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Program Director: Norman Denzin
Institute of Communications Research
228 Gregory Hall
810 South Wright Street
Urbana, IL 61801
(217) 333-0795
E-mail: n-denzin@uiuc.edu
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 degree 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 seminars 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 an 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. |
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