Greetings from the Director of Graduate Studies, Dr. Marie-Pierre Le Hir

Dear colleagues and students,

I am writing to share with you exciting opportunities for graduate study in French at the University of Arizona. We hope the description that follows will encourage qualified candidates to apply.

A dynamic group of faculty offer courses in all the major research areas and periods--Medieval, Renaissance, Classical Period, Enlightenment, Nineteenth Century, Twentieth Century and the Francophone world. A variety of critical approaches drawing on such fields as history, anthropology, feminism, post-colonial theory, sociology, linguistics and cultural studies are represented in courses offered at the graduate level. (www.coh.arizona.edu/french/faculty.htm) The department currently offers two options at the MA Level: Option-I French literature and Option II French as a Foreign Language. Students are encouraged to pursue their intellectual interests in related fields and may enroll in interdisciplinary programs and make use of a range of institutional resources across disciplines and cultures including Africana Studies, the Center for Middle Eastern Studies, Women's Studies, and Second Language Acquisition and Teaching to name only a few. Graduate students in French benefit from outstanding teacher training under the guidance of the Director of Basic Language instruction. Students who elect to exit the program with a Masters in French literature and pedagogy will be trained as teachers while those who pursue the literary path are prepared for graduate study at the doctoral level.

The University of Arizona's main library offers a considerable collection of research materials in French studies and related fields in the humanities and social sciences. In addition to the permanent collections, graduate students may also borrow from an extensive network including other libraries within the state of Arizona and the entire University of California system. The University's investment in an up-to-date collection in a variety of media (periodicals, videos, films, slides, photographs, audio archives), cutting edge technology (hardware and software), a range of inter-library loan options and expert reference librarians provides excellent research and teaching opportunities. (www.library.arizona.edu/)

The Department of French and Italian at the University of Arizona has been the proud host of a number of international conferences including the annual meetings of the American Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies, the North-American Society for Seventeenth-Century French Literature and, this year, the Nineteenth-Century French Studies Colloquium.

Students will no doubt find plenty to do on the campus of the University of Arizona, where one finds film series, discussion groups and first-rate international performances at Centennial Hall by such musicians and dancers as Le Ballet national du Sénégal, Les Misérables, the Urban Bush Women and Ibrahim Ferrier of the Buena Vista Social Club. (www.uapresents.arizona.edu/)

Qualified graduate students are encouraged to take advantage of opportunities for educational exchange in Paris at Université de Paris VII and at the Dartmouth Summer Institute, for example. The Graduate and Professional Student Council also makes financial awards on a competitive basis for students to attend conferences within the United States and abroad where they have been invited to present their research.

Financial aid is awarded every year to outstanding applicants in the form of research assistantships, graduate assistantships, tuition waivers for as many as 2,600 students. $1.4 million in fellowships is made available through the Dean's Fellows program and over 1,100 scholarships through the Graduate College. (www.arizona.edu/prospective/grad-paying.shtml )

Graduate students will enjoy a supportive atmosphere in which graduate representatives are invited to serve on a variety of committees at every level within the department, participate actively in outreach activities and benefit from focused career placement efforts as they exit the program. The French Department at the University of Arizona has an excellent track record placing its recent graduates in full-time teaching positions.

The University of Arizona is located in downtown Tucson, a city with a population of 800,000 people and lots to offer. Year-round sunshine, palm trees, affordable living and incredible possibilities for weekend excursions (Sedona, the Grand Canyon, Canyon de Chelly, as well as beaches in Mexico and San Diego) make Tucson a particularly attractive place to live.

Interested candidates are invited to explore the Graduate College website (http://grad.arizona.edu/). Afterwards candidates should fill out the online application located at (http://grad.arizona.edu/admissions/apply-now). Whereas the department is able to consider applications beyond the first week of January, prospective students are encouraged to apply as soon as possible to secure financial aid and teaching positions.

Please feel free to contact me via email at mlehir@u.arizona.edu  with any questions or comments you may have.

I look forward to hearing from you soon.

Marie-Pierre Le Hir