To major in English, you'll need to satisfy major distribution requirements and choose a concentration area. Learn more about the English major, modified major, and minor. With an emphasis on communication and critical thinking, courses in Dartmouth's English Department complement a variety of majors. Majoring in English instructs you in critical modes of thinking that are beneficial in almost any future career path. A corollary set of intellectual skills developed in the Dartmouth English major is a knowing deployment of a sophisticated critical vocabulary. All English majors will soon be required to take a course in literary theory. By focusing on major theoretical schools of the twentieth century--such as structuralism, post-structuralism, feminism, Marxism, deconstruction, queer theory, psychoanalysis, and post-colonialism--an English major learns how to integrate an array of demanding analytic paradigms. These acquired skills enhance your abilities to critique from a variety of perspectives a variety of texts, ranging from Old English elegies and Renaissance plays to Trinidadian memoirs and digital hypertexts. Writing is of paramount importance to the English major. Typically, you write at least two long papers in every English course, and in your senior seminar, the capstone course to the major, a hefty research paper is required. About 25 percent of majors choose to write an honors thesis. Though lengths may vary, particularly for creative projects, theses are generally between 60 and 90 pages long. And in the popular major in literature and creative writing, you take a series of seminars that culminate in a portfolio of poems, short stories, non-fictional prose, or a novel. Since clear, intelligent, and personable writing is a skill highly valued in the world after college, its development under the tutelage of attentive professors is another benefit of majoring in English.