Majors
Contact the Department of English advisor, Nathan Robinson. Nathan will review your degree requirements and transcript to see what you have already taken and what you still need to complete the major or minor. See our list of majors and minors.
You cannot have both a major and a minor in English.
Minors
All students must have at least a major and a minor, or a double major in order to graduate from WMU.
Minors to complement an English major
The best minors to complement an English major will depend upon what you intend to do after graduation. If you are flexible or undecided about what minor to have, here are some suggestions:
- If you are planning to go to graduate school in literature, a minor in another liberal arts area is eminently appropriate. Foreign language deserves a special mention because some graduate programs require competence in a foreign language and an undergraduate minor may allow you to do coursework in foreign literature. Other good minors include history, philosophy, religion and especially world literature.
- If you are planning graduate work in creative writing, the liberal arts areas also work well; but you should consider in addition areas such as communications and journalism. The School of Communication has courses in the production and critique of various different media that may use or require script writing.
- If you are planning to work in business or for a non-profit organization, a minor in some business area is clearly appropriate; for those of you with a more humanitarian bent, a minor in non-profit administration is often the way to go. Minors in organizational communications, mathematics, or statistics may also support a business ambition; and a foreign language, especially Spanish, would support employment in an international business.
- If you are planning to work in government, political science can be a good minor. Otherwise, the same recommendations that work for business also can work here. If you anticipate a career in social work, competence in Spanish can be useful or even necessary.
- If you are planning to earn a living by writing, editing or publishing either free-lance or in an organization, a minor in communications or journalism is appropriate. In addition, also consider a minor in imaging (located in the Department of Paper Engineering, which has courses introducing students to different aspects of publishing including inks, papers, color management and computer graphics.