English Literature

English literature at Birmingham City University is taught as an adventure through some of the most important works in the English language, from ancient classics and the plays of Shakespeare through Romantic poetry and Gothic fiction, Victorian novels, and modern and contemporary writing. The subject asks not just what these texts say but what they do: how they construct meaning through form and language, how they reflect and challenge the historical and social contexts from which they emerge, and what they reveal about human experience at its most illuminated and complex.

You will study for three years full-time, developing both breadth and depth through modules that survey how literature has changed across different periods and themed modules that examine how writers handle questions of environment, gender, sexuality and race. You will study the making and meanings of narrative and poetics, and develop the ability to form and express your own informed, evidence-based views about what you read. The programme embraces a range of critical perspectives, equipping you with the vocabulary and analytical tools to engage with literature on multiple levels.

English literature graduates are among the most employable of all arts graduates, not because the degree is vocational but because the skills it builds, close reading, critical analysis, clear and persuasive writing, the ability to construct arguments and synthesise complex material, are valued across a remarkably wide range of careers. Publishing, journalism, teaching, law, the civil service, marketing, public relations, arts administration, broadcasting and the charitable sector all regularly recruit English graduates. Many go on to postgraduate study in English, creative writing, publishing, journalism or education, using the critical foundations the undergraduate degree provides as the platform for specialist professional or academic development.