CULTURAL STUDIES AND INTERPRETIVE RESEARCH

Program Director: Norman Denzin

Correspondence and Admission Information: Institute of Communications Research, 228 Gregory Hall, 810 South Wright Street, Urbana, IL 61801; (217) 333-0795; E-mail: n-denzin@uiuc.edu

URL: www.comm.uiuc.edu/icr/home

program

This interdepartmental, intercollege option is designed for Ph.D. students pursuing a concentration (eight units) or minor (four units) in Cultural Studies and Interpretive Research (CSR). It is open to Ph.D. students in affiliated programs who wish to obtain expertise in cultural studies, social theory, and interpretive research while completing degre e requirements within their home departments. The requirements for the concentration or minor are designed to provide sufficient flexibility for students to pursue one of several areas of disciplinary and departmental specialization while obtaining expertise in cultural studies, social theory, and interpretive research.

This interdisciplinary concentration in cultural atudies and interpretive research derives from a body of knowledge developed since World War II. Cultural studies is an interdisciplinary field of study which examines contemporary culture, popular media, and those

cultural practices and cultural forms that shape the meanings of self, identity, race, ethnicity, class, nationality, and gender in everyday life. The program draws on current research and theory in several critical disciplines. Its focus, history, and depth derive from scholarly traditions in the social sciences and the humanities, including English , history, anthropology, education, and kinesiology. This concentration combines ethnographic and critical textual approaches to the study of popular literature, media, myth, advertising, religion, science, cinema, television, and the new communication and information technologies.

admission requirements

Graduate applicants will be required to have training equivalent to one advanced course each in qualitative/interpretive analysis and social and cultural theory. They should also be generally familiar with current issues in cultural and literary theory and qualitative/critical/interpretive research. Applicants who may be deficient in one or more of these areas will be expected to remove such deficiencies during the first year of study in the concentration.

course requirements

An intercollege proseminar in cultural studies and critical interpretation (one semester in length) will be taken as early in the graduate program as possible. In addition, students will choose se minars from a series of core courses in social theory, cultural studies, and qualitative/interpretive methodology taught by faculty from the participating programs. They will also select substantive courses combining theory, research, and specialization from the student's home department. CSR students will be asked to design an individualized plan of study leading to advanced competence in either an eight-unit concentration or a four unit minor. Areas of concentration could include the media, popular culture, the politics of discourse, or ethnographies of everyday life. Students can begin the CSR program during their second year of graduate study.

teaching requirements

Students will be expected to teach courses in their degree area, according to the standards of their home unit. Unless explicit graduate student training is already required by a student's home department, CSR graduate students will be asked to participate in a series of mentored teaching assistant workshops, with a n emphasis on experimental pedagogical practices.

examinations

Upon completion of CSR's required (and recommended) coursework, students in the eight-unit concentration may sit for a series of written examinations, stressing both breadth of knowledge and depth of understanding in cultural studies and interpretive research. The number will be determined by the student's doctoral committee in consultation with the home department; the home department may agree to accept one or all of the CSR examinations as fulfilling part of its own requirements. When the examinations have been successfully completed, students will present the CSR committee with a predissertation proposal statement, including a brief discussion of the problem, research materials, and a description of the theory and method to be used in the dissertation.