Course summary

The research degree programme aims to provide students with an outstanding learning experience in a supportive community of learning. The department is known nationally and internationally for excellence in research and teaching and all of its staff are engaged in conducting their own research. Information on staff research interests and achievements can be found on the Departmental web pages. Please see https://www.chi.ac.uk/humanities/public-humanities. English and Creative Writing at the University of Chichester is part of the thriving research culture. Research students benefit from training sessions and reading groups aimed at postgraduates, and also have the opportunity to attend the annual programme of visiting national and international speakers. Postgraduate students are supervised by active researchers who regularly publish in prestigious academic journals, write textbooks and monographs, and speak at international and national conferences. Students can also benefit from the Sussex Centre for Folklore, Fairy Tale and Fantasy, Thresholds, the International Short Story Forum, and the Chichester Romanticism and Eighteenth-Century Seminar Series, all of which aim to provide a dynamic research environment for students working in those fields. In the area of English and Creative Writing we offer programmes of study leading to the award of the higher degrees of MPhil (circa 50,000 words) and PhD (circa 75,000 words). These programmes are available as fulltime and part-time study options. As well as the MPhil or PhD in Creative Writing, candidates may consider the possibility of a joint critical/creative an MPhil or PhD in English and Creative Writing. Expert supervision for these is available in the following areas: o Creative writing (contemporary fiction, poetry and drama) o Shakespeare and Early modern drama o Romantic period and eighteenth-century women’s writing, including Wollstonecraft and Austen o Historical Novel o Eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century novel o Children’s literature o Fantasy literature o Twentieth-Century literatures o Contemporary literature o Post colonialism o Critical Theory o Ecocriticism The main aims of the programme are: a) the creation and interpretation of new knowledge through original research or other advanced scholarship, or of a quality to satisfy peer review, extend the forefront of the discipline and merit publication; b) a systematic acquisition and understanding of a substantial body of knowledge which is at the forefront of the academic discipline; c) the general ability to conceptualise, design and implement a project for the generation of new knowledge, applications or understanding at the forefront of the discipline, and to adjust the project design in the light of unforeseen problems; d) a detailed understanding of applicable techniques for research and advanced academic enquiry appropriate to the discipline.