The Global Future of English Studies

What is the true situation of English studies in the twenty–first century? This illuminating manifesto presents a succinct, carefully documented assessment of the current state and likely future of English studies around the world. By treating the global trends and trajectories of English studies with respect to actual student enrollments, faculty employment, curricular emphases, and emergent subfields, James F. English not only challenges many of the standard narratives of the decline of English studies, but turns them on their ear. With remarkable clarity, he shows how English functions within a global higher educational enterprise of massive scale and increasing integration, a system that is growing unevenly but rapidly around the world, and effecting major shifts in the flows of cultural capital.

Offering thought–provoking insights into the new challenges and opportunities presented by the spread of English studies, this is essential reading for anyone interested in studying or teaching English in higher education.

Preface xi

Acknowledgments xiii

PART I The Future of English Enrollments: Massification and Global Demand 1

I Beyond Crisis 3

II Let s Do the Numbers 9

III Not a Bust but a Boom 27

PART II The Future of English Professors: Efficiency versus Prestige in the Age of Global Rankings 51

I The Economics of Massification 53

II Doing More with Less 57

III Demand for the Doctorate 65

IV Credentials Fever 76

PART III The Future of the English Curriculum: Literary Studies in Its Global Aspect 105

I The End of the Discipline as We Know It 107

II Language versus Literature 115

III China: English Plus, Literature Minus? 126

IV English Studies and Culture Studies in Europe and Australia 141

V Creative Writing for a Creative Economy 157

VI The Global English Major 172

MANIFESTO 189

Index 193

James F. English is Professor of English and the Director of the Penn Humanities Forum at the University of Pennsylvania. His books include Comic Transactions: Literature, Humor, and the Politics of Community in Twentieth–Century Britain (1994), The Concise Companion to Contemporary British Fiction (2005), and The Economy of Prestige: Prizes, Awards, and the Circulation of Cultural Value, which was named Best Academic Book of 2005 by New York Magazine.