Undergraduate
Following are the courses being offered in the upcoming Spring semester. Please check the online class schedule listing for the most accurate scheduling information.
200-Level Courses
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EH 205-QLA: Intro to Creative Writing
Instructor: Slaughter
This course is an introduction to the practice of creative writing, with a particular focus on poetry and fiction writing. By the completion of the course students will:
- Employ the crucial vocabulary and terms necessary to discuss, read and write poetry and fiction;
- Practice and apply a range of techniques to help students write original, image-driven, polished poetry and fiction;
- Discover the incredible amount, quality, and range of writing being produced by living writers via contemporary online literary journals;
- Revise their creative writing and recognize that successful creative writing is always the result of a lot of hard work.
To this end, expect to devote considerable attention to strategies for observation and focus, modeling, accurate language choice, achieving a precise image, and the elements of structure.
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EH 213-1A: Ideas in Literature: Latino/a/e/x Lit
Instructor: Santiago
Hispanic? Latino? Latine? Latin@? Latinx? While the blanket terms used to define this diverse population are often contested, what is inarguable is the fact that Latinos constitute the largest ethnic minority group in the United States—a fact that has profound political, social, and cultural implications. Importantly, Latine experiences are not monolithic; there are as many experiences and perspectives about Latinidad as there are ethnicities and nationalities. In this course we will study selected works from the rich body of literature produced by Latinx authors residing in the U.S.A. and writing in English. Particularly, we will examine questions of home, identity, ethnicity, and nationality as manifested in Latine literature. These texts often ask:
- What does it mean to be Latin American?
- How do race, ethnicity, and nationality overlap? How do these identities interact with those related to gender, class, religion, and ability?
- How do does one remain authentic when straddling multiple identities?
- What does it mean to be an American who lives on literal or metaphorical borderlands?
As we explore these questions we will encounter multiple genres of classic and contemporary texts—from Sandra Cisneros to Bad Bunny—while examining their historical and social contexts. Assignments and expectations will be typical of 200-level lit courses.
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EH 213-1CB: Ideas in Literature: Queer Literature
Instructor: Butcher
Though often portrayed as a single, unified group, the LGBTQ+ community is filled with diverse—and sometimes competing—voices. We will examine fiction, creative nonfiction, graphic literature, film, documentary, poetry, and social media as we explore queer identities and queer experiences in writings by lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, intersex, nonbinary, and asexual authors. Along the way we will learn some queer history and consider the impact of social and institutional forces on queer lives—as well as the ways that queer lives can impact society and institutions.
Whether you are gay, straight, ally, or simply curious, this course is designed as an introduction to LGBTQ+ literature and issues. Students need bring only a willingness to read carefully, discuss openly, and think carefully about the topics and texts at hand. As with other 200-level courses, assignments may include tests, essays, quizzes, and journals.
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EH 213-1EB/1FA: Ideas in Lit: Money and Happiness
Instructor: Temple
In this class, we will read American literary explorations of connections between money and, for lack of a better term, “happiness.” By reading from writers such as Benjamin Franklin, Elizabeth Stoddard, Horatio Alger, Ralph Ellison, Richard Yates, and Cormac McCarthy, we will discuss issues such as the moral/ethical ramifications of the pursuit of money; the effects of race and gender on access to money and the pursuit of happiness; and the kinds of communities, institutions, pastimes, and even perversions that result from a society structured around the goal of private accumulation. Assignments will include two essays, an out-of-class final exam, and periodic study questions.
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EH 213-2A/2B: Ideas in Literature – Sweet Home Alabama?
Instructor: Major
Lynyrd Skynyrd’s “Sweet Home Alabama” was written in response to two songs by Neil Young—“Southern Man” and “Alabama”—that deal with themes of racism and slavery in the American South. The song’s lyrics, which call Neil Young out by name in a rebuke of his Yankee criticisms in some places and are problematically vague in other places, are controversial—heralded by some as admirable, defiant pride and criticized by others as a strutting defense of old Confederate values. In many ways, the tensions and complexities embodied within this song reflect conversations that are still very much alive today about pride, identity, and the ways in which Alabama’s troubling past continues to manifest itself in the present.
This class will begin by placing a question mark after the Southern rock anthem’s title: “Sweet Home Alabama?” What is this place and its people about? What are the different narratives that contribute to Alabama’s mythology? What does it mean to call Alabama home? What, if anything, is sweet about that experience? We’ll attempt to answer these questions by examining the contemporary literature of the place. Our approach will be kaleidoscopic: we’ll read a wide range of texts from a diverse group of authors who are from (or who spent significant time in) various places in Alabama and whose writing was deeply influenced by and directly responds to that experience. We’ll read this material critically and in the context of the cultural ethos from which it comes, and we’ll discuss and write about texts both individually and in relation to each other. As we do this, we’ll consider significant themes of contemporary Alabama writing and explore how this complicates, deepens, or explodes our understandings of place and identity—and why that matters in both historical and current political and social contexts.
This course is appropriate for anyone interested in Alabama, contemporary Southern literature, Alabama history, the Civil Rights Movement, social justice, or theories of place and identity.
