This major is designed around interdisciplinary critical methodologies and multi-modal objects of inquiry. This major provides students with the necessary skills of critical reading, thinking, and communication. The program of study places an emphasis on viewing texts in cultural, rhetorical, and theoretical contexts. The major aggregates diverse forms of textuality that previously have been formally separated by traditional disciplinary lines, such as cultural studies, film, literature, rhetoric, creative writing, and philosophy. By challenging, expanding, and redefining the disciplinary boundaries and attending interpretive practices that have been traditionally available to students of literature, the major offers a more integrated and global framework for understanding texts, contexts, and methods of critical interpretation.
Students who graduate with this major go on to careers in law, education, social work, public relations, advertising, publishing, business management, and more. This degree also prepares students for graduate study in literature, creative writing and the humanities.