Comparative Literature & Translation Studies

The Program in Comparative Literature and Translation Studies promotes an active interest in the way different national literatures show affinities or mark cultural differences across geographical boundaries. By systematically juxtaposing texts or similar aesthetic manifestations in multiple languages, students and scholars in this field enter into dialogue with other cultures, traditions, disciplines, media, or forms of art. Such study often relates literary expressions to each other by focusing on the common ground or important differences; or it tracks the influence of works of literature from different languages through historical epochs or artistic movements. This way of studying literature in world contexts entails keen awareness of the necessity, including the merits and constraints--of translations of literature from the source languages.

Students who want to study literature of all periods and regions from a “comparative” perspective typically begin by learning at least one foreign language. The comparative nature of the discipline requires students to choose a second language, which can be another foreign language or English. Students can begin taking introductory core courses alongside their study of languages. By their junior year, students should already have completed courses on the intermediate level of language acquisition so they can proceed to take literature courses at the advanced level in different language and literature tracks, e.g., French, Spanish, Arabic, Chinese, Russian, etc. Through careful selection of electives and required courses, students acquire a set of skills that allows them to compare literary texts from a theoretically informed perspective and to perform the analytical tasks necessary to plan and develop independently a writing project on the advanced level of language proficiency.

Since the founding of the program at Barnard College in 1994, Comparative Literature and Translation Studies has evolved to include not only Western and ancient languages but Asian languages and non-traditional fields of cultural expression as well. The program, in close cooperation with the various literature departments and programs, offers a wide array of courses in literature, literary theory, and translation studies and translation theory, along with courses on relations between literature and the other arts.

Studying Comparative Literature means to establish new relationships across and among different disciplines, languages and regions of the world. Students benefit from the rewards of a program that builds on its curricular diversity and a dedicated faculty who make themselves available throughout the semester. As members of a small-sized department, all faculty and undergraduates enjoy frequent opportunities for close contact in and outside of the classroom.

Fall 2026 Information for Current Students

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Student Learning Outcome

The ability to discern and analyze how formal and rhetorical features of language (diction, metaphor, imagery, hyperbole, litotes, rhyme, parallelism, structures of repetition, etc.) enhance, inflect, and complicate seemingly straightforward processes of

The ability to analyze literary texts and uses of language in historical periods, cultural contexts, and social systems that are different from one’s own and that can thus help one see and re-evaluate one’s own customary and contemporary context in produc

Knowledge about the dynamics of the global circulation of literary genres, aesthetic practices, and ideas through processes of translation and adaptation and by means of various media and technologies.

Knowledge about histories of writing practices, genres, relations between script and orality, logics of periodization, and ethical systems in traditions and lifeworlds beyond the West.

The ability to craft well-reasoned and cogent arguments substantiated by careful attention to textual evidence and knowledge of historical contexts.

The ability to use literary and critical theoretical approaches to analyze and interpret texts with deftness and agility, with attention to what remains inevitably literary within theoretical discourse itself.

The ability to do the above–and playfully–in relation to more languages than one.

Our Faculty

Peter Connor

Interim Chair of Italian, Professor of French

Daniella Gitlin

Lecturer in Comparative Literature and Translation Studies

Erk Grimm

Associate Professor of German

Alfred Mac Adam

Professor

Diana Mater

Professor of Professional Practice in Comparative Literature and Art History

Caroline Weber

Professor of French

Nancy Worman

Professor of Classics and Comparative Literature, Chair of Barnard’s Department of Classics and Ancient Studies

Hana Worthen

Associate Professor of Comparative Literature and Theatre

Affiliated Faculty

Ronald Briggs

Professor of Spanish and Latin American Cultures

Rachel Eisendrath

Chair of English Department and Ann Whitney Olin Professor of English. Affiliated Faculty, Program in Comparative Literature and Translation Studies at Barnard; Medieval and Renaissance Studies Program at Barnard; Classical Studies Graduate Program at Columbia; and Medieval and Renaissance Studies Program at Columbia.

Mélanie Heydari

Lecturer of French

Maja Horn

Professor of Spanish & Latin American Cultures

Matthew L. Keegan

Assistant Professor of Asian and Middle Eastern Cultures

Jhumpa Lahiri

Millicent C. McIntosh Professor of English; Director, Creative Writing Program; Affiliated Faculty, Department of Comparative Literature and Translation Studies and Program in Italian; Senior Fellow, The Italian Academy for Advanced Studies in America, Columbia University

Lili Xia

Assistant Professor of Asian and Middle Eastern Cultures