Recently ranked by Lingua Franca as among the top ten graduate programs in nineteenth-century British literature, the program also offers very strong preparation in medieval, Renaissance, eighteenth century, United States, modern, contemporary, and postcolonial literary and cultural studies. In addition, the faculty has special methodological strengths in historicist and new historicist criticism, feminist and gender studies, literary and social theory, and critical race and ethnicity studies. In recent years all students entering the Rice Graduate Program in English have received fellowships and tuition waivers awarded on the basis of merit. The program emphasizes professional participation throughout a student's graduate career, and this emphasis has led to a high rate of distinguished publication and conference presentation. The program also offers unusual support for students' professional activities.
Funds are available both for travel to conferences and for summer research.
Because the graduate program is small and selective, students work closely with faculty in seminars that range, on average, from four to ten students. And this unusual level of faculty support continues throughout their graduate career. At the same time, graduate students in English join a vibrant, intellectual community at Rice that spans the humanities and social sciences. Students both have the opportunity to take courses in other departments and to participate in the interdisciplinary research groups and workshops that are sponsored by the Center for the Study of Cultures.