Ph.D. PROGRAM

General Requirements

Degree candidates must complete substantial work in two of six areas of focus as well as a third field that is more grounded in a single academic discipline. In concert with their advisors, students will develop a focus within each of these areas. For example: Race, Ethnicity, and Modern Society: Asian American Literature and Politics from the 1880s to 1945; or Cultural History and Artistic Production: US Literature and Society since 1945.

Within each of these areas, students will work with an advisor to develop an appropriate reading list for their doctoral qualifying exams.

The Interdisciplinary Areas of Focus in American Studies at Rutgers - Newark:

Race, Ethnicity, and Modern Society
Urban Cultures
Cultural History and Artistic Production
The United States within a Global Context
The Operations of Social Institutions

Women and Gender Studies
Disciplines for Third Academic Specialization:

English
History
Political Science
Jazz History and Research
Urban Systems

Courses (48 credits)

Language Proficiency

Students will be required to demonstrate reading proficiency in one language other than English by taking an examination. This examination, which will be administered by the Department of Classical and Modern Languages and Literatures, must be taken before taking doctoral examinations.

Qualifying Examinations

After the completion of their course work and before beginning their dissertations, students must pass a written qualifying examination and an oral qualifying examination. Students will be expected to demonstrate a mastery of the specific areas of focus they have defined, based on their reading lists. They should also show a command of the key theoretical issues, debates, and landmark texts in American Studies. Examination readings should also prepare students for their dissertation.

Students are responsible for scheduling the dates of their written and oral examinations with their advisors.

The written examination is a take-home examination. Students will have a week to answer a question on each area of focus and its accompanying reading list for a total of three questions. Each answer should be 2,500 to 4,000 words in length. Two professors will grade each question.

A 90-minute oral examination will be administered within one week of the written examination. The examination committee will be composed of the three professors who administered the written qualifying examination.

Examinations will be graded fail, pass, and pass with distinction. If a student fails any one of the three written questions, or the oral examination, she or he can retake the failed question or the oral examination. A student who fails a retaken question may not continue in the program.

Dissertation Research (24 credits)

The culmination of work for the Ph.D. is the production of a dissertation based on original interdisciplinary scholarship in the candidate's primary area of focus.

Within six months of completing the written and oral qualifying examinations, students must present and defend a dissertation proposal to three advisors. These need not be the same three advisors who administered the oral and written examinations. The student is responsible for scheduling the date of the defense.

Procedures and Policies for the American Studies Ph.D Program

Students may enter the program with either a B.A. or M.A. degree.

For transfer students who earn the M.A. outside Rutgers-Newark, up to18 credits in course work may be counted toward the fulfillment of the Ph.D. degree requirements. Acceptance of these credits will be at the discretion of the Program Director and will depend on the field of the student's Master's degree and the appropriateness to American Studies of specific courses taken.

For students who enter the program with an M.A. earned at Rutgers-Newark, up to 30 credits may be counted toward the Ph.D. requirements. Acceptance of these credits will be at the discretion of the Program Director and will depend on the field of the student's Master's degree and the appropriateness to American Studies of specific courses taken.

All students, however, will be required to take the one-year-long sequence of introductory courses:

Introduction to American Studies (050:501) and Research Seminar in American Studies (050:502).

With the approval of the Program Director, the student's academic advisor, and the course instructors, up to three Rutgers Newark undergraduate courses may be counted toward the completion of the M.A. Degree. No more than one undergraduate course may be taken per semester. To receive graduate credit, the student must have been assigned and successfully completed significant additional work in the undergraduate course.

With the approval of the Program Director and the student's academic advisor, up to twelve credits in directed readings may be counted toward the completion of the Ph.D. degree.

Upon admission to the Ph.D. program, each student will be assigned an academic advisor from the American studies faculty. By the beginning of the second year of study, each student must select a second advisor in a field appropriate to one of the interdisciplinary areas of focus identified by the student. By the end of the second year of study, the student must select a third advisor appropriate to the disciplinary area of focus. Students have the responsibility of choosing their advisors and asking them to serve. Advisors will be identified on a standard form that must be updated annually. Once the student has passed the qualifying exams, she or he may constitute a dissertation committee comprised of advisors other than those who administered the qualifying exams.

Areas of Focus: by the end of the second year of full-time enrollment, the student will have identified two of the six interdisciplinary areas of focus and have an advisor for each. In addition, the student will choose a third area of focus that is more grounded in a single discipline and identify an advisor in that field.

It is expected that students will modify and refine the broad interdisciplinary areas as they define their particular academic interests. Thus, each field will, in effect, be followed by a colon and a more specific thematic, chronological and/or methodological designation. (For example: “Race, Ethnicity, and Modern Society: Asian American Literature and Politics 1880-1945;” or “Cultural History and Artistic Production: US Literature and Society since 1945.”)

Qualifying exams must be taken within six months of the completion of course work. The student will have established approved reading lists with her or his three academic advisors in each area of focus. The student's area advisors will design the separate exams, which will be written and submitted within a week's time, followed a week later by the oral exams.

Successful completion of the exams is necessary before permission is granted to register for university credit for dissertation research. Within six months of completing the written and oral qualifying examinations, students must present and defend a dissertation proposal to three advisors.

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