Yale offers a guaranteed sixth year of funding to all students in the Graduate School. Students will usually serve as Teaching Fellows in the sixth year and use this time to complete and submit the dissertation as well as look ahead to employment opportunities beyond Yale. The department supports students in both academic and non-academic job searches.
The department appoints a Job Placement Officer each year, who works closely with the DGS to help students prepare for the job market. Students who plan to apply for academic jobs in the fall should contact the Job Placement Officer in late spring before the semester in which they expect to begin their search. For the academic year 2026-2027, it will be Katie Trumpener.
All dissertations in Comparative Literature should be submitted with full translations of all texts (secondary and primary) quoted in languages other than English. This is to assure that the dissertation is understandable, in all its parts, to any Yale outside readers, prospective employers, readers of the dissertation on microfilm (possibly a larger and more heterogeneous audience, as information technologies change) and also any dissertation prize committees. Each of these audiences may well contain readers who command the relevant languages, but also some who do not. For detailed information on submitting dissertations, please see the Graduate School’s Checklist for the Submissions Process.