Romance Studies

The Department of Romance Studies offers programs leading to the degrees of Master of Arts (MA) and Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) in French Language & Literature and in Hispanic Language & Literatures. Research supervision and directed study opportunities in Italian and Portuguese are also available, and the department’s faculty contribute to the MFA in Literary Translation.

Romance Studies offers courses on diverse topics in literature, film, and cultural studies. Our faculty bring expertise in interdisciplinary approaches to archives, autobiography, disability studies, editorial studies, film studies, Francophone studies, gender studies, globalization and migration, historiography, Holocaust studies, intellectual history, Latin American studies, law and literature, linguistics, literary theory, material culture, Medieval and Renaissance studies, Modernism, philology, poetry, postcolonial studies, queer and trans studies, and theater and performance studies.

Students are encouraged to explore cross-disciplinary projects and to pursue opportunities for intellectual exchange with students and faculty from across Boston University and beyond.

Our department supports student opportunities to study, research, and teach abroad through arrangements with BU’s Study Abroad programs in Madrid and Paris, a partnership with the École Normale Supérieure de Lyon in France, and a variety of other means. Our students also receive rigorous training in pedagogy and the science of second language acquisition, and graduate with established teaching experience.

The graduate programs in Romance Studies appeal to talented, dedicated future scholars who seek broad historical, theoretical, and methodological expertise.