ENGL 150 Essay Writing I (3 credit hours). This course introduces students to the basic rules of formal writing. Students will learn how to communicate their ideas in clear English sentences that avoid common grammatical mistakes. Students will develop ideas into coherent paragraphs and be exposed to a wide- range of writing models. Through a range of writing assignments, students will practice writing, correcting and reviewing essays in a range of genres.
ENGL 151 Advanced Reading Comprehension (3 credit hours). This course introduces students to a wide variety of authentic texts of different lengths and density from different sources. Tasks are designed to include different skills reflecting the different kinds of responses to texts needed by students, such as summarizing the main argument of the text, taking detailed notes, criticizing texts, and comparing texts written in different registers.
ENGL 153 Essay Writing II (3 credit hours). This course builds on the skills gained in Writing I and introduces students to the rules of academic writing and research, providing practice with the process and styles of university-level writing. Through class readings in popular and scholarly texts, the course will show students how to apply techniques of critical analysis. Students will learn how to conduct library and database research and to write argumentative papers that integrate research findings and critical ideas.
ENGL 155 Introduction to Language (3 credit hours). This is an introduction to the general study of language. The course deals with the origin, nature and function of language as a uniquely human phenomenon. That is, what is common to all human speakers no matter what specific language they speak. Topics such as the structure of language, its role in society, and how it is learned are surveyed. Linguistic phenomena and their links to other disciplines such as artificial intelligence, psychology, society, culture, and brain, among others, are discussed.
ENGL 156 Introduction to Literature I (3 credit hours). This course introduces students to the study of English literature. The Study of literature up to 1660; the rich canonical tradition and how each generation of writers has responded to it. The study of selected plays, short stories and novels in addition to poetry will introduce the practice of close analytical reading of genres. The course will help students to learn key theoretical approaches and instill some of the essential study skills they need for their undergraduate programme.
ENGL 157 Introduction to Linguistics (3 credit hours). The course introduces students to the basic concepts in phonology, morphology, syntax, and semantics, as well as to some of the other subfields of linguistics, such as psycholinguistics, sociolinguistics and historical linguistics. Data and examples from numerous languages, particularly English and Arabic, are used to illustrate these concepts. The course helps students approach language in a scientific way.
ENGL 158 Introduction to Literature II (3 credit hours). This course builds on knowledge and skills gained from ENGL156. Study of literature from the eighteenth century to the present. Students will learn about the rich canonical tradition and how each generation of writers has responded to it. The course will help students to learn key theoretical approaches and instil some of the essential study skills they need for their undergraduate programme.
ENGL 208 Literary Criticism (3 credit hours). This course introduces the concept of literary criticism, the history of theorizing about literature, and the different views on the role of literature and its relation to life and society. This course will chart the history of these attempts from Plato to the present, and the subsequent rise of literary theory. Along with studying the main schools of criticism, this course will integrate practical or applied criticism by using a shared text to ground our knowledge within a literary context.
ENGL 209 Language and Society (3 credit hours). This course examines the ways in which relationships and structures in society influence language and vice versa. In this way, it examines language as a social practice. It examines variations in language that are determined by region, sex, social level, and cultural groupings. The course is intended to encourage students to think about language issues in their own lives and to help them establish positions in the light of the findings of sociolinguistic research.
ENGL 216 Phonetics and Phonology (3 credit hours). This course introduces student to the theory of phoneme and the articulatory features of speech sounds from phonetic and phonological perspectives. Students will touch on the topic of acoustic phonetics as well as phonological alternations (allophonic variation), phonological rules and rule ordering are dealt with. A discussion of the major theoretical frameworks in the field will cover theories such as feature geometry and underspecification in addition to the basic elements of optimality theory.
ENGL 220 American Literature (3 credit hours). This course introduces students to both the contexts and the texts that have come to shape American literature. We will explore differing versions of American identity. From the Declaration of independence and Walt Whitman’s proud assertion of an American selfhood in “Song of Myself” (1855) to Sylvia Plath’s struggle with what it means to be an American woman, this course will engage with major themes in American literature. These will include slavery and its inheritance, the creation of national identity, gender in America, the idea of the frontier and American gothic.
