Department of Comparative Literature
Undergraduate degrees: B.A.
Undergraduate minor
Connecting Literature and Culture
The comparative literature program encourages students to dissolve boundaries and cross cultures in a quest to chart new intellectual territory. In the program, students immerse themselves in the cultural output of two different languages. Do you want to study film, psychology, art history, or philosophy? The program lets you plan an academic excursion all your own. Delve into the question of whether Borges and Batman share a point of view. Connect the dots between Kurawasa, karaoke, and queer theory. The journey will take you places you never dreamed.
You’ll make exciting discoveries in the two tracks available in the comparative literature (COLT) program.
In the Language and Culture track, you will choose two languages such as Spanish and German, or English and Japanese, and compare literary traditions. (The language chosen to fulfill your foreign language requirement should coincide with one of these choices.) If you want to study abroad, gain an in-depth understanding of one or more foreign cultures, or attend graduate school in comparative literature, this is the emphasis for you.
The Disciplines in Dialogue track will allow you to combine literary study with work in a nonliterary tradition such as philosophy, film studies, psychology, or art history. If you want to combine literary study with creative writing, performance, or visual arts, choose this emphasis.
In many cases, intensive summer language programs supplement those offered during the academic year. The UO’s Yamada Language Center offers audio, video, and software support for the study of many languages, and provides these programs and other cultural events during the school year. If you choose to study abroad, you can earn academic credits through programs administered by the university or through other avenues.
In comparative literature, you will gain critical skills within a flexible and intellectually challenging curriculum designed to engage you in the study of language, literature, and culture.
Points of Interest
- Immerse yourself in the number-one comparative literature program in Oregon, and one that ranks in the top 20 in the United States
- You will be exposed to an in-depth study of two national literatures and their corresponding languages and cultures through the comparative literature program
- As part of your undergraduate curriculum, you can submit an article for publication in NOMAD, the undergraduate comparative literature journal, which features essays based on the department’s annual speakers series. A recent topic, The TV Edition, investigated the global effects of television
- The UO publishes Comparative Literature, the official journal of the American Comparative Literature Association
- You’ll finish three years of a foreign language while completing the comparative literature major
- The comparative literature major emphasizes the close study of literary traditions and critical theory
Sample Courses
- Comparative World Cinema introduces the principles of comparative analysis, exploring the aesthetic, ideological, and socioeconomic exchanges between national cinematic traditions. Recent course themes include melodrama, zombies, and queer cinema
- Gender and Identity in Literature: Women and Empire looks at gender and colonialism. The business of building and managing Europe’s empire has been understood as a masculine domain, but the textual work of anti-colonial writers focuses on the status of women in colonial cultures
- Literary Movements: Enlightenment examines the works of great thinkers, such as Freud and Nietzsche, to focus on literary movements and institutions of the Enlightenment, which is a time when the civilizing process was rendered suspect. Readings will come from texts by Diderot, Freud, Locke, Nietzsche, and Rousseau
- Theories of Drama offers a broad survey of theater, focusing on the ways generic shifts reflect changes in conceptions of the playwright’s function and, crucially for literary scholars, complicate our understanding of what is meant by “authorship”
Practical Learning
The comparative literature program sponsors a major lecture series that features speakers, films, and symposia based on an annual theme. Linking this series with curriculum, undergraduate COLT students work one-on-one with faculty and graduate student mentors to develop, present, and publish their own comparative work on the topic. You’ll have the opportunity to participate in this series of events and build your creativity in a literary project that combines your writing skills with comparative investigation.
As a comparative literature major, you are strongly encouraged to study abroad, either through programs that are administered by the university or through other avenues. With a bit of imagination, you can expand your language skills and enjoy a firsthand cultural immersion experience while earning academic credit.
Interdisciplinary Opportunities
Beyond your foreign language studies, you can choose classes from a wide variety of disciplines including history, philosophy, sociology, art, theater, journalism, and women’s and gender studies. COLT faculty members come to the department from an eclectic variety of disciplines and advise students in their diverse areas of interest.
Student Work
Katie Dwyer chose the comparative literature major because it allowed her to study a wide variety of topics. Her favorite class has been feminist theory, where students studied theory from the feminist movement by looking at a number of texts and participating in group discussions. Dwyer has expanded her academic scope by studying Latin American literature and contemporary art in Chile, and by volunteering as a Spanish translator at a local medical clinic. These opportunities that take scholarship beyond the classroom, “enhance my college experience both through encouraging improvements in scholarship and in preparing me for postgraduate life,” says Dwyer.
Meorah Solar loved her high school history classes and decided that she eventually wanted to teach. In the comparative literature major, she discovered that she could combine her interest in history with her passion for literature. “History can be taught through the novel, through literature,” she says, “and some novels can impact a class deeper than I might be able to touch my students with a history text.” Solar also studied abroad in Oviedo, Spain, where she became fluent in Spanish. As our culture becomes increasingly bilingual, Solar believes it’s her responsibility to build social bridges in the community, “for both language and cultural barriers, especially as a teacher.”
Selected Faculty Work
Kenneth Calhoon, a professor of German, is interested in the concept of reconstruction as it pervades the ethos and aesthetics of modern Germany. In the comparative literature program, he teaches an introduction to comparative literature, and courses in poetic justice and literary landscape.
An associate professor of English, Lisa Freinkel teaches courses in world literature and colloquium courses that include topics such as witnessing genocide. Her research interests include Renaissance literature, Shakespeare, psychoanalysis, theology, and the philosophy of money. She is a recipient of the UO’s Ersted Award for Distinguished Teaching.
John Lysaker is a professor of philosophy. He has published work on a wide range of philosophical and literary topics including Emerson’s theory of self-cultivation, the sense of self in devastating illness, and the critical aesthetics of Adorno.
Leah Middlebrook is an associate professor of comparative literature and of Romance languages. She is a recipient of the UO’s Ersted Award for Distinguished Teaching. Her research interests include lyric poetry, theories of the subject, and critical constructions of Western modernity. She teaches feminist theory, and introductory courses in lyric poetry and comparative literature.
Jenifer Presto is an associate professor of comparative literature. Her research interests include 20th century Russian literature, modernism, and cultural studies. Her essays have been published in Russian Literature, Slavic and East European Journal, and other academic journals. Among other topics, she teaches courses on gender and identity in literature, modernist lyric poetry, and contemporary writing theory.
Career Opportunities
As a graduate of the UO’s comparative literature program, you’ll have advanced research experience as well as analytical, linguistic, and writing skills that will open the doors of many professional positions. You might launch a career in the academic arena, or you may find that your interests are satisfied by work in the business world. You can choose from fields such as journalism, publishing, and any profession in which critical thinking and writing skills are assets. You also will be well prepared to pursue graduate education at the UO or at another institution.