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EH 213-2C/2D: Literature at the Movies
Instructor: Ellis
This course will explore intersections between literature and film by studying stories that take their characters to the movies, poems about cinema, and the ways films interpret literature by adapting stories for the screen. We will examine films about the study of literature and author biopics, as well as criticism and reviews of film, film theory, and screenplays as literary texts. Looking through both page and screen as lenses, we will consider identification, spectatorship, psychoanalysis, narrative, and the cinema as cultural institution. Works may include selections from Agee, Anzaldua, Baldwin, Ellison, Farrell, Faulkner, Fitzgerald, King, Morrison, Puig, and Schwartz.
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EH 223-2E: Witches
Instructor: Dwivedi
The issue of representation is problematic, particularly for witches; this semester, we will explore the identity of witches as violators/violated. We will study two novels (Maguire’s Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West, and Conde’s I, Tituba: Black Witch of Salem), a few fairy tales, and some excerpts to understand how authors have resisted the established discourse on witches and appropriated the witch narrative in their own writing.
There will be short supplemental materials, which will be posted on Canvas, and which will help you understand the context and how the narrative has changed. For instance, we will read chapter 12 from Wizard of Oz, which is about the Wicked Witch of the West, and then start reading Wicked. In terms of major assignments, there will be a literary analysis essay, a midterm exam, and a final project.
300-Level Courses
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EH 301-1E: Reading, Writing, and Research
Instructor: Grimes
English 301 is a methods course focusing on the practice of reading literary texts, locating and studying the critical and historical contexts of those texts, and writing well-crafted and well-informed critical essays that explore the meaning, value, and significance of those texts. Having taken EH 301, students will be able to:
- Read closely such that they can recognize and describe the significant features of a given literary text. This skill presumes that the student has command over the basic terminology used in literary and rhetorical criticism and has a fundamental understanding of the major literary genres and periods of literary history.
- Conduct effective library research in secondary sources using databases such as the Modern Language Association International Bibliography (MLAIB) and the Annual Bibliography of English Language and Literature (ABELL). They should also be able to use JSTOR and other full-text repositories of critical materials, and they should be able to locate and use materials from the Sterne Library collection. Students who have developed these abilities will also recognize both the legitimate uses and the limitations of such tertiary sources as "SparkNotes" or other students' guides.
- Write critical essays which situate an original thesis in an appropriate and well-informed scholarly context. Students should be able to incorporate both primary and secondary source material into their own writing and then document the essay accurately but unobtrusively using the MLA documentation system.
- Recognize the aims and principles of some of the central theoretical approaches to literary analysis that have been prominent in recent critical writing. While EH 301 is not a course in literary theory, students should gain sufficient exposure to prominent theoretical approaches so as to be able to recognize when a critic is writing within, for example, a psychoanalytic or feminist or poststructuralist (or other) context.
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EH 305-2D: Beginning Poetry Writing Workshop
Instructor: Vines
EH 305 is a poetry writing workshop that emphasizes reading, writing, and critiquing poetry. Throughout the semester, we will explore the fundamental elements of poetry and closely examine poetry by writers with various styles and sensibilities. Our discussions will employ the types of vocabulary and considerations specific to poetry and poetry criticism. These discussions should help you to articulate your impressions and criticisms—a facility you'll need for workshopping the poems of your peers and for writing critical responses and original poetry.
Required Texts
- Chad Davidson and Gregory Fraser, Writing Poetry: Creative and Critical Approaches
- Two contemporary poetry collections
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EH 315-1B: Introduction to Professional Writing
Instructor: Wells
In this course, students will explore and practice the work of professional writers. We will study how professional writers use research to better understand their rhetorical situation, which often includes the organization(s) for whom they are writing. From there, we will study how professional writers make choices about their writing based on what they have learned about their audience, purpose, and context. Students will practice processes of invention, audience analysis, document design, drafting, giving feedback, revising, and editing.
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EH 327-2B: Finding the Lost Generation
Instructor: Young
Extended Title: Modernist Expatriates in Early-Twentieth-Century Paris
“You are all a lost generation.”
This is the epigraph from Ernest Hemingway’s 1926 novel The Sun Also Rises. He credits the comment to his literary mentor, the iconoclastic American writer Gertrude Stein. The idea of a lost generation may not have been new in 1926, however. Indeed, in his posthumous memoir A Moveable Feast, Hemingway recounts that Stein overheard a French garage owner use the phrase with exasperation as he berated a mechanic. But when Stein says it, she does so with an eye toward the young, mostly American writers and artists who populate her Paris salon. At once pithy and enigmatic, Stein’s observation provides a way for these artists to self-identify and to explain what they are seeking—in their work and in Paris. They are looking for themselves. And in that search, they find each other.
In this course, we will explore texts by writers who made up the artistically fertile early-twentieth-century expatriate community in Paris. We will not limit ourselves to works by American writers but will also consider those of writers from other English-speaking countries as well as performing artists. Our work will deepen our understanding of what literary scholar Donald Pizer calls the “Paris moment” specifically and Modernism generally and will allow us to draw connections with our own historical and cultural moment.