ENGL 226 History of the English Language (3 credit hours). The course is designed to introduce student to a history of the English language, focusing on its origins and development in the areas of sound (vowels and consonants), spelling, form and syntax. It will cover Old English, Middle English and Modern English. The course will also familiarize students with methods used by linguists to recognize, describe and analyze language change.
ENGL 230 Professional Writing (3 credit hours). This course teaches key rhetorical concepts that help students shape their professional writing ethically, appropriately for audiences, and in a variety of professional contexts. Students will learn to plan, organize, and deliver effective business communications, including formal letters, memos, proposals, reports, presentations, and resumes. Students are encouraged to focus coursework and projects on prospective careers. Through both collaborative and individual projects, students will engage with practical and theoretical problems of communicating in the complex professional environments of the global, 21st century workplace.
ENGL 234 Language and Gender (3 credit hours). This course focuses on how the social lives of women and men in a society interact with the ways language(s) is structured, learned and used; how people talk to the opposite sex in face-to-face interaction; and how we read and write. Topics covered include gender differences in linguistic forms, nonverbal communication and conversational patterns. These issues are considered in terms of theoretical and historical perspectives from sociolinguistics, anthropology, sociology, psychology and women studies.
ENGL301 Syntax (3 credit hours). This course introduces students to the study of the theory of the syntax of human language, and sentence structure analysis. It studies the concept of structure, how it is formed, assigned, represented and tested. Students will concentrate on two types of rules: Phrase Structure Rules and Transformational Rules. Human language will be treated as a specific cognitive capacity restricted to humans. The course addresses the need for a scientific model to explain human knowledge of language.
ENGL 302 Comparative Literature (3 credit hours). Comparative literature is the critical study of literature dealing with two or more literatures, different in their cultural, linguistic or national origin. The Course introduces the students to the theory and practice as well as to the recent developments in this field. In addition to enhancing their command of new development in critical theory, this course will enable the student to transfer the skills they learnt in English and American literature to other literatures, and particularly their own literature, Arabic.
ENGL 303 Sociolinguistics (3 credit hours). This course introduces students to the study of language in its social context, focusing on uses and users of language. It tries to answer to a number of questions regarding the correlation between language and society, including the following: a) Who uses different linguistic forms and/or language varieties? b) Who do they use them with? c) Why do some forms or languages ‘win over‘ some others? Topics include sociolinguistic variation, politeness, social identity construction, and language contact.
ENGL 304 Shakespeare (3 credit hours). This course will introduce plays and a narrative poem from Shakespeare’s career as chief dramatist for The Lord Chamberlain’s Men and, later, The King’s Men. Class discussions will involve close analysis of Shakespeare’s language, his culture, and the various moral, political, and aesthetic issues raised in the plays and poetry. The class will favor a thematic over chronological order of reading so that students can build on a progressive examination of king and kinship, gender, love, friendship and reciprocal obligation; also, in relation to these issues, the class will examine domestic and political tyranny, revenge and moral redemption.
ENGL 305 First Language Acquisition (3 credit hours). This course focuses on issues related to first language acquisition. It starts by discussing some fundamental considerations of the nature of language and language acquisition. Then ideas and research that have provided the framework for First Language Acquisition will be represented. Other aspects of in this field will be surveyed and discussed in order to contribute further to our understanding of language acquisition processes. Examples will be taken from Arabic as a first language (varieties mainly Qatari Arabic) as well as from English as a First language.
ENGL 307 Psycholinguistics (3 credit hours). This course introduces the study of language and mind. It covers the main areas of this subfield: language processing, innateness and issues regarding the nature of mind as a theoretical construct and as a way of talking. The course deals with the ways that various kinds of evidence are marshaled in support of different mental models of how linguistic data is represented and processed. Evidence of language and mind with regards to language organization, structure, function, and breakdown, is considered.
ENGL 309 Second Language Acquisition (3 credit hours). The course outlines and discusses the theoretical and empirical background concerning aspects of Second Language Acquisition (SLA). Some fundamental considerations of the nature of language and language learning will be discussed first. Then ideas and research that have provided the framework for SLA will be represented. Other aspects of SLA will be surveyed 332 333and discussed in order to contribute further to our understanding of the process of foreign language acquisition.
