The Centre is run by ten core members of academic staff and two administrative staff, and serviced by a range of other lecturers in the College of Arts, Humanities & Law and College of Social Science, drawing from the disciplines of English Literature, Film Studies, History, History of Art, Modern Languages and Politics. The first two years of an American Studies degree at Leicester comprise a series of complementary modules dealing with American History, Literature, Politics, Film and Visual Culture. This structure provides a firm and stimulating foundation that enables students to specialise in the final year by researching and writing a long dissertation of their choice and by selecting from a range of options (see below). 

First Year

The First Year provides a foundation in key disciplines in American Studies: History, Literature and Politics. In addition, we offer The American West, an interdisciplinary module which integrates the different subject areas to deal with a vital part of the American experience.

Second Year

The Second Year develops the knowledge gained in the First Year by exploring specific themes including African-American History, Ethnicity and Diversity in American Literature, Film and Visual Culture and the Civil War and Reconstruction. We also offer a second interdisciplinary module on The American City, which consolidates and extends the approaches taken on The American West module in the first year. Together, these two modules are designed to show how disciplines can be brought together to explore a single theme in American Studies.

Final Year

The Final Year is comprised of two options each semester and a long dissertation.

The Final Year options may include: American Foreign Policy; New York Stories; Coming of Age in America; American Political Development; American Autobiography; Containment and Resistance in 1950s and 1960s American Culture; Modern American Poetry; Mexico-US Border History and Culture; The Civil Rights Movement; The USA and Vietnam; Women in American Society; Hollywood and Melodrama; Race, Crime and Punishment; The Presidency of Franklin D. Roosevelt; B Films and Serials.

Students have recently worked on the following dissertation topics: African-American Protest Music; The American Horror Movie; The American Talk Show; The Death Penalty; Female Prostitution in New Orleans; The Great Migration; The Leisure Industry; Paranoia in American Film; The Rise of Gangsterism; The Role of Mexicans in Film; The Southern Plantation Mistress; Women in 1920s America.

Degree Structure (three years and four years)

Year One

Year Two

Year Three (Year Abroad students only)

Year Four