The PhD program in East Asian languages and literatures is designed to provide students with a high level of competence in their area of specialization and a familiarity with applicable methodologies and theories. The program has four components: course work, comprehensive examination, prospectus for the dissertation, and the dissertation itself.
Specific courses and projects used to fulfill requirements must be approved by the student’s advisor, who works with the other faculty members to develop the student’s program.
In summary, here is a timeline students should anticipate:
- Course work: Two years
- Comprehensive examination and prospectus approval: One year
- Dissertation writing and defense: Two years
PhD in Chinese
The PhD degree in East Asian languages and literatures with a specialization in Chinese literature requires completion of a minimum of six 4-credit graduate-level courses beyond those required for the MA degree.
Depending on the student’s background or preparation at the time of admission to the PhD program, the number of required courses may be nine or twelve. Courses must be chosen in consultation with the student’s advisor.
Course Work
For the PhD, the student needs to successfully complete:
- Six courses in Chinese literature or film
- Three methods courses:
- Issues in Early Chinese Literature (CHN 523)
- Issues in Medieval Chinese Literature (CHN 524)
- Issues in Modern Chinese Literature (CHN 525) or equivalents if the student has already taken these courses
The student also needs to choose one of the following options:
- Demonstrate the ability to use a second foreign language substantively in research or pass a translation examination in the language.
- Demonstrate advanced knowledge of a particular methodology or theory by taking three graduate-level courses, including one course in Reading and Conference (CHN 605) for which the student writes a paper applying the methodology to Chinese literature.
- Complete three courses in a secondary literature.
Depending on the student’s background when admitted to the PhD program, additional course work may be required.
Advancement to Candidacy
Students in the EALL PhD track must successfully complete a comprehensive examination and prospectus defense (culture students) or qualifying paper (linguistics students) in order to advance to candidacy (ABD, all but dissertation) status.
By the end of their second year in the PhD program at the very latest, each student should identify a committee of three professors who will oversee their training for the comprehensive examination. Since each person’s needs and interests may be different, students are expected to work closely with their primary advisor at all stages of the process.
Students will advance to ABD status after the successful completion of both comprehensive examination and prospectus defense (culture) or qualifying paper (linguistics) in addition to completion of all required coursework.
Immediately following successful completion of the comprehensive examination, a dissertation committee is formed by the student and the graduate secretary. This committee advises the student on writing the dissertation and approves the completed dissertation. The student presents to this committee, within one month, a dissertation proposal with a bibliography. After approval of this prospectus, the student becomes eligible to enroll in Dissertation (CHN 603).
PhD in Japanese
The PhD with a specialization in Japanese Studies requires students to successfully complete nine graduate courses beyond the number required for the MA degree. These courses must be chosen in consultation with the student’s advisor. Appropriate courses in related fields (e.g., Japanese history, religion) may be substituted with the advisor’s approval.
Course Work
Students must successfully complete nine graduate courses (4-5 credits each) including courses in:
- Japanese literature and/or film (3 courses) with at least one course in each area
- Interdisciplinary subfield course (1 course)
- Critical theory and/or film theory (2 courses), preferably in the Japanese studies sector
- Japanese linguistics or teaching methodology (1 course)
Advancement to Candidacy
Students in the EALL PhD track must successfully complete a comprehensive examination and prospectus defense (culture students) or qualifying paper (linguistics students) to advance to candidacy (ABD, all but dissertation) status.
By the end of their second year in the PhD program at the very latest, each student should identify a committee of three professors who will oversee their training for the comprehensive examination. Since each person’s needs and interests may be different, students are expected to work closely with their primary advisor at all stages of the process.
Students will advance to ABD status after the successful completion of both comprehensive examination and prospectus defense (culture) or qualifying paper (linguistics) in addition to completion of all required coursework.
Immediately following successful completion of the comprehensive examination, a dissertation committee is formed by the student and the graduate secretary. This committee advises the student on writing the dissertation and approves the completed dissertation. The student presents to this committee, within one month, a dissertation proposal with a bibliography. After approval of this prospectus, the student becomes eligible to enroll in Dissertation (CHN 603).
PhD in Korean Literature and Culture
The PhD with a specialization in Korean Literature and Culture requires students to successfully complete nine graduate courses beyond the number required for the MA degree. These courses must be chosen in consultation with the student’s advisor. Appropriate courses in related fields (e.g., Korean history, religion) may be substituted with the advisor’s approval.
