Declare an English Major
The Department of English offers a B.A. in English along with four concentrations (Creative Writing, Language and Digital Technology, Literature and Culture, and Pedagogy). More information on the concentration descriptions is provided below.
Current UNC Charlotte students who want to add a Major in the Department of English:
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Current students must have an overall UNC Charlotte GPA of 2.0
. Will accept new incoming students that have not earned a GPA yet. - If you are already an English major and want to switch concentrations, email advisor: Gina Karp [gkelley1@charlotte.edu]
Non-English majors must fill out this FORM (Please do not fill out the form more than once)
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Please give the submission up to 10-15 days before you see the change reflected on your academic record.
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Check Degreeworks to make sure the declaration has been applied and then make an appointment with the English Advisor via Connect for any academic inquiries in the major.
The English Department offers degree-concentrations in a variety of specialized areas of study: literature, creative writing, digital technology, and pedagogy. All of these concentrations promote in their specific ways the crucial liberal-arts skills of advanced literacy: critical reading and high-quality writing. But what if you’re interested in sampling the full array of areas, rather than concentrating in only one? For you, the general English BA will be the way to go. The general English BA will give you the broadest training in the essential liberal-arts skills.
B.A. in English – Creative Writing Concentration
Students in the Creative Writing concentration will study and practice the art and craft of writing poetry, fiction, and creative nonfiction as part of a broader humanistic inquiry. As students progress through introductory, intermediate, and advanced courses, they will sharpen skills in crafting poetry and prose while refining aesthetics, style, grammar, and mechanics. They will become engaged, insightful readers and critics of contemporary poetry and prose, regularly exchange drafts with peers and learn to offer thoughtful, substantial feedback, and actively revise creative work and reflect on their growth and processes. The act of writing creatively gives students valuable sentence-level expertise but also instills in them how to question, contemplate, explore, problem-solve, empathize, observe, and imagine—all of which can open opportunities in the fields of writing, editing, publishing, education, and the arts, as well as in law, business, public service, and nonprofit sectors.
B.A. in English – Language and Digital Technology Concentration
This pioneering concentration combines linguistics and technical/professional writing, offering unique and cutting-edge applied-language expertise to English majors interested in any career that requires expertise in how people interact and present themselves on different platforms and media, how they respond to language, and how they negotiate power and identity through language. Such knowledge is necessary in many careers such as speech writing, advertising, medical narratives, education, profiling, belief formation, corporate storytelling, and bibliotherapy.
B.A. in English – Literature and Culture Major Concentration
Literature and Culture courses offer imaginative, interdisciplinary and theoretical engagement with Anglophone literatures in all their historical, formal, generic, and global diversity. They emphasize critical thinking and writing. This major fosters our students’ ability to read, appreciate, and interpret literary texts.
B.A. in English – Pedagogy Major Concentration
(Students who wish to teach English in High School MUST select this concentration coupled with the Secondary Education minor that can be declared in the TEAL office.) Pedagogy majors will be prepared to teach secondary English in settings as diverse as large city high schools to smaller more rural schools. Graduates of the program will be effective and engaging teachers of literature, literacy, and writing. The Pedagogy program focuses on preparing educators to design and implement instruction that is socially just, addresses critical issues in the English Education classroom, and incorporates digital tools.