Postgraduate Studies

The Department of Scottish Literature is the only academic department in the UK to focus pre-eminently on the Scottish literary tradition in its teaching and research activities. This unique focus brings together a group of scholars who are active in editing the work of major Scottish canonical writers as well as engaging in research and publication in all periods of Scottish literature. This core research provides a particularly strong foundation for supervising new postgraduate research.

The Department of Scottish Literature is grouped within the School of English and Scottish Language and Literature (SESLL) which received a 5* classification in the 2001 Research Assessment Exercise and the highest award of ‘Excellent’ in the most recent TQA exercise. The School actively promotes collaboration between its areas of academic speciality and offers a broad range of knowledge and expertise in both teaching and research.

The department offers postgraduates a committed yet friendly research environment. Facilities include a dedicated Postgraduate IT room and specialist library of Scottish Literature.

Special events are organised for postgraduates throughout the year, including seminars, mini-conferences and outings such as the annual visit to the National Library of Scotland, the Arran reading trip and the research trip to Abbotsford House.

The Department’s research activities are focused upon the following key areas:

• Medieval and Renaissance Scottish literature
• 16th-century Scottish poetry and prose
• Ramsay, Fergusson, Burns and the wider 18th-century literary tradition
• Scott, Galt, Hogg and Romantic Scottish Literature
• 20th-century Scottish modernism and the 1920s Renaissance
• Contemporary Scottish literature
• Oral tradition and song
• Scottish women’s writing
• Theory and Critical History

Resources

We have close working links with cognate subject areas such as Scottish History, Celtic Studies, English Literature, English Language, Theatre, Film & TV Studies, the Centre for Robert Burns Studies and the Glasgow Centre for Medieval and Renaissance Studies.

Library holdings are extensive, including the internationally famous Stirling-Maxwell Collection of 16th century emblem books. The library also holds a new database of fiction from the long 19th century and a collection of unexplored Scottish fiction from the period.

The Scottish Theatre Archive is a unique collection of 19th and 20th century theatrical material and holdings relating to Scottish poetry and other genres.

The Department has its own library and postgraduate IT room.