Course Work
Students must successfully complete nine graduate courses (4-5 credits each) including courses in:
- Korean literature and/or film (3 courses) with at least one course in each area
- Interdisciplinary subfield course (1 course)
- Critical theory and/or film theory (2 courses), preferably in the Korean studies sector
- Korean linguistics or teaching methodology (1 course)
Advancement to Candidacy
Students in the EALL PhD track must successfully complete a comprehensive examination and prospectus defense (culture students) or qualifying paper (linguistics students) to advance to candidacy (ABD, all but dissertation) status.
By the end of their second year in the PhD program at the very latest, each student should identify a committee of three professors who will oversee their training for the comprehensive examination. Since each person’s needs and interests may be different, students are expected to work closely with their primary advisor at all stages of the process.
Students will advance to ABD status after the successful completion of both comprehensive examination and prospectus defense (culture) or qualifying paper (linguistics) in addition to completion of all required coursework.
Immediately following successful completion of the comprehensive examination, a dissertation committee is formed by the student and the graduate secretary. This committee advises the student on writing the dissertation and approves the completed dissertation. The student presents to this committee, within one month, a dissertation proposal with a bibliography. After approval of this prospectus, the student becomes eligible to enroll in Dissertation (CHN 603).
PhD in East Asian Linguistics
The East Asian Languages and Literatures Department offers a PhD program in East Asian Linguistics. This is one of few in the nation that offer a complete East Asian Linguistics program, focusing on Chinese, Japanese and Korean. Students may elect to specialize in Chinese, Japanese or Korean linguistics or, alternatively, they may undertake cross-linguistic studies involving two or three of the East Asian languages.
EALL faculty’s expertise covers major sub-fields of linguistics and applied linguistics. In our research and teaching, we emphasize functional and empirical approaches to the study of language structure, use, learning and teaching.
Our instructors include:
- Kaori Idemaru: Japanese linguistics, acoustic phonetics, second language acquisition, language pedagogy.
- Zhuo Jing-Schmidt: Cognitive linguistics, corpus linguistics, emotion and pragmatics, historical linguistics and grammaticalization.
- Nayoung Kwon: (Korean) linguistics, psycho-/neuro-linguistics, language processing and acquisition.
UO is also home to a very strong Linguistics Department, and students may augment their programs by drawing upon its course offerings.
Course Work
Students must successfully complete a minimum of nine graduate courses. At least six of these must be in the Department of EALL.
Select 3 of the 6 classes from this list:
- CHN 580 Chinese Linguistics
- EALL 540 East Asian Phonetics
- EALL 541 Japanese and Korean Syntax
- EALL 680 Research Methods and Bibliography
Select additional classes to make 6 from EALL Electives:
- CHN 581 Chinese Pedagogical Grammar
- CHN 582 History of the Chinese Language
- JPN 554 Japanese Pedagogical Grammar
- KRN 510 Korean Pedagogical Grammar
- EALL 543 Chinese, Japanese and Korean Pedagogy
- EALL 542 SLA of Chinese, Japanese and Korean
- EALL 586 East Asian Sociopragmatics
- EALL 507 Seminar (Figurative Language etc.)
- EALL 607 Seminar (East Asian Linguistics Bibliography and Research Methods etc.)
Theoretical Linguistics Courses
- LING 511 Phonetics
- LING 515 Semantics
- LING 523 Fieldwork Methods and Ethics
- LING 532 Pathology of Language
- LING 535 Morphology and Syntax
- LING 540 Linguistic Principles and Second-Language Learning
- LING 544 Second-Language Acquisition
- LING 550 Introduction to Phonology
- LING 551 Functional Syntax I
- LING 552 Functional Syntax II
- LING 560 Historical and Comparative Linguistics
- LING 590 Sociolinguistics
- LING 595 Language and Gender
- LING 614 Linguistic Theory: Phonology
- LING 615 Linguistic Theory: Syntax
- LING 616 Linguistic Theory: Semantics
- LING 617, 618, 619 Field Methods I,II,III
- LING 621 Empirical Methods in Linguistics
- LING 622 Discourse Analysis
- LING 644 Advanced Second-Language Acquisition
- LING 660 Historical Syntax
LTS Courses
- LT 528 Culture, Language and Literature
- LT 535 Second Language Teaching Methods
- LT 536 Second Language Teaching Planning
- LT 537 Second Language Teaching Practice
- LT 541 Teaching English Pronunciation
- LT 548 Curriculum and Materials Development
- LT 549 Testing and Assessment
Statistics Courses (in Psychology and Education Departments)
- EDUC 614 Educational Statistics
- PSY 302 Statistical Methods for Psychology
- PSY 512 Applied Data Analysis
Courses must be chosen in consultation with the advisor and may be tailored to the research interests of individual students (Applied Linguistics, Theoretical Linguistics, etc.). While it is important to balance the courses of study, it is important to develop a specific research area and to focus on taking courses related to that area.
