MA English Literature/Mathematics

About this course

English literature and mathematics may seem an unlikely pairing, but they share more than is immediately obvious. Both are disciplines of rigour that reward close attention and careful reasoning. Mathematics asks you to construct proofs and solve problems with precision; literary study asks you to read texts with attention and to argue about their meanings with evidence and care. Students who are drawn to both often find that the habits of mind each develops enrich the other, and that the combination produces a graduate of unusual versatility. At the University of Glasgow, this part-time degree allows you to develop both disciplines to a high level while managing other commitments. In English literature you will explore writing from the early modern period to the postmodern, engaging with American, Irish, postcolonial, and British literatures alongside critical theory, creative writing, and the intersections between literature and other arts, media, and science. In mathematics you will work through the analytical and abstract foundations of the discipline, developing the capacity for rigorous formal reasoning and problem-solving that mathematics demands. A year abroad is available, broadening your academic and personal perspective through study in a different educational and cultural environment. You will develop two very different but mutually reinforcing sets of skills: the quantitative precision and logical rigour of mathematics alongside the interpretive depth and critical argument of literary study. Employers in many fields value graduates who can move fluently between analytical and humanistic modes of thinking. Graduates from this combination move into careers in education, finance, data analysis, publishing, the civil service, consulting, and research. Those who continue to postgraduate study often specialise in either mathematics or English, or pursue interdisciplinary fields such as computational humanities or the history of science. The combination's rarity is itself an asset in a competitive graduate market.

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