Degree Requirements

The English Department invites students to furnish their minds with beauty. English majors participate in the soul-building experience of reading widely, thinking deeply, and writing both creatively and critically. In English courses at Northwest University, students study texts that have shaped Western culture as well as texts that challenge that culture—and they add their voices to this conversation.

Graduates from NU’s English program land teaching jobs at all levels both in the U.S. and abroad; publish poems, essays, and fiction; earn graduate degrees from top programs; serve as pastors and missionaries; and work for high tech companies such as Microsoft, Expedia, and Google. 

Outcomes

Graduates with a degree in English will be able to:

1. Produce genre-appropriate, college-level writing.
2. Analyze literature.
3. Practice critical discourse using literary or rhetorical theory.
4. Evaluate texts according to grammatical and structural conventions suited to the rhetorical situation.
5. Integrate the study of English and the Christian faith.

The English Major Core Requirements consist of 49 credits in specific writing, literature, theory, criticism, and culture courses. English majors are encouraged to use the elective credits to explore a broad range of interdisciplinary experiences or to achieve a minor in TESOL or another humanities field.

Core Curriculum Note: Students majoring in English must complete the Story of Beauty requirement in the Core Curriculum along with all required Literature courses in the major.