Thesis Advisory Committee

The first step toward a thesis is forming your Thesis Advisory Committee. Consisting of a Thesis Committee Chair and two Readers, this committee has the major responsibility of guiding you in completing a thesis. Form your Thesis Advisory Committee from faculty members with whom you would like to work and who have strong backgrounds in your thesis area. This should be done early in your M.A. program, and no later than the end of your second semester of study. You should consult with the departmental Graduate Advisor on your choice of the Thesis Committee Chair and Readers before approaching individual faculty members with a formal request to be on your Committee.

German Department faculty cover a wide variety of specialties in literature, language, and rhetoric studies; however, you may go outside the department for readers if your subject requires it. Your Thesis Committee Chair MUST be a German faculty member. Until the Thesis Advisory Committee is formed, the Graduate Advisor will serve as your advisor. A list of German faculty and their research specialities follows:

• Brewer, Cindy P., Assistant Professor. PhD, University of Utah,1998. German Literature (Eighteenth- and Nineteenth-Century Prose, Literature by Women).
• James, Michelle S., Associate Professor. PhD, University of Utah, 1987. German Literature (Lessing, Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries, Women’s Studies).
• Keele, Alan F., Professor. PhD, Princeton University, 1971. German Literature (Earlier Twentieth Century, 1945’Present, Rilke, Grass).
• Kelling, Hans-Wilhelm, Professor. PhD, Stanford University, 1967. German Literature (Goethezeit); Cultural History.
• Lund, Randall J., Assistant Professor. PhD, University of Minnesota, 1986. Foreign Language Methodology; Teacher Education.
• Lyon, James K., Professor. PhD, Harvard University, 1963. German Literature (Holocaust, Brecht, Celan, Twentieth Century Drama and Poetry).
• McFarland, Robert B., Assistant Professor of German Literature. PhD., University of California, Berkeley, 2000
• Smith, Laura C., Assistant Professor of German Linguistics. Ph.D., University of Wisconsin-Madison, 2004

Early in the M.A. program, and no later than the end of the second semester of graduate study, the student should form a Thesis Advisory Committee, which consists of a Chair and two Readers. This committee, and especially the Chair, will help the student with the choice of a thesis topic and in selecting appropriate courses, etc. Students are strongly encouraged to select the Committee Chair from faculty members with whom they would like to work and who have strong backgrounds in their chosen or putative thesis areas.

Note: It is important to consult with the Graduate Advisor about the choice of a Thesis Committee Chair and Readers before approaching individual faculty members with a formal request to be on a student’s committee. Once the choice is made, the student must obtain the signatures of the three committee members on a form that can be obtained from departmental secretaries.