Oklahoma State University Entry Essay

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I am writing this statement to apply for admission to the Ph.D. program in English at Oklahoma State University. After earning my Master’s Degree in English and Comparative Literature from Tours University in France, I worked for 9 years as an English and English as a second language instructor almost exclusively in a higher education setting. Now I have decided to take my professional career to another level by undertaking a doctoral program that will prepare and qualify me to teach literature in higher education institutions.

The decision to apply to the Ph.D. program in English at Oklahoma State University came after a careful exploration of what the doctoral program in humanities provides in terms of research and professional development …show more content…

With its stylistic revolution in conventional dramatic norms and its emphasis on the nonsensical aspect of human existence, Absurd Drama has not only intrigued and awed me with its accurate depiction of the plight of mankind, but it has also shaped my understanding of myself and the world.
Accordingly, I wrote a detailed research paper on Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot as a Model of Absurd Drama to earn the Bachelor’s Degree in English Language and Literature. The Master’s dissertation; however, led me to an in-depth analysis of the dramas of another prominent figure in Absurd Drama: Harold Pinter. Thus, the Master’s Degree thesis attempted to shed some light on the distortion of the communicative process in his …show more content…

I am particularly interested in twentieth-century literature. In fact, the theme that I am eager to research should I attend your doctoral program is the violence of language and the language of violence in modern American Drama. In other words, verbal and physical violence represent the human defensive mechanisms and our reluctance to unmask ourselves and to disclose our real identities to others no matter how distant or close they are to us. In this regard, numerous American playwrights have portrayed the limits of verbal communication in their dramas. Subsequently, choosing which playwright is the most fitting to this thematic and the most promising to study is no facile task. I have been thinking for months about the author whose dramas are emblematic and relevant to my proposal, and my initial choice is to examine the theme of the violence of language and the language of violence in the dramas of Edward