We will read fiction, non-fiction, and poetry produced by writers like T. S. Eliot, Ernest Hemingway, James Joyce, Ezra Pound, and Gertrude Stein, though we will certainly add selections by others.
Major assignments will include two exams and a multimodal project.
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EH 345-1S ST: Rhetoric of Human Rights
Instructor: Minnix
It is difficult to imagine a situation where words matter more than in the advocacy, activism, law, and policy-work that seeks to secure and protect the rights of our human community. In fact, we might say that a significant part of the work that takes place in social movements, Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOS), legislative bodies, and other key organizations is rhetorical work, work designed to compel the recognition of human dignity and rights through the power of persuasive speech.
In this course, we will explore this fascinating work in two ways. First, we will explore the rhetorical history of some of the most enduring and important rhetorical and philosophical statements of human rights. Second, we will take a case-study approach that asks us to explore what we know about practicing rhetorical history and the history of human rights. We will examine specific cases of human rights activism and advocacy, and students will have the opportunity to pursue a research project that allows them to develop their own rhetorical case-study of a particular human rights movement, event, law, or conflict that interests them. In addition, students will have the opportunity to meet and discuss the practice of human rights rhetoric with practitioners, activists, and advocates.
400/500-Level Courses
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EH 402/502-7P: Writing in Popular Periodicals
Instructor: Ryan
Required Texts and Materials
- Anthology of recent periodical writing.
- Assigned journal articles and book chapters available through Sterne Library Databases and provided by the instructor.
Course Description
This course will introduce you to the conversations that flourish in a plethora of periodical forms: print and digital, consumer and trade, historical and contemporary. Throughout this course, we’ll be examining:
- The cultural phenomenon of the “popular periodical” in global cultures, including the early history of newspapers and magazines and the role/s they played, and continue to play, in civil society
- Approaches to understanding periodical audiences and their consumption habits Strategies for pitching and producing effective prose for targeted periodicals
Course Assignments and Percentages
Assignments to be completed in this course include the following:
- Reading Journal (15%): a series of mostly in-class and occasional out-of-class short writing assignments based on class readings and discussions. Additional requirements may be given to students in EH 502 for several of these assignments, including a required discussion leader exercise worth 15 points. Since reading journal prompts will be assigned throughout the semester, the grade for this portion of the course will be incomplete until the end of the semester. The instructor will, however, send updates about the number of points earned/points available at intervals throughout the semester.
- Slice of History Paper (20%): paper examining an aspect of popular periodicals in historical context (e.g., representation of a particular historical issue in the pages of a single title). Research required. EH 402: 5-7 pages EH 502: 8-10 pages Final Project (30%) and Final Project Oral Pitch (10%): completion of a project drawing on each student’s interests in the periodical industry. Research required Reading Journal (15%): a series of mostly in-class and occasional out-of-class short writing assignments based on class readings and discussions. Additional requirements may be given to students in EH 502 for several of these assignments, including a required discussion leader exercise worth 15 points. Since reading journal prompts will be assigned throughout the semester, the grade for this portion of the course will be incomplete until the end of the semester. The instructor will, however, send updates about the number of points earned/points available at intervals throughout the semester. Slice of History Paper (20%): paper examining an aspect of popular periodicals in historical context (e.g., representation of a particular historical issue in the pages of a single title). Research required.
- EH 402: 5-7 pages
- EH 502: 8-10 pages
- Final Project (30%) and Final Project Oral Pitch (10%): completion of a project drawing on each student’s interests in the periodical industry. Research required
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EH 427/527-1C: Money and Happiness
Instructor: Temple
In Volume I of Capital, Marx describes money as “the alienated essence of man’s labor and life.” In Marx’s view, the work we do as subjects of capitalism, our aspirations in life, and even the judgments we make about the moral character of others, are fundamentally connected to money, an abstract and essentially arbitrary symbol that “dominates us” as we “worship it.”
Marx’s critique of capitalism and its primary goal, the accumulation of ever-increasing profit, was not universally shared, however. In fact, writers from a seemingly limitless array of disciplines and perspectives have examined the social ramifications of capitalism since at least the early decades of the nineteenth century. In this class, we will read American literary explorations of connections between money and, for lack of a better term, “happiness.”
By reading from writers such as Benjamin Franklin, Elizabeth Stoddard, Horatio Alger, Ralph Ellison, Richard Yates, and Cormac McCarthy, we will discuss issues such as the moral/ethical ramifications of the pursuit of money; connections between competitive individualism, the American dream, and inequality in America; the effects of race and gender on access to money and the pursuit of happiness; and the kinds of communities, institutions, pastimes, and even perversions that result from a society structured around the goal of private accumulation.
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EH 427/527-1C: Poems
Instructor: Grimes
This is a course in the “appreciation” of British and American poetry. Our aim will be to develop a comprehensive sense of the emergence and evolution of poetic techniques and traditions from the Early Modern period to the present. We will do this by close-reading a small sample of poems that have been influential in shaping the historical trajectory of poetry in English. By the end of this class students should have a detailed and comprehensive grasp on the history of English poetry, an intimate familiarity with a number of highly influential poems, and (if all goes well) a few new favorite poems.
