Portuguese and English Literature

One of the world's ten most widely spoken languages, Portuguese is estimated to have around 260 million speakers. Alongside English-speaking cultures, the countries in which Portuguese is spoken have had a significant international influence on literature.

This joint honours programme aims to develop your critical, analytic, linguistic and creative skills. As well as language learning, you will engage with a broad range of texts in both English and Portuguese, and a variety of approaches to reading.

Studying this combination shows an openness to ideas and perspectives other than your own, an essential attribute in many careers and a global marketplace.

Many of our graduates started as complete beginners in Portuguese. By the end of the programme, you will be able to demonstrate a range of language skills and crucial intercultural competencies.

Portuguese

Study with us and you will be immersed in an extraordinary range of literature, film, music and the arts from Portugal, Brazil and Portuguese-speaking (Lusophone) Africa.

Intensive language training, including a year abroad, gives you the opportunity to develop advanced speaking, writing, reading and translating skills in Portuguese.

English Literature

Based in the first UNESCO World City of Literature, you will study in the oldest department of English Literature in the UK, one of the longest-established in the world.

You will gain the essential skills needed for the critical close reading of poetry, drama and prose and explore the cultural contexts of writing in English from the late Middle Ages to the present.

At honours level, you will select courses on the basis of your own interests in specific topics, periods or literary genres.

Why Edinburgh

We are unique in Scotland in offering students a full academic year abroad within the four-year honours programme, regardless of whether you spend the year studying or working.

Our programme is flexible. In Years 1 and 2, as well as your core subjects, you will choose option courses from a wide range of disciplines. You will then specialise as you progress through your honours years.

When you graduate, you will have the combination of broad cultural education and specialist knowledge valued by employers worldwide.