English - Texts and Contexts: Medieval to Renaissance University College Cork

Overview

The MA  English - Texts and Contexts: Medieval to Renaissance course at  University College Cork examines canonical and lesser-known texts, forms, and authors from the islands of Britain and Ireland, ranging from the earliest works in English, such as riddles, elegies, and wisdom poetry, to the proliferation of texts and genres in Middle English writing of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, including Chaucer, to the cheap print of the sixteenth century and the popular plays of Shakespeare. 

Key facts

• We take a particular interest in interrogating conventional boundaries between periods (including between Old and Middle English, and between medieval and Renaissance texts), between genres, and between media (from oral to written traditions, from page to stage, and from text to screen).
• Our English MA graduates are linguistically and critically adept writers and researchers. On this programme they develop a broad skill set, knowledge, and experience in independent research, effective verbal and written communication, critical thinking, organisation, teamwork, problem-solving, and time management.
• Equipped with this array of transferable skills, MA graduates progress to careers in areas such as publishing, second-level teaching, arts and heritage, journalism and broadcasting, civil service, technical writing, and policy research development. Having developed the discipline-specific skills for the study of earlier literatures, graduates have also advanced to doctoral study in the fields of Old, Medieval, and early modern English, and Digital Humanities, and to careers within and beyond academia.