ENGLISH

Faculty

At Dordt College, you will study under professors who feel deeply the excitement and value of studying literature. They will help you analyze and evaluate literary work from a Christian perspective, considering the moral vision and worldview of an author, along with the literary elements of his or her work.

Students learn to write best from those who write well, which is why Dordt’s English department offers a particularly strong writing emphasis. All of our professors are practicing writers who write and publish stories, poems, professional articles, essays, and op-ed pieces. Several have published books, some of which have included work by talented students. Our professors believe that what they write—and also how they see and feel and think—is shaped by and should reflect their faith in a God who holds eternal ownership of every inch of our world.

Their goals for students are to help each graduate write with clarity, precision, and grace in a variety of forms and for a variety of audiences; to perceive literature as a way of experiencing the truth about being human; to read critically; to be able to interpret and understand literature from a variety of time periods and cultures; to apply these skills of interpretation in all areas of life; to find a Reformed place to stand on language and literature; and to be independent learners, able to search for, assess, and integrate information on literature as well as other subjects and areas of life.