French MA at University of Wisconsin Madison

The M.A. and Ph.D. programs in French offer a first-rate faculty in all the areas of French and Francophone literature and culture. The program emphasizes broad coverage as well as specialization, and is organized so as to take advantage of the quality and range of the faculty. A Wisconsin Ph.D. has the ability to teach not only a very focused topic of research, but also much of the French literary tradition.

The French graduate program offers a wide array of courses and seminars each semester, providing a fairly even distribution across the various literary periods in most academic years. Courses typically meet two or three times a week and are quite broad in focus, generally exploring well-defined periods or genres, while seminars are held once a week for two hours and take up narrower topics in greater depth. Both the offerings and the requirements of the M.A. and Ph.D. programs are designed to give students not only the tools necessary for specialization, but also an excellent knowledge of these extremely rich literary traditions.

Strong emphasis is placed on the practice of the language. French is the usual language of instruction in graduate courses and seminars. The department offers possibilities for international stay through exchange programs and further promotes the use of French through lectures, films, theater, and events at the French House.

The French Ph.D. program has a fine job placement record. Its students' solid foundation in the French and Francophone literary tradition is increasingly rare among North American literature programs, as is the extensive training students receive in language pedagogy.

1. Show broad knowledge of French and Francophone literature and culture.
2. Master a broad range of texts fundamental to French and Francophone studies.
3. Demonstrate critical understanding of the major works in literature and the history of ideas that have been written in French from the Middle Ages up to the present.
4. Show the ability to analyze literary texts of various genres, and to formulate well-informed, interpretive arguments about them.
5. Identify, select, and retrieve primary and secondary sources pertaining to questions in French and Francophone literature.
6. Analyze and interpret the theories, research methods, and approaches to inquiry in this discipline.
7. Demonstrate adequate proficiency in French to lead a well-informed discussion of literature and culture.
8. Communicate clearly and appropriately in both written and spoken French
9. Demonstrate skills as teachers of the French language and French/Francophone culture at the college level: the ability to create level- and course-appropriate instructional objectives, activities, and assessments for teaching language, literature, and culture; the ability to use instructional technologies appropriately to enhance the teaching of language, literature, and culture; the capacity to incorporate insights from second language acquisition theory and current best practices in foreign language teaching into instruction.
10. Recognize and apply principles of ethical and professional conduct.