Graduate
programs at Cornell are organized around the "special committee"
which is composed of three or four faculty members and endowed with significant
autonomy in guiding and determining the particular program of each graduate
student. The graduate program in Comparative Literature uses the flexibility
inherent in this arrangement to its full advantage. First, the program
imposes no required courses, thus allowing the student maximal latitude
in composing a program of study. Second, the program sets minimal restrictions
on the composition of the special committee, requiring only that the chair
of the special committee belong to the graduate field of Comparative Literature,
so that the remaining 2 or 3 three members of the committee can be drawn
from the graduate field of any discipline. These two defining aspects
of the graduate program permit the graduate student, in consultation with
the Special Committee, to compose a program tailored precisely to her
interests as these evolve and become refined in the course of study. The
graduate program’s flexibility has fostered cutting-edge interdisciplinary
approaches and allowed students to explore emergent fields of study.