ENGL 319 Semantics (3 credit hours). The aim of this course is to examine the nature and scope of semantics. Attention will be given to such topics as Context, Reference, Semantics and Grammar, Utterance Meaning, Semantics and Logic. Set texts will be mostly in the form of a discussion of general principle applied to some data, followed by a number of exercises. Each point is followed by relevant exercises almost instantly. Every point will be illustrated with examples from both English and Arabic.
ENGL 324 Victorian Literature (3 credit hours). This course studies the literary production of the Victorian era. The general cultural and intellectual background of Victorianism will be introduced to understand the rapid social and political changes of the times such as the industrial revolution, urbanization, political reform, the rise of the middle class, material and scientific progress, mass production, the transformation to modernity, among other changes. Overall, the course exposes students to the body of literature in its literary-historical context of the second half of the 19th century.
ENGL 326 Poetry (3 credit hours). This course familiarizes students with critical terms required for poetry analysis and introduces poetry written in English in England, Ireland, America, and overseas, from Medieval
times through the Romantic period, to the present. It includes discussions of poetic genres and examines poets at the junction of poetry, and other literary genres. Art-forms as paintings are utilized to provide a challenging approach. The course roots poems in their socio-historical contexts, offers innovative analyses, and provides an overview of current philosophical approaches.
ENGL 327 Discourse Analysis (3 credit hours). Discourse Analysis is the study of spoken or written, naturally occurring language use. While much of linguistics focuses on abstract linguistic structure, this course will focus on the things we do with language, including telling stories, holding a conversation, and carrying out forms of interaction specific to particular kinds of social encounters (like courtroom proceedings, doctor-patient consultation, classroom interaction, talk show radio chat). The patterns we find in discourse can tell us something about the social world around us.
ENGL 328 Drama (3 credit hours). This course will introduce students to the genre of drama and its basic characteristics, beginning with the model of Greek tragedy and a study of Aristotle's Poetics. It will also introduce them to the evolution and development of English drama through its most significant phases. The students will study how plays reflect their respective ages and overarching theme of man vs. fate/destiny, as well as man vs. society.
ENGL 330 The Short Story (3 credit hours). This course introduces the genre of the short story. The texts are selected from the works of well-known worldwide writers. Close reading and in-depth analysis of the stories are applied
to enhance the students’ knowledge, experience, and skill in critiquing a prose text. The literary elements of short fiction, a brief history of it, and writing analytical essays—are all components of the course. The selection should include a variety of short story genres, types, themes, styles, and techniques.
ENGL 332 The Novel (3 credit hours). This course introduces students to the English novel as a literary genre, exploring not only the various elements that make up the novel (plot, characterization, time, voice or narrative perspective, narrative techniques, theme, etc.) but also its development in historical, cultural, and thematic contexts. Students also explore timeless moral and ethical questions probed by great novelists. After an introduction to the English novel and its development, the course concentrates on the epoch of great English novels.
ENGL 393 Twentieth-Century Literature (3 credit hours). This course explores the social and ideological function the literary genre Magical Realism. While the term Magical Realism is often defined as a regional trend, restricted to Latin American writers, this class explores magical realism as an international movement with a wide-ranging history. Situating Magical Realism within the expanse of twentieth century literature and history, we will explore Magical Realism as a mode of writing that has been a catalyst and a reviving force for more established narrative traditions like postcolonialism and postmodernism.
ENGL 400 Women’s Literature (3 credit hours). This course examines representations of women across world literatures in English. It explores questions such as: how do representations of women change across historical and cultural contexts? How do authors give voice to women who have been left out of history? How do these texts challenge western views about the way women should act and interact in society? In what way do female characters challenge our assumptions about power, gender relations, and discrimination?