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EH 429/529-QL: Memoir in Film and Spoken Word
Instructor: Madden
"What would you write if you weren't afraid?" asks Mary Karr in her book, On Memoir. This is a memoir class. You will be mining your life's stories to create a memoir. We will be reading memoirs and watching films based on those memoirs, so you will also get to see the possibilities in adapting your memoir to film. Your memoir may be about a single period in your life, or it may be a series of connected stories.
Through a series weekly writing sparks and readings, you will begin to discover the story you want to tell. Every memoir has a container. The container in Cheryl Strayed's memoir, Wild, is the Pacific Crest Trail, but it is actually the story of her late mother gone too soon. The container in Sarah Broom's The Yellow House is Broom's childhood home in New Orleans East, but it's really a story about family, loss, and the devastation wrought by Katrina. Art is the container in Allie Brosh's hilarious memoir, Hyperbole and a Half, about her crippling anxiety.
From graphic to traditional memoirs, we'll be reading memoirists like Alison Bechdel, Vivian Gornick, Amy Tan, Ta-Nehisi Coates, Mary Karr, Jesmyn Ward, Amos Oz, Tobias Wolff, Sally Mann, Jeannette Winterson, Tara Westover, and many others in our workshop. This class is an opportunity for you to consider how to shape part of your life experience into a narrative, and by the end of the workshop, you will have approximately 30-60 pages of a memoir. You will also create a Submittable Account to begin the process of submitting short and long essays to literary journals seeking the voices of new writers.
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EH 442/552-2F: Literary Theory/Criticism: 20th Century to the Present
Instructor: Bach
In this class, we will read some of the greatest hits of literary theory. We will start with Psychoanalytic Theory and Marxist Theory, and move on to Feminism, Queer Theory, Critical Race Theory, Animal Studies, Postcolonial Theory, Ecocriticism, and Science Studies. That trajectory will help students to understand both the history of literary theory and the ground on which current theorists are building their texts. Students will learn how to take apart difficult theoretical texts and use their insights to read in new ways.
Course Requirements:
- A reading journal collected weekly
- Three exams
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EH 455/555-2D: Digital Publishing
Instructor: Bacha
Beginning with the shift from print to digital publication practices, students in this course analyze how the act of text production is changing and learn rhetorical strategies necessary to publish information in newer communication contexts. Specifically, students explore how newer trends and technologies for digital communication are influencing how people read, write, interact with, and share publicly available information.
Students in this course are also introduced to a variety of industry standard communication technologies designed to help them prepare and publish interactive information (including web-based and video productions) designed to function in a number of different communication contexts. No prior experience with any type of technology is required for this course.
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EH 476/576-2E: Shakespeare Across the Centuries
Instructor: Bach
In this class, we will read four Shakespeare plays intensively, and we will look at how those plays have been responded to and transformed since they were written more than four hundred years ago. We will read early editors of Shakespeare and talk about how and why his plays have been heavily edited. We’ll also read responses to Shakespeare from 19th and 20th century authors. We’ll talk about how his plays have been rewritten to conform to later ideas about gender, sexuality, and race. Students will learn to read the plays carefully in relation to their original cultural context, and they will learn what has happened to Shakespeare and his plays over the last four hundred years.
Plays
- As You Like It
- Twelfth Night
- Othello
- The Tempest
Course Requirements:
- Six 750-word Responses
- One 8-page Paper
- A Final Exam
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EH 478/578-2F: Milton
Instructor: Chapman
Sometime in the late 1650s, the blind poet John Milton began writing to “justify the ways of God to man.” Specifically, he was trying to understand why there is evil in the world and how a loving God can allow suffering and death. The resulting poem, Paradise Lost, retells the fall of Adam and Eve, although Milton does not confine his imagination just to the Garden of Eden. The poem also includes the landscapes of Heaven and Hell, and the vast, wind-battered realms of Chaos.
Many readers over the centuries have considered Paradise Lost the single greatest poem in the English language, and our main goal this semester will be to read it in its entirety. Along the way, we will sample other works by Milton and his contemporaries in order to develop a broader sense of seventeenth-century ideas about gender, theology, justice, ecology, and politics.
Assignments for undergraduates will include a number of low-stakes reading responses, two short papers (which may include creative or multimedia work), and a final exam. Graduate students will write a longer final essay in place of the exam.
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EH 496-QLA: English Capstone
Instructor: Wells
In the Capstone Seminar, students will reflect on their experiences as English majors, explore options for careers and continued education, and practice finding and analyzing job ads. Additionally, students will learn to describe their skills and experiences in documents like résumés and personal statements and study how to manage their professional identities and networks in online spaces like LinkedIn. Students will receive peer and instructor feedback on their job materials and will have many opportunities to revise.
600/700-Level Courses
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EH 646 7P: Practicum in Teaching Writing
Instructor: Mina
This course is designed to prepare graduate students to teach writing at the college level. The course focuses on the theories, research, and pedagogies of teaching and learning college composition through readings, discussions, reflection, and mentored practices. Students will observe instructors, practice commenting on papers, design writing assignments and units, and plan and teach a class session while being mentored by an experienced instructor. Students will also produce their own teaching materials using the conceptual learning and classroom experiences accumulated during the course of the semester all while reflecting on their learning and teaching knowledge and practices.
