About the English Department

The English Department at the Brooklyn Campus of Long Island University offers a wide range of undergraduate and graduate courses in writing and literature designed to meet the needs of a richly diverse student body.  The emphasis is on the teaching of writing as a rhetorical act and the close analysis of literary texts in historical, critical, and cultural contexts.  At the undergraduate level, the three-semester Writing Program consists of the study of interdisciplinary issues intended to stimulate purposeful writing at each level of development.  The study of the elements of rhetoric, along with intensive practice, equips students with the writing skills they will need for success in college and in the business and professional worlds after graduation.   The four sophomore literature courses, any two of which satisfy the six-credit literature requirement of the Humanities core curriculum, survey the Western literary tradition from the beginnings to the present as well as the non-Western traditions of Africa, Asia, and/or Latin America.  Readings from a wide variety of texts may be structured chronologically or thematically, depending on the instructor.  

Our undergraduate major program allows students to concentrate in Literature, Creative Writing, or Writing & Rhetoric. Students gain a breadth of knowledge in literature in English, a sense of the scope of English studies, and familiarity with contemporary debates in their chosen field of concentration. At the graduate level, the English Department offers a Master of Arts (M.A.) degree with three possible concentrations:  Literature, Professional Writing, and the Teaching of Writing. The Department also offers a Master of Fine Arts (M.F.A.) degree in Creative Writing. Teaching fellowships and assistantships are available. The English Department promotes literary studies and the literary arts through the activities of the English Club; the Omicron Zeta chapter of Sigma Tau Delta (the international English honor society); our literary magazine, Downtown Brooklyn: A Journal of Writing; and the Voices of the Rainbow poetry/fiction reading series.  In addition, the Creative Writing MFA Program hosts its own reading series, and the Department hosts the annual Paumanok Lecture on American Literature.

Contact Information

The English Department
Humanities Building, Fourth Floor
Long Island University, Brooklyn Campus
One University Plaza
Brooklyn, NY  11201

front desk phone: 718-488-1050

department fax:  718-246-6302

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Brooklyn Campus