Comparative Literature/English Language

Comparative literature and English language is a combination that approaches literary and linguistic questions from two complementary angles. Comparative literature, as Glasgow describes it, is the study of literature across cultural and national frontiers, time periods, languages, and genres, even across the boundaries between literature and the other arts. It asks what happens when you read texts from different traditions alongside each other, and what that comparison reveals about the assumptions, values, and forms that any single literary culture takes for granted.

English language studies the structure, history, variation, and social life of the English language itself, providing the analytical tools to understand how one of the world's most widely spoken languages actually works.

At the University of Glasgow, this part-time programme allows you to engage with both disciplines at a pace that fits your existing commitments. You will develop the comparative reading and critical skills of literary study across multiple traditions alongside the linguistic analysis that English language study demands, from grammar and phonology to sociolinguistics and the history of the language. A year abroad is built into the programme, giving you the opportunity to study at an international partner institution and experience different literary and linguistic contexts at first hand.

Graduates from this combination go on to work in publishing, teaching, journalism, translation, editing, language services, cultural organisations, and academic research. The combination of cross-cultural literary sensitivity and linguistic analysis is valued in any role that requires a sophisticated understanding of how language and culture interact. Many graduates go on to postgraduate study in comparative literature, English language, applied linguistics, or literary theory, deepening their expertise for academic or professional careers in education, cultural institutions, or language services.