English BA (Hons)

UCAS course code: 

English BA (Hons) Q300
English with Languages BA (Hons) QR39 

Duration:  Three years full-time/six years part-time

Institution code: D26

2013

• Normally 260 points with a minimum of 160 points from 2 full A levels and including grade C or above in English Language or Literature
• National Diploma DMM and a grade C or above in A level English Language or Literature
• Five GCSEs at grade A*–C including English Language or Literature at grade C or above. We also accept the BTEC First Diploma plus two GCSEs including English at grade C or above
• International Baccalaureate: 28+ Points

Interview required: Yes

International Students

If English is not your first language, an IELTS score of 6.5 or equivalent when you start the course is essential. English language tuition| is available at DMU both before and during the course if required.

This course is taught by a team of internationally-renowned scholars and uses varied teaching methods, including lectures, guest lectures by visiting academics, seminars, workshops, and one-to-one tutorials. Students normally have eight to ten hours of scheduled contact time per week, with each course usually consisting of one lecture and one seminar per week or one two-hour workshop. In addition, staff are available each week for one-to-one tutorials.

During your time at DMU, you will experience a wide range of assessment methods, including essays, presentations, preparation worksheets, journals, examinations, website production, anthologies (in which you select poems on a topic of your choice and write an introduction to your own poetry collection), peer evaluation and creative work. The range of assessment methods means that you will develop a broad spectrum of communication and technological skills alongside an ability to think critically, independently, flexibly and imaginatively. Students are in addition kept up to date through Blackboard, our interactive teaching resource. We also have an open door Academic Guidance Centre, a University Learning and Study Support Centre, and a bespoke postgraduate assisted learning scheme. 

• Nicholas Zurbrugg Prize (for Best English Dissertation)
• Leicester Literary and Philosophical Society Prize (for the Best Overall Final-Year English Literature Student)
• Prize for Best Overall Second-Year English Literature Student

Year one modules|

Year two modules|

• History of English: Medieval to Augustan Literature (compulsory)
• Romantic and Victorian Literature
• Twentieth and Twenty-First Century Literature
• Ways of Reading
• Rewriting Film and Literature

Year three modules|

• Dissertation (compulsory)
• British Drama 1956 to the Present
• Contemporary Fiction
• Contemporary Poetry
• English in the Workplace
• Modernism and Modernity
• Postcolonialism
• Shakespeare and Marlowe
• Studies in Literature and Film
• The Working Class in Literature and Film
• Writing the Self
• medieval.com
• Text Technologies
• Sex and Death in Romantic Writing
• Practical Oral History: The DMU/British Theatre Archive Project

There are 16 full-time members of staff|, including young scholars and established researchers, who form distinctive research clusters in the following areas:

• Literature on Screen/Adaptations
• Textual Studies (electronic publishing, history of the book, bibliographical studies)
• Early Modern Literature and Culture, including Shakespeare
• Modernism
• Romanticism
• 19th Century Literature and Society
• Critical Theory and the History of Criticism
• Women’s Writing

Four major international journals are edited within the department:

• Adaptation (OUP)
• Journal of Browning Studies (Browning Society)
• Literature and History (Manchester University Press)
• Shakespeare (Routledge)

A major series of undergraduate guides to literature is co-edited within the department:

• Edinburgh Critical Guides to Literature (Edinburgh University Press) 

A number of staff publications have had an international impact upon the academic community and have helped to shape English in new and distinctive ways.

In the third year Single Honours students taking ‘English in the Workplace’ have the chance to do a work placement with a local employer. The placements allow students to reflect on the skills that they have acquired during their degree, while also gaining valuable work experience before entering the world of full-time work.

Students on this module have undertaken placements at the National Space Centre in Leicester, the English Association, the DMU Press office, The Demon student newspaper, the Leicester Mercury, voluntary organisations such as Help the Aged, Leicester Study Support and Right to Read, and schools and colleges including Leicester Grammar School, Regent College, Taylor Primary School, Riverside Business and Enterprise College and Bishop Ellis Primary School.

Careers Advice is provided by the University Careers Service and the Faculty Careers Adviser. She is available on-site every Wednesday during term time for career consultations and she contributes to the Year 3 talk (given by the programme leader at the start of students’ final year) and gives a presentation for students on the third-year ‘English in the Workplace’ module.

With their advanced level of communication and reasoning skills, accompanied by their ability to work independently and as part of a group, English graduates are highly employable, with 93 per cent of recent graduates finding employment or going on to further study within six months of their degree (2011). Our graduates go into a wide range of careers including banking, charity work, the civil service, library services, marketing, the media, public relations, publishing, primary and secondary teaching, and postgraduate study.

Recent English graduates have gone on to careers in:

• Teaching (Primary and Secondary English)
• Teaching English as a Foreign Language – Central Mexico
• Higher Education – Communications Officer for the Centre for Learning Support and Development, London South Bank University; Corporate Communications Manager, De Montfort University
• Journalism and Publishing – Condé Nast (publisher of Vogue and GQ)
• Arts – Researcher/Talent Seeker for On-line Art Gallery

2013 entry

UK/EU Fees: £9000
International Fees:  TBC 

Learn more about fees and funding information 2013|

The first year of the degree focuses on the major literary genres and developing your critical skills, as a way of providing you with a firm foundation for your subsequent study of literature.

In the second year, you build on this foundation, extending your knowledge of the development of English literature, through studying a core module on the History of English, which covers literature from Chaucer to the early eighteenth century. In addition, you have the option of studying later periods of literature including Romantic and Victorian Literature and Twentieth and Twenty-First Century Literature, and/or courses on Ways of Reading, and Rewriting Film and Literature.

In your final year, you can choose from a wide range of options which closely relate to the research interests and expertise of the English team. Year 3 options currently include: British Drama 1956 to the Present, Contemporary Poetry, Contemporary Fiction, Shakespeare and Marlowe, Studies in Literature and Film, The Working Class in Film and Literature, Writing the Self: 20th and 21st Century Autobiography, Modernism and Modernity, and Postcolonialism. Single Honours students may choose to do English in the Workplace, a module which provides the opportunity to go on a work placement. 

You will also have the opportunity to write a dissertation on a topic of your choice. Recent dissertation topics have included family conflict in modern American drama,  contemporary British-Asian fiction, Oscar Wilde, adaptations of Peter Pan, John Donne, Shakespeare and violence on film, nineteenth-century sensation fiction, African American women’s writing, interpretations of Robinson Crusoe, and Jewish-American writing.

"My time at DMU opened my eyes to the extent of literature available and the approaches that I could take in reading and studying it. The module choices mean that you can tailor it to your own interests. The experience I have had has been so good I’m choosing to continue my academic career."

Kayleigh Watts

“The varied module choices and methods of assessment were a breath of fresh air and the staff are all so knowledgeable and helpful. The positive result is that I now plan to teach English and have secured a PGCE place, thanks in no small part to the knowledge and experience I have gained whilst studying English at DMU.”

Julie Webb

Students studying English also have the opportunity, as part of their degree programme, to study abroad, at a University in Europe or the US. 

The Faculty currently has partnerships with the following overseas institutions:

• University of Lodz (Poland)
• The European University of Cyprus
• Francis Marion University (South Carolina, US)
• East Carolina University (Greenville, US)
• Georgia College and State University (Georgia, US)
• University of Maryland (Baltimore, US)

Of her experience at the University of East Carolina, a current Year 3 student writes:

‘I became more self-confident. I got to talk to so many different people and I know what it’s like to live in an entirely different culture. It’s fun and exciting, sometimes confusing, but really a brilliant experience’ (Hope Dinsdale, 2011).