Department of English, University of Toronto

The Professor Linda Munk Graduate Futures Scholarship is awarded based on exceptional academic merit to one full-time MA student in the Department of English at the University of Toronto. The scholarship is open to all areas of English Literature, but where all other indicators of excellence are equal, priority is given to applicants whose stated area of interest is American literature.

No special application is required — all MA program applications are automatically considered.

Visit our link in bio for more details.

🎉 You’re invited! 🎉

Join us for Verse & Revelry, the Department of English’s End-of-Year Celebration, as we recognize the achievements and hard work of our undergraduate students!

📅 Date: April 4, 2025
⏰ Time: 1–3 PM
📍 Location: Charbonnel Lounge (81 St. Mary St., Toronto)

✨ Please RSVP by March 31 by visiting our link in bio!

For questions or accommodations, contact Jason Phillips at [email protected].

We can’t wait to celebrate with you! 🎭📚

We’re thrilled to invite you to Literature Matters, featuring Nahlah Ayed, Billy-Ray Belcourt, and Kyo Maclear on Friday, April 25 at Isabel Bader Theatre. Hosted by Smaro Kamboureli, this marks her final event as the Avie Bennett Chair in Canadian Literature—don’t miss it!

📍 Location: Isabel Bader Theatre (93 Charles St. West, Toronto)
⏰ Doors open at 7:00 PM | Event begins at 7:30 PM
🎟 Reserve your free ticket today!

Featured Speakers:
📚 Nahlah Ayed
📚 Billy-Ray Belcourt
📚 Kyo Maclear

Visit our website for more details!

Interview with Fawn Parker:

“A Conversation with Fawn Parker: Insights from the MA in English in the Field of Creative Writing”

Can be found on the English Department website: https://www.english.utoronto.ca/news/conversation-fawn-parker-insights-ma-english-field-creative-writing

Fawn Parker is a celebrated author and distinguished graduate of the English Department’s MA program in English in the Field of Creative Writing.

March 12, 2025, by Zhehui Cici Xie – MA English Student

Join us on March 24th at 4:15 PM in Jackman Humanities Building Room 616 for an exciting talk by Kevin Quashie, Royce Family Professor of Teaching Excellence in English at Brown University.

A reception will follow the event. Visit our website for more details and to RSVP!

You are invited to attend:

Professor Lisa Siraganian: "Who Lifted the Lorax? Personifying the Environment and Problems of Action"

Location: Jackman Humanities Building, Room 100

Time: Wednesday, March 19, 4:00-6:00 pm

 

The event is sponsored by the Department of English and the Centre for Comparative Literature. 

 
Talk Description:
After a river in New Zealand was granted legal personhood in 2012, related movements blossomed around the world. But giving human-like rights to the environment has also faced serious problems and challenges. To begin investigating them, this talk zeros in on Dr. Seuss’s [Theodore Geisel’s] The Lorax (1971), the celebrated illustrated environmentalist book, which was written and published virtually contemporaneously with legal scholar Christopher Stone’s groundbreaking 1972 essay, “Should Trees Have Standing? Toward Legal Rights for Natural Objects.” The basic dialectic of Dr. Seuss’s children’s story shares some of the same challenges of the personification of the environment that Stone advocates. Is the “Lorax” who “speak[s] for the trees, for the trees have no tongues,” a “who” with intention and agency or an “it” without interests or the capacity to act? This question continues to weave its way through later environmental personhood debates, often as the challenge of anthropomorphism and property rights. Perhaps other forms of representation might be more effective—for the environment—than personhood?

Titilola Aiyegbusi is studying the life writing of Black Canadian women to understand how their stories about culture, belonging, and collective memory have shaped — and continue to shape — Black identity and consciousness in Canada.

Read about how she is 'finding her words' through the life stories of Black Canadian women at:

https://www.english.utoronto.ca/news/titilola-aiyegbusi-%E2%80%98finding-her-words%E2%80%99-through-life-stories-black-canadian-women

Photo credit: Lisa Sakulensky; Courtesy of Massey College, where Aiyegbusi is a Junior Fellow.

The Professor Linda Munk Graduate Futures Scholarship

From now until December 20, 2023, the University of Toronto is accepting applications to its Master of Arts in English program. All eligible applicants will automatically be considered for the Professor Linda Munk Graduate Futures Scholarship, a prestigious award acknowledging exceptional academic merit.

Learn more about how this award could support your studies at U of T’s esteemed Department of English by visiting our website.

https://www.english.utoronto.ca/graduate/current-students/finances-awards/professor-linda-munk-graduate-futures-scholarship

Come join our Department!

Assistant Professor - African American Literature

Assistant Professor - African American Literature Assistant Professor - African American Literature

The Department of English Administrative Office will be closing early on Friday, May 19th at 2:00 pm. We apologize for any inconvenience.

The Administrative Office will reopen at our usual time of 8:45 am on Tuesday, May 23rd.

Thank you for your understanding and have a safe and happy long weekend!

Interested in taking a summer course? The Department of English is offering dozens of options for the 2023 Summer Session, from introductory courses to Advanced Studies seminars. Click the link in our bio to learn more!

Prof. Cheryl Suzack recognized with the Ludwik & Estelle Jus Memorial Human Rights Prize!

Cheryl Suzack recognized with the Ludwik & Estelle Jus Memorial Human Rights Prize | Department of English Cheryl Suzack, a leading scholar of Indigenous literature, studies and decolonization, has been named the 2023 winner of the prestigious Ludwik & Estelle Jus Memorial Human Rights Prize, in the Influential Leader category.