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EH 693-7M: Death in Medieval Literature
Instructor: Clements
This graduate seminar is centered on the topic of death in the early Middle Ages with a particular focus on dying and the dead in medieval literary texts. Students will be introduced to death’s historical and material contexts to explore how medieval cultures managed the event of dying and the various physical and spiritual stakes related to the handling of the body, burial, and mourning. We will use this contextual work to examine how early medieval writers addressed or represented death in a range of textual genres, from homilies and sermons to carved inscriptions and epic poetry.
Students will read both primary and secondary sources each week, learning the history of scholarship on this topic over the last two centuries. Each student will present prepared material and lead discussion and will complete a culminating research project that explores this theme more deeply in a given text.
Assignments will include midterm and final essays, an out-of-class final exam, and a critical presentation. Graduate students will be expected to produce more sophisticated, critically and theoretically nuanced, and consequently longer essays than their undergraduate classmates.
Writing Can Change Your World
Welcome to Freshman Composition at UAB!
Our first year composition courses are designed to promote your success as a writer both inside and outside of the classroom.
Our small, hands-on classrooms immerse you in processes of writing and provide you with an important set of tools and strategies for writing in academic, professional, and public contexts. You will learn how to analyze a variety of different print and visual texts, explore interesting academic research questions, use sources effectively and ethically, use rhetorical strategies to persuade others, and write in a variety of different genres and mediums.
Rather than a lecture or “drills and skills” class, each of our courses promotes your development as a writer by actively engaging you in writing and revising your work. You will receive consistent feedback on your work from the instructor and your peers that provides important guidance for revision. You will also develop a portfolio of your work throughout the semester that gives you the opportunity to revise your work and reflect upon your progress.
Our Course Goals
The design of each of our courses is informed by scholarly research on writing from composition studies and rhetoric. Our program’s goals or outcomes follow those outlined by the Council of Writing Program Administrators. Please visit their site for more information.
Ultimately, a central goal of our writing program is to treat each student not simply as a student but as a writer. As writing teachers, we want our students, whatever their major or discipline, to see themselves as confident, effective, and adaptable writers.
Questions?
If you questions regarding Freshmen Composition, please contact Lilian Mina, Director of Freshman English, at
Our Honors program is available to students pursuing the BA in English. Students pursuing the BA in Writing and Media complete an internship instead.
English Honors offers you the chance to fulfill the requirement for a Capstone experience by crafting a scholarly, creative, or professional writing project over the course of your senior year. You will work closely with a faculty mentor to plan and execute the project. The subjects for the projects are up to you and your faculty mentor to decide, but some previous topics include:
- poetry collections, short story collections, novellas, and memoirs;
- analyses of works by William Shakespeare, John Milton, J. K. Rowling, and Charles Dickens;
- analyses of various genres of film such as horror movies;
- technical writing projects such as creating a style guide, website building, and writing manuals.
Our honors students gain valuable scholarly research experience, personalized writing instruction, and the opportunity to acquire especially strong letters of recommendation from committee members — all of which can help you in future careers or applications to graduate schools. Students who complete an Honors thesis present their work at our annual Honors Symposium.
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Eligibility
To be eligible for the Honors Program in English, a student must:
- be enrolled as a UAB English major
- have earned a 3.5 GPA in English courses taken and a 3.0 GPA overall
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Requirements
Students in the English honors program are required to do the following:
- Meet with the director of Departmental Honors to discuss the possibility of entering the honors program.
- Select a member of the English graduate faculty to serve as faculty mentor. The mentor and the Director of English Honors will constitute the Honors Project Committee.
- Submit a completed English Honors Program application form to David Basilico, Director of the Honors Program, for approval. Students must secure permission of the director in order to enter the program. Submit the honors application form.
- Be enrolled in EH 494: English Honors Research (or EH 491: English Honors Research for Non-Concentrators) and EH 495: Honor Capstone Thesis in consecutive terms.
- During EH 494 (or 491), compile a thesis proposal or work in progress (for creative writing students) and have it approved by the Honors Thesis Committee. Once approved, a paper copy and an electronic copy or the proposal or work in progress should be given to the Director.
- During EH 495, write the thesis under the committee's guidance.
- Note: the English Honors Program highly recommends that students meet their faculty advisors once every 1-2 weeks throughout the semester. In order to successfully pass EH 494, 491, or 495 with a grade of C or better, students must meet with their advisor a minimum of 5 times. These meetings may be held in person or over Zoom, and they may be held individually or in workshop groups.
- Obtain final approval of the thesis from all members of the Honors Project Committee and submit a completed copy to the director in electronic form.
- Prepare and present honors project work at the Honors Symposium.
These requirements can also be reviewed in the UAB Course Catalog.
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Contact
If you have any questions about the honors program, please contact:
David Basilico
Director of the English Honors Program
University Hall 5037
This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
Hear from Our Students
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Wallace Golding
"Completing an honors thesis was one of the most challenging and rewarding experiences of my college career. It allowed me to explore the intricacies and minutiae of my particular topic more than I would have been able to in a standard course, and the year-long structure of the program gave me the opportunity to formulate a thesis that I felt truly contributed to the academy."
