An Initial Exploration of the Undergraduate English Major Curricula Issued by the 2000-2001 Member Schools of the Council for Christian Colleges and Universities

<p>Problem</p> <p>This study made the initial exploration of English major curricula among 101 members of the 2000-2001 Council for Christian Colleges and Universities (CCCU), describing their nature and state and discerning evidence of Christian thought.</p> <p>Method</p> <p>Stewart’s (1989) Modified Categories of English Majors and Eisner’s (1991) education criticism provided frameworks to categorize all curricula and to describe a purposeful sampling of 20 selected by region, religious, and enrollment.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Types 1.0 Straight Literature and 1.5 Primarily Literature majors represented 78% of the population and 75% of the sampling; Type 2.0 More Flexible majors represented 18% of the population and 25% of the sampling. The sampling found two structural models: the traditional tripod model (45%) and the core-and-periphery (55%). Types 1.0 and 1.5 emphasized American and English/ British literatures, Type 1.0 by genres, and Type 1.5 by surveys; Type 2.0 stressed those literatures, but proliferated writing electives.</p> <p>Content weaknesses included the (a) lack of goals; (b) slighting of writing, composition, and rhetoric; and (c) imbalance of 300-level courses. Strengths included (a) offering literary criticism, (b) requiring capstone/seminars, and (c) increasing writing programs. Christian thought appeared in four course categories: (a) biblical content, (b) integration, (c) major authors associated with Christianity, 5th through 19th centuries, and (d) those associated during the 20th century. Milton, Chaucer, and C. S. Lewis dominated.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>The aggregate CCCU English major curriculum appeared to be: 1. Dominated by literature, especially British/English and American literatures 2. Structured in the traditional tripod of literature, composition, and grammar, or in the core-and-periphery model 3. Utilitarian-oriented toward “helping professions,” teaching, and graduate studies 4. Static with minimized composition, writing, rhetoric, linguistics, and non- traditional literatures 5. Accommodating of writing electives 6. Preserving of field-coverage in upper-level literature courses and 7. British-Christian influenced, reflecting Christian ideas through British historical, cultural, white-male perspective(s).</p>

Name thesis:degree_name

Doctor of Philosophy

Level thesis:degree_level

Dissertation

Year dc:date.available

2008

Author dc:creator

• Crandon, Maralee Sue

Contributors dc:contributor

• Lyndon G. Furst
• Larry D. Burton
• Douglas A. Jones

• English
• Undegraduate
• Curriculum
• Education
• Curriculum and Instruction
• English Language and Literature

Repository record dc:identifier

https://digitalcommons.andrews.edu/dissertations/1710

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:digitalcommons.andrews.edu:dissertations-2981