| Taking the MA in English exam? This essay explains the exam’s format and guidelines…. Several years ago, the MA in English at DePaul abandoned the traditional
“comprehensive” Master’s exam format still used by many
MA programs. That model for the master’s exam requires students
to read a broad sampling of texts from numerous literary periods covered
in the program’s curriculum, such as Medieval, Renaissance, and
Victorian literature. Here’s how this format works: Each fall, the MA in English exam committee chooses 4-6 literary texts drawn from a variety of literary periods, genres, and traditions, along with a single critical essay that introduces a topic or theme developed prominently in these literary works. Some literary texts that have appeared on the exam in the past include King Lear, Song of Solomon, Villette, and The Beaux Strategem. Some recent topics have included: “the carnivalesque,” love and knowledge, and literary tradition and adaptation. To take the exam, students must have completed their coursework or be taking their final courses in the quarter in which the exam is offered. The exam takes place in the computer lab in SAC on a Saturday in April and in September of each calendar year. Students may bring to the exam only the works on the reading list. These texts may be annotated, but no secondary material or other sources will be allowed, except for a dictionary or thesaurus. The exam is divided into two periods--three hours in the morning and three hours in the afternoon, usually 9:00-12:00 and 1:00-4:00. In the morning half of the exam, students write two short essays (from a choice of four topics) which demonstrate their ability to perform close and meticulous readings of the formal and thematic features of individual passages drawn from the literary texts. The afternoon questions ask students to draw sustained and supportable connections among all of the texts on the exam, both literary and critical. The afternoon question will be sent one week in advance to students by e-mail. The committee encourages them to prepare diligently to write this question, but not to bring in actual drafts or notes. Well in advance of each exam, the program director in English will hold at least one orientation session to assist student in their preparations for the test. Please feel free to contact Professor Bartlett for further information. The MAE exam committee will evaluate the exams and deliver the results to the MA program director about a month after the exam date. The Director will notify students via e-mail. The exam grades are Distinction, Pass, and Fail.
The testing dates for 2005 are 2 April and 10 September, and the reading list is as follows: • William Shakespeare, The Tempest (Folger Shakespeare
Library) 0743482832 Individually, these works represent a broad range of genres, periods, and literary forms. Taken together, they offer provocative points of convergence and contrast on the general topic of “hegemony and power.” Benedetto Fontana [Hegemony and Power (Minneapolis: University of Minneapolis Press, 1993)] writes, “Hegemony is defined by [Antonio] Gramsci as intellectual and moral leadership whose principal constituting elements are consent and persuasion. A social group or class can be said to assume a hegemonic role to the extent that it articulates and proliferates throughout society cultural and ideological belief systems whose teachings are accepted as universally valid by the general population.” Hegemony can be exercised in oppressive ways in situations of a disparity of power within gender or economic relations or within the discourse of “race” and the experience of colonialism. Indeed, the cultural and literary canons can themselves be construed as hegemonic. In reading and researching the exam texts, the committee asks you to pay special attention to the relationship between these texts and other texts, both literary and non-literary, to which they can be seen to respond. To provide an introduction to these phenomena, the committee will make available (in the English Department office, for a nominal copying fee) an essay: • Paul Ransome, “The concept hegemony: a variable definition,” in Antonio Gramsci: a new introduction (New York: Harvester, Wheatsheaf, 1992), 132-55. Using the tools and strategies that you've learned in your coursework, read all of these texts critically and comparatively, and research their formal strategies, historical and cultural circumstances, and their reception in current critical discourse. You may bring to the exam only the five works on the reading list. Your texts can be annotated, but no secondary material or other sources will be allowed, except for a dictionary. While you are not expected to write a polished, “take-home” essay, your writing has to be correct and clear, and you have to respond to the questions posed with pointed, supported discussions. Students fail this exam when their writing is consistently incorrect, when they ignore or misunderstand the questions posed, or when they do not respond to the required number of questions. Pace yourself. Leave time to revise and edit what you write. Diskettes will be distributed for the exam; do not bring your own. In
case of a computer malfunction, another computer will be provided, but
it is your responsibility to save your work. The exam is divided into
two periods--three hours in the morning and three hours in the afternoon,
usually 9:00-12:00 and 1:00-4:00. These time limits will be strictly enforced;
you must stop writing when the end of each period is announced. After
each period is over, you may print out your discussion for that period.
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