aspects to be discussed include translation of genre and form (including poetry, dramatic literature), language register and tone, metaphor and imagery, word play. Lecture discussion with workshop elements. Readings: translation theorists, philosophers, linguists. Requirements: one historical analysis, one translation project, class participation. Prerequisites: proficiency in a language other than one native tongue.

Comparative Literature as literary theory and as academic practice. Nineteenth-century background and the rise of literary studies traditional concepts of influence, periods, themes, genres, extraliterary relations, translation studies, and their development in modern theory. Questions of textuality, canonicity, cultural identity, the politics of cross-cultural literary images, metatheory, and institutional setting as they affect current practice.