English Department Mission Statement
Vancouver Island University English Department strives to generate, offer, and maintain a BA curriculum based on the following fundamental strengths:
1. Relevance. A BA in English is an excellent preparation for a number of professional schools (e.g. law, secondary school teaching, library science), as well as for graduate studies in the discipline. Moreover, a degree in English gives students many of the skills most highly valued in today’s job market: oral and written communication skills, critical thinking/problem-solving skills, research skills, and organizational skills. Also, our pedagogical practices emphasize and promote teamwork and the development of interpersonal skills.
There are many opportunities for students with English degrees in the fields of communications, business, service professions and public relations. BC Job Futures identifies writing, publishing, communications, and public relations as fields in which job growth will be above the provincial average.
Our degree, with the requirement of a Special Project, allows individual students the chance to work in certain areas of interest and potential for future employment. The project helps students develop initiative, cooperative and time management skills, research skills, and professional presentation skills.
In addition to skills, the impetus behind the BA emphasizes learning, appreciation, critical thinking, evaluation, and a sense of cultural history—all important contributing elements for a well-functioning citizenry.
2. Innovation. Our degree builds on the foundation of a traditional model but offers students something more: the opportunity to participate in developing their own curriculum and approach. Degree requirements ensure that students receive a solid grounding in literacy and literary study; then students may choose from a range of courses/studies addressing specialized/more current issues in the discipline. The Department offers, as well, colloquia and short enquiry seminars to allow faculty and students to work cooperatively in a mentoring, nurturing atmosphere in order to focus on areas of special interest.
The Special Project, usually offered only in Honours programmes, encourages students to develop their own methods of enquiry; the finished project and the stages leading up to it provide a useful portfolio to present to the world of work or to graduate schools. Many students elsewhere are not presented with this opportunity until graduate school.
Finally, the chance to combine our Major with Interdisciplinary specializations in areas such as West Coast Studies, First Nations Studies, or Language, Media & Culture is unique to VIU. We offer a wide choice and democratic approach to students to tailor their studies to their individual needs.
3. Historicity. With our BA, students are presented with the opportunity for the examination and interpretation of canonicity and canonical texts. Courses permit and, in some instances, are based on the coverage of main periods, movements, and authors in the annals of national literatures/literary history. There is also attention to contextualizing the study of writing and of literature within cultural and literary historical perspectives.
Attention is given to conveying to students traditions in writing and literature, including an examination of rhetorical developments and models, changes in the English language, influences of intellectual/artistic movements, impact of ideologies, and changing approaches to critical theory and praxis.
4. Coherence. English Department faculty remain committed to designing a curriculum with a consistent approach to prerequisites (but with opportunities to credit students for prior learning) and with clearly determined standards of evaluation of student work, including opportunities for peer and self-evaluation. Curricula will always reflect the Department’s commitment to inclusiveness and to cultural diversity (see below).
Course programming is, and will continue to be, developed which attends to the groundwork of literary/interpretative skills in first and second year and then proceeds from generic and more traditional/canonical studies (300 level) to more specific, and at times more experimental, approaches (400 level).
Throughout the programme, there is a clear and continued emphasis on the commitment to teaching reading, writing, and speaking skills as mutually supportive and enhancing. Students are also exposed to a wide range of literatures, traditions, approaches, and theoretical issues but with an emphasis on establishing a clear grasp of major concerns in culture and literature.
The Department guarantees support for the Special Project as a means by which students may integrate their studies and explore a particular approach or issue in depth with the assistance and advice of professional faculty.
5. Recognition of Cultural Diversity. The Department is committed to developing curriculum that considers the nature and influence of gender/race/ethnicity/sexuality and their constructions in our and other cultures. Attention is given to orality as well as to literacy and to pre-Contact and Contact literature as well as colonization and de-colonization among indigenous and settler cultures.
The Department curricula attend to the influence and impact of other literatures on literature written in English, offer representations of the varieties of English across the world, and provide access to the study of translation theory and literature in translation. In addition, students will have access to different cultural forms/representations: scripts, film, Web pages, etc.
Curricula pay attention to cultural practice and texts, influences of literacy, revisionist interpretations, minority literatures, comparative literature, discourse levels/pragmatics, and cross-literacy studies in light of ideological analysis.
The development of colloquia and enquiry seminars allows students and faculty the chance to share views/concerns about the recognition and celebration of cultural diversity.
6. Flexibility. Within the confines of a relatively small Department, we require a curriculum which is open enough to serve a broad constituency: students taking Majors degrees in English, interdisciplinary specializations, English as a field, and the concurrent degree with Education. With this in mind, we have developed a range of courses reflecting the best of the faculty’s research and teaching interests, with opportunities for team teaching and otherwise sharing presentation of curriculum. Within this range, we offer a mix of foundation courses that examine current issues/new curricular developments in the discipline.
Our students have the flexibility of shaping their own programme of study in consultation with Department members. Students may choose to combine a Major in English with a specialization (e.g. gender studies/language, media, and culture). They may also choose a Major field with a Minor field in another discipline, or even simply a Major. The flexibility in degree requirements means that students have a space to select those upper-level courses that best meet individual needs. The Special Project gives students the opportunity to develop individual interests in the discipline, as topics are selected by the student with the assistance of faculty consultation and supervision.
7. Credibility. Our BA emphasizes the development of programmes/courses which draw upon and reflect the academic strengths of the Department and which also reflect a commitment to keep in touch with the current issues and approaches in the discipline.
Focus is on preparing students for the world of work of for graduate studies through mentoring, advising, evaluation, and on-going consultation. The Department supports the facilitation of regular evaluation—both internal and external—of faculty, pedagogy, Department curriculum, faculty, standards and professional development.
Regular attendance at conferences and meetings and consultation with other University English departments and with universities will ensure the maintaining of accountability to students, provincial bodies, and to national organizations (like ACCUTE) which monitor and access credibility.