The Department of American Culture and Literature offers a program leading to the Bachelor of Arts degree. The department offers a course selection that examines the United States in all its complexity, integrating literature, culture, and history. This interdisciplinary program will not only introduce students to the study of the United States but will also develop critical and creative thinking skills that will enable students to reflect upon their own culture and its history and literature. The newly revised curriculum seeks to ground students in the skills of close reading and textual analysis. Further, it asks students to consider works in their historical and cultural contexts, illustrating the complicated social relations that exist between writer, text, history, and reader. In recognition of the demands of contemporary professional and academic life, the program now requires courses in the natural and social sciences. The program, as is true of most other programs in the humanities, does not offer vocational training per se but rather develops fluency in English, analytical skills, and ability in written expression that will prepare students for success in their professional lives and in further academic study.