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Graduate Program Overview

The Department of South Asian Languages and Civilizations is a multidisciplinary department made up of faculty with expertise in the languages, literatures, histories, philosophies, and religions of South Asia. The study of South Asian texts, broadly defined, is the guiding principle of our PhD degree. This involves exposure to a wide range of South Asian texts and their historical contexts, and theoretical reflection on the conditions of understanding and interpreting these texts. These goals are met through departmental seminars, advanced language courses, two written papers, and oral examinations on an interdisciplinary reading list, all of which leads up to the dissertation project.

 

Program Overview

Size of the Program

SALC admits around four new PhD students every year.

Structure of the Degree

Beginning with the Autumn 2025 cohort (Summer 2025 if a student matriculates one quarter early), students enrolling in the SALC PhD program are expected to graduate within seven years, although students may take an additional (eighth) year with the approval of the department. Our expectation is that all students should be able to graduate within seven years. The first two years of the PhD are taken up with coursework, including the completion of language requirements. Students also write one “qualifying paper” in each of their first two years to assess their progress toward professional standards of research and writing. Students also take two oral examinations, typically in their third year of the program. Students enter candidacy upon successful defense of a dissertation proposal, which usually takes place in year three or four. The final years of the program involve the fulfillment of remaining teaching requirements (including in most cases a self-designed course) and the completion and defense of the dissertation.

For details about the PhD program and its requirements, please see the SALC PhD Student Handbook.

Courses

In their first two years of the program, students take an average of three courses per quarter. SALC requires students to take three departmental seminars: one is called “South Asia as an Area of Study,” and introduces students to the study of the South Asian area, and the other two are thematic seminars (called “Research Themes”) taught by SALC faculty on a variety of topics. Apart from these required seminars, students are free to count any course offered at the University of Chicago toward the completion of their  requirements. Students will generally spend at least a third of their time fulfilling their language requirements.

See our courses page for a list of our course offerings.

Languages

SALC PhD students are expected to obtain research-level mastery in one of the South Asian languages taught in the department. They are also expected to achieve high intermediate proficiency in another South Asian language, and to achieve reading knowledge of at least one additional language of scholarship. The languages taught in SALC are:

  • Bangla (Bengali)
  • Hindi
  • Marathi
  • Sanskrit
  • Tamil
  • Tibetan
  • Urdu

Reading courses are occasionally offered in other languages, including Apabhramsha, Kannada, Rajasthani, Persian, and Prakrit. 

Teaching

Teaching is an integral part of the SALC PhD program, and students are generally assigned teaching roles beginning in their third year. Students are exposed to a variety of teaching styles and methods, and receive pedagogical training from SALC faculty as well as other resources at the University of Chicago. By the end of their program, students will usually have served as a Graduate Student Teaching Assistant for three courses and a Graduate Student Lecturer for one. 

For more information about SALC’s teaching requirements, see here.

Alumni Outcomes

We are proud to report that SALC students place into academic and nonprofit jobs at a very high rate (95% as of 2024). SALC students have gone on to become professors, researchers, and librarians. For more information see our alumni page.

Funding

All admitted PhD students are guaranteed to have full funding support from the University and external sources, or a combination of the two for the duration of their program. Applicants do not need to apply separately for funding. More information can be found on the Humanities Division website.

For additional support throughout their program, and especially for research in South Asia, students may apply to a number of other grants and fellowships, which are detailed here.

How to Apply

Prospective graduate students should read the Graduate Program portion of our departmental website and consult the list of our faculty members to learn about their current research interests and their publications. One of our professors will serve as your advisor and chair of your dissertation committee. You should therefore consider applying to SALC if your interests correspond in some measure with those of one or more members of the SALC faculty. This correspondence should be made clear in the Statement of Purpose included in your application materials.

Prospective students will apply to the University of Chicago Humanities Division with the following materials:

  • A statement of purpose which describes the intellectual issues you hope to explore at the University of Chicago.
  • A writing sample of approximately 20 pages in length; this could be an undergraduate thesis, research paper, or a section of your MA thesis that best demonstrates your critical thinking and scholarly writing.
  • At least three letters of recommendation submitted by persons able to describe your academic achievements and promise.
  • Transcripts from all previous colleges and universities.
  • All applicants for whom English is not a primary language may be required to submit current scores from the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) or the International English Language Testing System (IELTS). Current scores are no more than two years old at the time of application submission. A complete description of the English proficiency policy may be found at this website, and questions about the English proficiency requirement should be directed to humanitiesadmissions@uchicago.edu.

SALC does not require GRE scores.

Further questions

Master’s Degree Program

Although SALC does not offer an independent Master’s Degree, the University of Chicago offers Master’s-level study in through the Master of Arts Program in Humanities (MAPH). In this one-year program, students build their own curriculum with graduate-level courses in any humanities department (including SALC) and complete a thesis with a faculty adviser.

Students may also pursue more thorough language training in the MAPH Two-Year Language Option (MAPH TLO). MAPH TLO students begin taking language classes in their first year of the program, weaving language-focused coursework into the traditional MAPH year. Students continue to focus on their language skills in the second year of the program, registering for a minimum of nine total language classes during the two years they are at the University.