This concentration requires 16 credit hours of workshops, including ENG 7470 - Creative Writing Workshop: Poetry.
English Ph.D. ā Creative Writing
English Ph.D. ā Creative Writing
One of the first universities in the country to offer an English Ph.D. in Creative Writing, 51ĀŅĀ× continues as home to a thriving, widely respected graduate program in creative writing, with concentrations in poetry, fiction, and creative nonfiction.
Our graduate program offers a comprehensive curriculum, an award-winning faculty, and the intensity of workshops. Students in the Creative Writing M.A. and Ph.D. programs enjoy:
- Teaching assistantships with competitive stipends and opportunities to teach a wide range of courses, including creative writing workshops
- Generous graduate student travel funding
- Editorial positions on New Ohio Review, Quarter after Eight, and Brevity
- Opportunities to interact with distinguished visiting writers
Pursue What Interests You
English Ph.D. students pursuing Creative Writing can concentrate in one of three areas.
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Poetry
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Fiction
This concentration requires 16 credit hours of workshops, including ENG 7490 - Creative Writing Workshop: Fiction.
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Nonfiction
This concentration requires 16 credit hours of workshops, including ENG 7480 - Creative Writing Workshop: Nonfiction.
Careers with a Ph.D. in English
Explore our Creative Writing Faculty Expertise
Our graduate program in creative writing is taught by award-winning faculty and the intimacy of small classes. A primary aim and strength of the program is the fruitful dialogue between students and faculty with differing but related professional interests.
Our spirit of dialogue and community also is fostered by the university's location in the informal and tranquil setting of rural Appalachian Ohio. The sense of collegialityāthe common pursuit of shared goals from different perspectivesāproduces an atmosphere of intellectual challenge and personal consideration that distinguishes this program from others in both public and private institutions.
English Teaching & Graduate Assistantships
Graduate degree candidates who receive Teaching Assistantships benefit from professional development opportunities to teach courses such as First Year Writing and Rhetoric, Introduction to Prose Fiction and Nonfiction, Introduction to Poetry and Drama, Writing with Research, and Workshops in poetry, fiction or nonfiction.
Graduate Assistantships also are available for editorial positions with the department's literary journals.
About the English Ph.D.
The Ph.D. in English is designated primarily as professional preparation for scholars and teachers of Creative Writing, Literature, and Rhetoric/Composition. The program at 51ĀŅĀ× offers students the opportunity to concentrate in one of these three areas of English studies. However, while our program requires students to focus on a particular area, it also enables them to explore other areas, to investigate the intersections of subfields, and even to pursue a hybrid degree. Accordingly, the program includes general and cross-disciplinary requirements as well as specific requirements within each of the concentrations. In all concentrations, student work culminates with a dissertation.
Completion of the program generally requires five academic years, but full-time students who are not teaching assistants may complete the program in less time.
Degree Requirements & Dissertation
The Ph.D. in English requires a minimum of 90 hours, including any credited from prior graduate work. Students must fulfill the requirements for one of the three concentrations (Creative Writing, Literary History, or Rhetoric and Composition). The Director of Graduate Studies will determine which specific courses may fulfill each requirement category.
Doctoral students in Creative Writing specialize in poetry, fiction and/or creative nonfiction and take at least four workshops in creative writing.
Students also complete coursework in literature and take comprehensive exams in a literary period to discover and articulate connections between the achievements of particular authors and literary traditions and their own creative work.
Advanced Requirements
All students must successfully complete a comprehensive examination; Literary History and Rhetoric and Composition students must also successfully defend a dissertation prospectus. A minimum of 6 hours of ENG 7940 should be completed for the comprehensive exam.
View English Ph.D. Comprehensive Examination
Culminating Experience
All students complete a dissertation, a book-length manuscript typically at least 200 pages in length, and defend their work to a committee of faculty members both within and outside of the department. A minimum of 6 dissertation hours (ENG 8950) is required and a maximum of 45 dissertation hours (ENG 8950) may count toward degree requirements.
View English Ph.D. Dissertation
Creative Writing Graduate Seminars
Creative Writing graduate seminars mix both studio and academic approaches while being selective regarding genre (poetry, fiction, and nonfiction).
There are typically one poetry, one nonfiction, and two fiction workshops taught each year with each of the four workshops taught by different instructors.
Related Programs
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English Ph.D. ā Literary HistoryDoctoral students in Literature aspire to a comprehensive knowledge of a literary period, genre, or movement through a systematic historical, theoretical, and critical course of study.
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English Ph.D. ā Rhetoric and CompositionDoctoral students in Rhetoric and Composition study the history and tradition of the discipline from classical rhetoric through contemporary theories of writing.
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English M.A.The English M.A. degree serves as preparation for a Ph.D. or as an extension of education in the liberal arts beyond the bachelor's degree.