Students who began MA studies in fall 2004 or spring 2005 should use the link to the 04-05 advising sheet below.
Students who began MA studies in fall 2005 or spring 2006 should use the link to the 05-06 advising sheet below.
Studens who began MA studies in or after fall 2006 should use the following advising sheet.

Professional Writing and Editing Advising Sheet 07-08:

This program consists of courses in professional development, nonfiction writing, literature, and research. Professional development courses enable students to build (or renew) expertise in professional writing as exercised in organizational contexts. Nonfiction writing courses offer forays into various genres and approaches to writing as exercised by professional writers. Literature courses provide insight into texts and writing practices in the literary tradition, and the research course provides instruction in current methods of research, archival and on-line. A distinguishing feature of this program is the thesis, completed when course work is complete (or nearly complete) and written for a lay or professional audience. As with all of the MA in English programs, students must demonstrate intermediate proficiency in a foreign language, outlined below.
Planning Your Course of Studies

You must complete 30 credit hours of course work in this program. Course work must be distributed according to the areas below; several courses qualify in more than one area.

Core Course (3 hours)

_____501. Introduction to Professional Writing

Research Methodology (3 hours)

_____506. Research for Narrative Writing*

_____701. Literary Scholarship*

*Students may take both courses, using the second in the applicable category below.

Professional/Writing Courses (12 hours)

_____503. Theory and Practice of Editing

_____504. Internship

_____505. Computer-Assisted Publications Writing and Design

_____506. Research for Narrative Writing

_____565. Forms of Nonfiction

_____612. Cultures of Professional Writing

_____613. Technical and Scientific Writing

_____615. Proseminar in Composition Instruction

_____616. Nonfiction Writing Workshop

_____619. Special Topics in Writing

_____695. Writing and Learning (NVWP)

_____697. Theory of Composition

_____699 Workshop in English

Literary, Linguistic, Cultural, and Rhetorical Studies (9 hours)

_____511. Styles and Modes in Literary History

_____512. Issues in Literature and Philosophy

_____513. Advanced Special Topics in English

_____514. Theories in Comparative Literature

_____551. Literary Criticism

_____591. Special Topics in Folklore

_____604. Internship in Folklore

_____611. Studies in Rhetoric

_____625. British Medieval

_____630. Early Modern

_____635. Eighteenth-Century British

_____640. Nineteenth-Century British

_____645. Twentieth-Century British

_____650. Seventeenth-Century American

_____655. Nineteenth-Century American

_____660. Twentieth-Century American

_____670. Visual Culture: Theories and Histories

_____675. Feminist Theory and Criticism

_____676. Intro to Cultural Studies

_____685. Special Topics, Movements, or Genres of Literature in English

_____701. Literary Scholarship

_____705. Literary Theory and Criticism

_____LING 785. Semantics and Pragmatics

Thesis (3 hours)

_____799. Thesis

Language Requirement (intermediate proficiency in a foreign language)

Intermediate proficiency corresponds to GMU's coursework through the 202 or 209 level. Generally speaking, this level represents 4 consecutive semesters in a given language (e.g. French 101, 102, 201, and 202). You may satisfy this requirement in three ways:

Transfer of Credit Policies

Up to 12 credit hours of graduate credit earned prior to admission to a master's program may be eligible to be transferred into the program and applied to the degree.  This applies to credit earned in GMU's Nondegree program, as well as accredited colleges and universities outside of George Mason.   To learn more about the policies governing transfer of credit, please click on Credit Transfer Policies.