ENGL 401 Speech Sciences (3 credit hours). This is a comprehensive course, which teaches the core material of the three areas of speech science: Speech Production, Hearing, and Speech Perception. The course opens with a unit on basic research skills, techniques, and basic statistics. It then proceeds to the unit on Speech Production, which addresses the anatomy and physiology of speech. This course provides students with the necessary expertise and experience to work in a speech lab, or to proceed to graduate studies in the speech sciences.
ENGL 403 Field Methods (3 credit hours). This course gives students first-hand experience and training in linguistic fieldwork, including data archiving, data preprocessing, and linguistic analysis of a non-Western language. The course covers basic research techniques in the form of guided elicitation sessions in class with a language consultant who is a native speaker of the language of study. Phonological, morphological, syntactic, or semantic structures are elicited and analyzed by the students in a research paper which they submit at the end of the course.
ENGL 404 Modernism (3 credit hours). This course is designed to introduce students to modernist poetry and prose. Modernism’s challenge to literary form will be related to its historical context and formal analysis. The course takes an international perspective, reflecting modernism’s own transatlantic cosmopolitanism. Beginning with the differing genres of poetry and prose, the course allows students to trace the revolutions in poetic and fiction expression throughout the twentieth century and how they reflect the changing ideologies of the time.
ENGL 406 Post-Modernism (3 credit hours). This course provides an Introduction to postmodernism and its critics, focusing on novels and films. Learning about concepts and techniques deployed in novels and films, and demonstrate their destabilizing rhetorical and visual effects. The course will include a discussion of a number of literary concepts such as intertextuality, metafiction, self-reflexivity, parody, pastiche and collage. We will also explore how postmodern concepts and techniques can be traced in other disciplines such as architecture, visual arts, film, and technological innovations.
ENGL 408 Post-Colonial Literature (3 credit hours). This course introduces a clear definition of the field and an historical account of its development, and culminates the application of this method of analysis to selected works of colonial and postcolonial literature. It will introduce students to the shift from history to geography which in turn brought the question of power, hegemony and representation into focus. It also includes in the range of its inquiry the comparison of different types of art.
ENGL 423 Seminar in Linguistics (3 credit hours). This course provides students with the opportunity to read and discuss primary research articles in detail, on a topic not covered in the program’s regularly scheduled linguistics courses. The specific topic will be selected by the instructor. Students will read and discuss seminal articles on the topic chosen by the instructor. Student evaluation will be based on the quality of reaction paragraphs to each article and their level of participation in the seminar meeting discussions.
ENGL 424 Modern Drama (3 credit hours). This course analyzes modern plays from the late 19th and the 20th centuries. Selected texts of European drama are studied not only for their aesthetic traits but also innovation. The most significant of these crises is the breakdown of traditions that defined individuals and their relationships to society and culture. Modern drama illustrates individual disillusionment with ideals and historical meaning. We will therefore consider what drama in particular has to offer now and in the future.
ENGL 425 Topics in Linguistics (3 credit hours). The aim of this course is to introduce students to special and/or new-trends issues in the study of language at both formal and functional levels. This is meant to keep up with new developments in the field of linguistics without having to change or modify the study plan. It is also meant to provide the students with the chance to pursue a topic relevant to their academic interests that is not offered as a regular course in the program.
ENGL 426 Children’s Literature (3 credit hours). This course will introduce students to the wide variety of literature for children, including poetry, plays, picture-books and prose. We will look at the origins of children’s literature in fairy tales, folk lore and the oral rhythms of nursery rhyme and song. Students will study the differing approaches to the psychology, literacy and individual development found in writing for children.
ENGL 428 Topics in Literature (3 credit hours). This course will introduce students to special and/or new-trends in the study of literature. Students with have the chance to pursue a topic relevant to their academic interests that is not offered as a regular course in the program. Although this course is offered under the rubric of ‘Topics in Literature’, a specific topic is tagged on to it every time it is offered.
ENGL 499 Capstone Course (Integrated Skills) (3 credit hours). This course is designed to train students to conceive, plan, and execute a small-scale research project under the guidance of their instructors. The project will reflect the skills and training students have undergone throughout the DELL program. At the end of the term students submit a research paper that is modeled on a journal-paper in the field of linguistics or literature. To enhance group-learning and collaboration skills, students are required to work in group.