Advancement to Candidacy
Students in the East Asian Linguistics PhD track must successfully complete (I) a comprehensive examination and (II) a qualifying paper in order to advance to candidacy (ABD, all but dissertation) status.
By the end of their second year in the PhD program at the very latest, each student should identify a committee of three professors who will oversee their training for the comprehensive examination. Since each person’s needs and interests may be different, students are expected to work closely with their primary advisor at all stages of the process.
Students will advance to candidacy upon successful completion of both the comprehensive exam and the qualifying paper as well as the required course work. At this point, the student and the Department must electronically submit the advancement to candidacy to the Graduate School for approval.
The doctoral committee must include at least three faculty members from EALL and an outside member, and must be either chaired or co-chaired by the doctoral advisor in EALL. The PhD is granted upon the completion of the course requirements, the comprehensive exams, the qualifying paper, the composition of an original dissertation acceptable to the doctoral committee, and a successful oral defense of the doctoral dissertation.
Comprehensive Examination
The goal of the comprehensive examination is to make sure that students are broadly enough trained that they are qualified to teach beyond the narrow research focus of their dissertation. The comprehensive examination is composed of a written and an oral component.
In conjunction with their primary advisor, students will choose three fields: a major field and two minor fields, each to be advised by a professor in that area. Cultural fields may be determined by genre, time period, or methodology; linguistic fields may be determined by theoretical orientation, language orientation, and methodology.
The following are requirements that are specific to culture track students:
In conjunction with their advisors, students will develop a reading list of 30-40 items for each field. These items may include both primary and secondary texts; the composition of each reading list will be tailored to the individual student’s needs. It is expected that reading lists will develop organically from graduate seminars and readings and conferences.
The student will submit one comprehensive examination paper. The paper may be developed from a term paper written for a seminar or written for the sake of the examination, as determined by the advisor. The comprehensive examination paper should demonstrate the student’s broad knowledge of a field. It should be between 7000-9000 words and will be examined and approved by two members of the committee. The paper should be written at a "professional standard"; by "professional," it is meant that any reasonable scholar in the relevant field(s) of study would deem the paper a legitimate work of scholarship.
It is expected that the examination paper will be finished, and that the two committee members reading it will have approved it, by the end of the term previous to the oral examination. Readers have the right to expect at least one week to read and approve the final version.
After the paper has been approved, the student will schedule an oral examination. The oral examination, to last one to two hours, is an opportunity for the three examiners to engage the student in a broad conversation about the items on the reading lists. The goal of the oral examination is to ensure that students have enough familiarity with both the critical and primary works in the field to teach at the post-secondary level. The oral examination is not open to the public.
Both written and oral parts of the comprehensive examination, alongside the prospectus defense, should be completed by the end of the student’s third year in the PhD program. It is at the discretion of the committee to determine if students should have a second opportunity to sit for an oral examination if the first attempt is not successful. No student will be allowed to sit for an oral examination for a third time. At the discretion of the committee, those students whose performance is deemed unsatisfactory may be granted a terminal MA.
The following details a hypothetical timeline of when PhD students should complete the comprehensive exams and prospectus:
- by the end of the second year, three fields examiners are assigned, and the reading lists for each field are compiled; the topic of the qualifying exam paper is determined, and the two examining committee members for the paper are identified
- by the end of Fall term of the third year, the comprehensive exam paper is completed and approved
- by the end of Winter term of the third year, the oral defense is completed
- by the end of Spring term of the third year, the prospectus defense is completed
Note that students on the BA-PhD track have an additional year to complete all requirements.
