Comprehensive Area Exam

The PhD Area Exams, constituting the Comprehensive Area Exam (CAE) and the Specialization Area Exam (SAE), prepare students for teaching and research. The two areas complement and reinforce each other, but are graded separately. The Comprehensive Exam will comprise primarily canonical texts for a teachable area, while the Specialization Exam will cover, in-depth, both the canonical and the non-canonical texts necessary for the dissertation.

No later than the final week in November of their first term, the PhD student consults the graduate coordinator to determine the constitution of the overall area exam committee based upon the plan of research and study for the dissertation.

The committee, including the dissertation supervisor and two other members with expertise in one or more of the areas the student wishes to pursue, is selected by the student, with the assistance of the supervisor and the graduate officer, by January of term 2.

One overarching area of study — genre, period, movement, nation, theory — is chosen by the student for the purpose of developing a recognized teachable and to form a general background for the specialization. This constitutes the Comprehensive Area Exam. 

Reading List

The reading list for the CAE will be provided by the department from a series of set lists updated yearly to reflect changes in the discipline. It will involve 300-350 hours of reading and/or viewing time, or 50-58 "text units," where each text unit is equal to six hours of reading.

An exact definition of “text unit” is impossible; however, a practical outline of its sense is offered in the following descriptive guidelines: a text such as Pride and Prejudice, which can be read in six hours, constitutes one “text unit,” and would form one of the readings on the list. An average feature-length film of 90-120 minutes constitutes two-thirds of a “text unit” (since films do not have a fixed length, the count is based on a viewing and reviewing of the film – approximately four hours = two-thirds of six hours).

The reading lists will comprise the number of works equivalent to the 50-58 “text units” required because a complex theoretical article or experimental novel may take more time to read than a text such as a review article or an historical overview of a literary period or era. The reading list, for example, might determine the following “text unit” values:

• Derrida’s Of Grammatology = 18 hours of reading = three text units.
• The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner = nine hours of reading = one and a half text units.
• Citizen Kane = two hours of viewing = 1/3 of a text unit.

Doctoral students are expected to begin reading their CAE list as early as January of Year 1, but certainly they should devote themselves to full-time study of the list from May to December. 

Set Reading Lists by Topic

• Canadian Literature
• Children's Literature
• 20th-Century American Literature
• Medieval Literature
• Early Modern
• Romantic Literature
• Victorian Literature
• Postcolonial
• Gender and Feminist Theory
• Critical Theory
• Film Theory
• Film History

CAE Exam

On the first business day after Fall Reading Break (October), students will be given the exam questions in advance with five business days to prepare, and then write the two essays required by the exam in two different three-hour blocks over two days. The two essay questions will be weighted equally.

Supervisors are then responsible for the distribution of the test to the remaining CAE committee members, and for coordinating grading meetings and written feedback and grades to the student. Supervisors must also submit grades to the graduate coordinator before the end of the grading period that term, and the written feedback for the student’s departmental file.

Evaluation

The CAE is marked on a pass/fail basis.

The two essay questions will be weighted equally.

If a student should fail the Comprehensive area exam, the student is allowed one chance to rewrite the exam within two months of receiving the failed grade (normally during the exam period in December).

Notes

The department will make every effort to avoid conflict between TA responsibilities and the student’s CAE writing time. Students are expected to write their CAE in October.

In order to ensure that requirements, policies, and guidelines are followed, the supervisor meets with the student at least once a term in winter and spring.