Note: The department is presently not accepting applications to its Ph.D. program.
Requirements for the Ph.D. degree include a total of 42 credit hours of course work, taken in the Department of French and Italian and in other departments with the approval of the director of graduate studies. The Department of French & Italian does not offer a terminal M.A. degree, but they do earn the M.A. with the successful passing of the exam, en route to the Ph.D. For BA students and for non French Studies M.A. students, an M.A. qualifying exam, based on a departmental reading list, must be taken no later than before the beginning of classes in the student's fourth semester of study, and students who successfully pass the exam enter the Ph.D. stage.
Students are expected to begin to register for research credit no later than the beginning of classes in the student's fourth semester of study. Up to 33 credit hours may be taken as research credit. In addition to French and English, doctoral candidates must demonstrate a reading knowledge of an additional language to be determined in consultation with the student's dissertation adviser. Other regulations governing graduate work are available from the director of graduate studies.
After completing the M.A. exam, the student identifies an area of specialization (including, but not limited to, the subject of the dissertation). During the fourth semester, the student prepares an extensive reading list on this area of specialization. The Ph.D. qualifying exam is taken in the sixth semester upon completion of course work.
Upon successful completion of the Ph.D. exam, the student submits the dissertation proposal. After its approval by the Ph.D. committee, the student writes and defends the dissertation to complete the requirements for the Ph.D.
The Jean and Alexander Heard Libraries' rich collection of French materials makes research possible in all periods of French literature. The library's special collections department also houses the W. T. Bandy Center for Baudelaire and Modern French Studies, the Pascal Pia collection (nineteenth- and twentieth-century literary criticism), the Gilbert Sigaux collection (twentieth-century French literature), and the Wachs collection (eighteenth-century fiction and almanacs). In 2016 the W. T. Bandy Center acquired the Herv© Velez collection of Paul Verlaine materials, one of the finest collections of Verlaine works ever amassed.