The Graduate Department of Slavic and East European Languages and Cultures offers instruction leading to two degrees — Master of Arts and Doctor of Philosophy — in one of the broadest ranges of Slavic languages and literatures available in a North American university. Courses are offered in the following areas: Croatian and Serbian Languages and Literatures, Czech and Slovak Languages and Literatures, Polish Language and Literature, Russian Language and Literature, and Ukrainian Language and Literature.
The department's literature programs are especially strong in nineteenth and twentieth century literary and cultural history, modernism, avant-garde and contemporary movements, literary theory, drama, cinema, and Slavic-Jewish cultural relations.
Over the last decade, curricula in all the languages, literatures and cultures taught in the department have been rewritten to mirror the dramatic social, cultural and political changes in Central, Eastern and Southern Europe. The department has developed new areas of research and expertise. Due to extensive internal cooperation and interdisciplinary focus, new common ground among disciplines has been found; the study of the interrelations of these cultures is promoted.