Wallace Golding
“‘In Herself Complete’: Autonomy and Identity Creation in Milton’s Eve”
Faculty Mentor: Dr. Alison Chapman -
Jaclyn Hogan
"Writing my honor's thesis was a fantastic experience. My mentor, Kerry Madden-Lunsford has been incredibly supportive of my writing for my entire time at UAB. The workshop meetings we had were very useful, and I really feel like my writing has improved because of it. The defense itself was a wonderful conversation with my committee, all of whom gave me very insightful feedback and encouraged me to continue writing and to complete the work that I started with my thesis. I would encourage anyone who has the opportunity to consider completing an honor's thesis. It is truly a rewarding experience."
Jaclyn Hogan
“Sins of the Father”
Faculty Mentor: Professor Kerry Madden-Lunsford -
Jessica Robbins
"My experience with the UAB English honors program has been wonderful. My faculty were there with me every step of the way to guide me. I was really nervous at first because it seemed like such a daunting task, but once I started working, ideas started coming. Before I knew it, I had written well over the necessary page count, and I could've kept going if given more time.
"To anyone who is considering writing an honors thesis for the English department, it is a wonderful opportunity that will benefit you academically, professionally, and personally. In addition to the incredible support you will receive from the department faculty, it is also a great opportunity to gain valuable research skills and produce a real piece of meaningful scholarship that has the potential for publication. I am extremely grateful for the English honors program and I am so happy I decided to be part of it!"
Jessica Robbins
"Fairy Tales, Pet Snakes, and Fish Stories: An Analysis of the Roles of Nonhuman Animals in A Series of Unfortunate Events"
Faculty Mentor: Dr. Rebecca Ann Bach -
Courtney Melvin
"The journey of writing and revising an Honors Thesis provided a great lesson in humility and, ultimately, in standing by my work. The process is tentative and cathartic at once. It was a joint effort. My director, Kerry Madden-Lunsford, was enthusiastic and hands-on, offering guidance at every opportunity. In the end, I walked away feeling like I'd really done something to contribute to my passion.
"My advice to anyone considering this path: Do it. You can't go wrong when you're trying to better your craft. When the work is done and your hands are sore from typing or writing, you then get the chance to say, 'Here's why I chose the words that I chose.'"
Courtney Melvin
"What If It Hurts."
Faculty Mentor: Professor Kerry Madden-Lunsford -
Anna Simms
"The English Honors Program challenged me to an honest exploration of my abilities in professional writing. The program allowed me produce a document that would stand as a testimony of not just the education that I took part in but also the steps I took to explore that education further."
Anna Simms
MEMORANDUM Style Guide
Faculty Mentor: Dr. Jeffrey Bacha -
Toby Camp
"There were many nights of diligent work where I skipped meals to work on sentences. Yes the Honors Thesis was the hardest thing I've written so far without a doubt in my mind. But I encourage everyone to do it because it makes a better writer of us all. It has made me confident in my abilities."
Toby Camp
“Becoming Men: Analyzing the Heroic Journey into Toxic Masculinity in Sol Yurick’s The Warriors”
Faculty Mentor: Dr. Margaret Jay Jessee
Professional writing courses allow students to develop the knowledge and skills necessary to join a community of professionals who are communication experts in a multitude of workplace settings: nonprofit organizations, publishing companies, manufacturing plants, medical institutions, and legal offices, to name just a few. Professional Writing courses emphasize drafting, revising, and designing documents in both print and digital formats. Many of the courses provide students opportunities to engage the community and gain hands-on experience writing for real audiences and purposes.
BA in Writing and Media
If you are interested in completing a BA in Writing and Media, you will take 15 credit hours of writing electives which may include Professional Writing courses. By choosing a mix of writing electives, you’ll increase your creative and expressive capacities while also learning how to persuade different kinds of readers, how to work within different professional contexts, and how to compose compelling digital documents.
A complete list of major requirements, courses, and a proposed four-year program of study for the BA in Writing and Media are available in the UAB Undergraduate Catalog.
BA in English: Concentration in Professional Writing
English majors who concentrate in Professional Writing will learn how to write and design the kinds of documents that are most common outside of university classrooms, such as memos, brochures, newsletters, reports, instructions, manuals, multimedia presentations, and resumes.
A complete list of major requirements, courses, and a proposed four-year program of study for the Professional Writing concentration are available in the UAB Undergraduate Catalog.
Minor in Professional Writing
The Minor in Professional Writing prepares students in any major for the writing required in their chosen careers. Students who Minor in Professional Writing will learn how to compose both academic and professional documents, emphasizing the requirements of writing in their own disciplines.
A complete list of minor requirements and courses is available in the UAB Undergraduate Catalog.
Featured Alumni
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Marie Sutton
By day, Marie Sutton is the Director of Marketing and Communication for the Division of Student Affairs at UAB. By night, she is a writer whose passion is telling stories about the African-American experience. Read more about Marie.