Prospectus Defense (Culture Track)
Before scheduling the prospectus defense, students need to notify the Graduate Coordinator of the membership of their dissertation committee. A complete committee consists of the Chairperson, two core faculty, and one Institutional Representative. At least one core member must be from EALL. Core members from outside UO are acceptable via petition to the Graduate School. At the time of scheduling the prospectus defense, at least three members of the committee should be identified, of which two must be from EALL (including the Chairperson). At least three members, of which two must be from EALL (including the Chairperson), are required to attend, in person or remotely, the prospectus defense, during which they will provide feedback on the dissertation research project. The prospectus, a document of 20-30 pages, should introduce the research question, the methodology, and a basic outline of the dissertation, as well as include a bibliography. Once the advisors approve a draft of the dissertation prospectus, basically certifying that in their opinion the project is well-conceived and viable, the student will schedule a meeting of the committee. A defense is an opportunity for the committee to ask questions and provide advice and direction for the research project. The prospectus defense can be made public at the student's request.
If the defense is successful, then the student must form a complete committee if they have not already done so and notify the Graduate Coordinator no later than six months before the final oral defense of the dissertation.
If the defense is not successful, the committee may decide to allow the student to defend again the next term or decide that the student will no longer complete the PhD program. No student will be allowed to defend the prospectus a third time.
In order to leave enough time for the dissertation research and writing, the prospectus defense should take place during the third year of study and no later than the winter term of the fourth year. Students who are unable to complete a viable prospectus by spring of their fourth year in the PhD program will be granted a terminal MA.
Qualifying paper (Linguistics Track)
As the equivalent of the prospectus defense for culture track students, linguistics students are expected to produce an original publishable paper, of substantial length and quality, in a subfield of linguistics. This qualifying paper should demonstrate the student’s ability to carry out an empirical study and to write an analytical research paper. The unmodified MA thesis cannot serve this purpose.
A committee consisting of the Chairperson and a second faculty member familiar with the subfield will referee the qualifying paper. The student may be asked to revise the qualifying paper before it is accepted as satisfactory work. Upon documented completion of the paper, the student needs to identify a dissertation committee and notify the Graduate Coordinator. A complete committee consists of the Chairperson, two core faculty, and one Institutional Representative. At least one core member must be from EALL. Core members from outside UO are acceptable via petition to the Graduate School. At time of advancement, at least three members of the committee should be identified, of which two must be from EALL (including the Chairperson). At this point the student will confirm the dissertation topic. This should be done within one term of completing the qualifying paper. After the topic has been approved by the committee, the student will advance to candidacy.
After advancement, the student must form a complete committee if they have not already done so and notify the Graduate Coordinator no later than six months before the final oral defense of the dissertation.
In order to leave enough time for the dissertation research and writing, the qualifying paper and prospectus should be completed during the third year of study and no later than the winter term of the fourth year. Students who are unable to complete a viable qualifying paper by spring of their fourth year in the PhD program will be granted a terminal MA.
Dissertation Timeline
In graduate programs, it’s the student’s responsibility to:
- Communicate in an appropriate and timely way with advisors to stay on track.
- Understand and meet all Graduate School deadlines.
Advising PhD students is among the most important responsibilities of faculty; reading multiple drafts of theses and dissertations can be extremely time consuming. Different advisors and committee members will have different preferences and work styles in terms of how many drafts they prefer to read and how much time they need to read and comment on each one.
The guidelines below represent the minimum amount of time students should give their advisor and committee to read and respond to drafts. If a number of students plan to defend during any given term, the advisor/committee members may ask the student to turn in work to them at an even earlier date. Those students who cannot honor these deadlines may be asked to defer graduation one term.
A “clean copy” means a draft needing only minor technical and editorial corrections, not one needing substantive revisions.
- Two terms before graduation: Meet/correspond with advisor and committee members during the first week of term to coordinate student and faculty schedules (i.e. winter term if planning to graduate spring term).
- At least six weeks before the date of the final oral defense: Submit a complete draft to main advisor for approval. The advisor is expected to return comments within two weeks. There will then be a continuing dialogue between the student and advisor until the manuscript is considered defendable. If approval is not obtained at this point, there is no guarantee that the student will be able to graduate that term.
- Submit clean copy of dissertation to primary advisor and committee members two weeks before confirming defense date with Graduate School.
Apply to our Graduate Program
Ready to apply? Start your application on Slate, the centralized application portal for graduate admissions at the University of Oregon.