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Shelby Morris
Shelby Morris earned her B.A. in Professional Writing with a minor in Spanish in 2016 followed by an M.A. in Rhetoric and Composition in 2018. She is currently attending law school at Samford University, Cumberland School of Law. Read more about Shelby.
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Luke Richey
Luke Richey is a Copywriter and Content Strategist at McNutt & Partners, LLC, a local ad agency, where he drafts copy for multiple clients on a myriad of social media platforms. Read more about Luke.
Contact
Cynthia Ryan
Director of Professional Writing Programs
University Hall 5038
(205) 934-8600
Students in literature courses engage with works from diverse historical periods and cultural perspectives, learning about the development of genres, forms, and styles in relation to the historical circumstances that surround them. Courses range from broad surveys of a period or movement to specific investigations into a single author or theme; they also reach across the media spectrum, from Elizabethan sonnets to propaganda films.
BA in English: Concentration Literature
Literature is the most flexible of the four concentrations within the BA in English. Students can choose electives not just in literature but in linguistics, creative writing, and professional writing.
If you choose this concentration, you’ll improve your reading, writing, and critical thinking skills and the communication and analytical skills developed here are a good fit especially for teaching careers and managerial careers. Students who concentrate in Literature have gone on to work in fields as diverse as book and magazine publishing, web publishing, teaching, law, medicine, library science, banking, public relations and development, and retail management. Many go on to achieve advanced degrees from graduate and professional schools.
A complete list of major requirements, courses, and a proposed four-year program of study for BA in English with a Literature concentration are available in the UAB Undergraduate Catalog.
Minor in Literature
The minor in Literature offers you an exciting and practical way to make the most of your college learning experience. The program gives you the opportunity to read works about the human condition, and the courses will help you hone your writing, critical thinking, primary and secondary research, and text analysis skills.
A complete list of minor requirements and courses is available in the UAB Undergraduate Catalog.
Contact
Margaret Jay Jessee
Director of Undergraduate Studies
University Hall 5055
This program allows you to explore the scientific study of language. Linguistics courses are recommended for anyone interested in understanding the principles that underlie language.
BA in English: Concentration in Linguistics
If you are working toward your BA in English, you may choose to concentrate in Linguistics by completing five Linguistics courses in addition to core English coursework. For a complete list of requirements for the BA in English with a Linguistics concentration, see the UAB Undergraduate catalog.
Minor in Linguistics
The Minor in Linguistics allows students to pair a major with focused classes on the science and structures of language.
A complete list of minor requirements and courses is available in the UAB Undergraduate Catalog.
Featured Alumni
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Rebekah Kummer
One month after graduation, Rebekah Kummer landed a job as a Technical Writer/Editor II at Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville. Read more about Rebekah.
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DeJordique Pearson
DeJordique Pearson never planned to be an English teacher in Vietnam, but he quickly fell in love with his "backup country." Read more about DeJordique.
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Jeff Hodges
Words matter. No one knows that better than alumnus Jeff Hodges who has made a career out of helping others, most recently in his role as Vice President, Diversity and Inclusion Talent Program Manager for Regions Bank. Read more about Jeff.
What Will I Study?
As a language scientist, you will study how people turn thoughts into sentences. You will explore such diverse topics as grammar, dialects, language history, sound systems, language acquisition, and language and the brain, among other areas. Linguistics is deeply interdisciplinary, having ties to anthropology, cognitive science, education, foreign language, philosophy, computer science, and psychology.
What About My Career?
Completing the English major with a concentration in linguistics can make a student uniquely suited for a number of different professions — law, medicine, education, writing, government service (such as the FBI), professional translation, or diplomacy, to name a few. Our linguistics students have entered diverse fields upon graduation: speech therapy, technical writing, language-related software development, law, and neurological medicine.
Resources
Do you want to learn more about the study of linguistics, its uses in everyday life, the science behind it, or the many career opportunities it gives? Explore these websites:
Contact
David Basilico
Director of Linguistics
University Hall 5037
(205) 934-8588
Margaret Jay Jessee
Director of Undergraduate Studies
University Hall 5055
(205) 975-3751
Our workshops introduce you to the craft of writing fiction, creative nonfiction, and poetry. Over the course of a semester, you will learn ways of shaping stories and poems through various exercises and prompts. You'll read works by contemporary authors and use those works as models for your own writing, and classroom workshops offer a lively setting for students to respond to one another’s work.
At the end of the semester, you will have gained wide-ranging new skills in writing creatively, critiquing, and revising.
BA in Writing and Media
If you are interested in completing a BA in Writing and Media, you will take 15 credit hours of writing electives which may include creative writing workshops. By choosing a mix of writing electives, you’ll increase your creative and expressive capacities while also learning how to persuade different kinds of readers, how to work within different professional contexts, and how to compose compelling digital documents.
A complete list of major requirements, courses, and a proposed four-year program of study for the Writing and Media major are available in the UAB Undergraduate Catalog.
BA in English: Concentration in Creative Writing
If you are working toward your BA in English, you may choose to concentrate in Creative Writing by completing five workshops in addition to core English coursework. For more information on the BA in English with a concentration in Creative Writing, see the UAB Undergraduate catalog.
Minor in Creative Writing
The minor in Creative Writing offers you an opportunity to write fiction, poetry, and creative non-fiction as a complement to your major. A complete list of minor requirements and courses is available in the UAB Undergraduate Catalog.
Featured Alumni
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Jason Aaron
Jason writes for Marvel Comics on titles like Thor and The Avengers. Read more about Jason.
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Ashley Jones
Ashley is a poet who focuses on identity, history, civil rights, and gender. Read more about Ashley.
An interview with Ashley M. Jones, the next Alabama Poet Laureate
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Beth Shelburne
Journalist and writer Beth Shelburne has been named one of 10 PEN America 2018 Writing for Justice fellows. Read more about Beth.
Publishing
Our undergraduates have opportunities to publish their work and to compete for awards and scholarships. They can also work as interns for our nationally circulated journals, Birmingham Poetry Review and NELLE, and many are involved with UAB’s literary journal Aura.
Creative Writing Prizes
The Creative Writing program offers several prizes for the best work of short fiction, creative nonfiction, and the best poem or group of poems produced by students. Prizes of $200 each are awarded annually.
- The Barksdale-Maynard Prizes in Fiction and Poetry are made possible by a gift from Isabel Barksdale-Maynard in honor of her family.
- The Tom Brown Prize for Creative Nonfiction is named in honor of Dr. Thomas H. Brown, chair of the English Department from 1984-1992.
To be eligible you must be a currently enrolled UAB student in good standing with the University. Contact the director of Creative Writing for more details.
Resources
Contact
Adam Vines
Director of Creative Writing
University Hall 5024
(205) 934-5317
One of the best things about UAB is its amazing diversity of its students — we are one of the top most diverse campuses in the United States. We want you to have every opportunity to succeed in your course work and college life. Here are eight easy tips for you to follow:
Are you an international student interested in attending UAB? Explore the INTO UAB initiative.
- Visit the UAB International Student and Scholar Services website. They have all sorts of forms, guides, and helpful links to make your life easier.
- Don’t be shy. Let your instructors know that English is your second language.
- Take advantage of class study groups. They let you go over material at your pace.
- Record lectures (with your instructors’ permission). Transcribe your recording to notes.
- Meet regularly with your advisor. They are experts and can help!
- Visit the UAB English Language Institute. They will give you assistance with both oral and written English.
- Visit the UAB Writing Center. They have tutors and instructional workshops.
- Frustrated and out of options? UAB counselors are there for you.
We invite you to explore all of the programs and services offered to international students. International Student and Scholar Services will be able to advise you about how to apply and who to contact for information. Please visit their website, or send general questions to
And remember — you are not alone! There are other international students/non-native English speakers in just about every class you take! Share your stories and help each other!
No matter how good a student you are, having good advice is essential to your academic success. Students are assigned College of Arts and Sciences advisors based on their status as a freshman, sophomore, junior, or senior.
The College of Arts and Sciences' Academic Advising website has everything you need — advice, contact information, and all kinds of helpful links.
Incoming and Transfer Students
If you are a new student, meet with your advisor before signing up for classes. The hardest part of your first year should be your classes, not deciding what they should be. Take the easy way out: Make an appointment to talk or meet with your academic advisor before you attend New Student Orientation.
Contact the College of Arts and Sciences Advising Office at (205) 934-6135 for help with registering but also with making the most of your choice to attend UAB!
Current Students
You can rely on your academic advisor for information, assistance, and encouragement throughout your time at UAB. In general, advisors will:
- help you identify your goals and develop educational plans to reach them
- help you understand degree requirements, course selection, and schedule planning
- refer you to resources across campus that can boost your academic performance
- help you understand academic policies and procedures
- provide information about potential areas of study
Visit the College of Arts and Sciences Advising Office to find contact information for the English advisor.
The English Department offers the two following bachelor’s degrees for students, each one tailored around a different set of skills and outcomes.
BA in English
The Bachelor of Arts in English is designed for students with a passion for reading, writing, and thinking about language. Our students study writing that inspires them, even as they work to sharpen their own powers of expression and communication. This BA program gives students a wide exposure to various aspects of English studies (Creative Writing, Linguistics, Literature, and Professional Writing), and students then choose one area in which to concentrate, taking five or more classes in that concentration.
This BA also gives students the option to enter our departmental Honors track and, in collaboration with a faculty mentor, to write an honors thesis on a subject of their choosing.
The BA is an excellent choice for students interested in fields such as teaching, librarianship, law, creative writing, editing, linguistics, advocacy, non-profits, higher ed, and many others.
BA in Writing and Media
This bachelor’s degree is designed for students who want to become creators of digital media. The BA combines coursework in Creative Writing and Professional Writing so that students can become more precise and imaginative writers. Elective coursework from other disciplines, such as graphic design and screenwriting, allows students to build toolkits so they can apply their writing skills in a variety of practical, relevant ways.
In keeping with this BA’s focus on applying knowledge to professional contexts, students on this degree track get hands-on experience through a capstone internship. They also take courses in digital content creation and build portfolios.
This BA is an excellent choice for students interested in fields such as content creation, website design, user experience marketing and PR, screenwriting, podcasting, streaming media, and other forms of multimodal entertainment.