Johns Hopkins University was, in 1947, among the first major academic institutions in the United States to create a degree for writers.

The department of the Writing Seminars, distinguished by 60-plus years of teaching by prominent American writers, is characterized by the quality of its faculty, small classes, and a broad liberal arts curriculum as part of the major. More than 30 introductory writing classes are offered each semester, with an additional 20 reading seminars and writing workshops for majors and non-majors.

For the BA, students work primarily in fiction and poetry but may take courses in nonfiction prose, editorial writing, screenwriting, playwriting, and science writing. An array of internships and a visiting writers’ reading series offer wider opportunities.

For the two-year MFA, students concentrate in either fiction or poetry. The Writing Seminars’ success at all levels is confirmed by an extraordinary record of prizes for, and publications by, our alumni.

What can you do with your degree?

Write! With skills learned at The Writing Seminars, countless students have gone on to publish novels, short stories, poetry collections, and nonfiction articles and books. Our graduates also excel simultaneously in fields such as teaching, editing, arts administration, and a variety of other professions ranging from law to business to medicine.

Related Programs and Centers

• Film and Media
• Theatre Arts
• The Hopkins Review

The ancient Near East is where the first crops were sown, the first cities were built, and the first writing was invented. The origins of Western culture are found in its great civilizations, from the three main monotheistic religions—Christianity, Islam, and Judaism—to things we use every day and take for granted, such as the alphabet and marking time by hours and minutes.

The Johns Hopkins Department of Near Eastern Studies offers a wide range of courses on the cultures and languages of the ancient Near East, including Egypt, Israel, Syria-Palestine, Mesopotamia, and the Arabian peninsula. Archaeology is also an option for students, and the department carries out excavations in Egypt, Syria, Oman, and Ethiopia. Courses cover archaeology, history, religion, art, language, and literature of the ancient civilizations of the Near East.

The department uses modern tools of analysis to study ancient Near Eastern civilizations, utilizing ancient written records and physical evidence as primary data. The study of language and script allows for an ability to access sources in the original, while historical and archaeological study facilitates an understanding of context and relationships with surrounding cultures. 

What can you do with your degree?

A degree in Near Eastern studies can be used as the basis for a career in Near Eastern history, languages, art history, or archaeology, teaching or conducting research at a university, college, museum, seminary, or research institute. In addition, the grounding in humanistic, social science, and natural science techniques as well as in the study of different cultures prepares graduates for careers in a wide diversity of fields beyond Near Eastern studies itself.

Related Programs and Centers

• Program in Archaeology
• Umm el-Marra Joint Expedition
• Johns Hopkins Archaeological Museum

The civilizations of ancient Greece and Rome continue to delight and engage us with their history, literature, art, philosophy, and perennial relevance. Students of the Classics ground their enthusiasm for the ancient world in the study of the languages, thought, and physical remains of these amazing societies.

The Department of Classics offers a rigorous yet flexible BA program, while also accommodating a variety of interests in and approaches to the ancient world. Classes are small and students work closely with their professors and instructors.

The department offers courses in ancient Greek and Latin language and literature at all levels, as well as a variety of courses on the history, civilization, religion, art, archaeology, philosophy, and mythology of the ancient Greek and Roman worlds. Students are also encouraged to spend a semester or summer overseas in Italy or Greece.

Undergraduates have the option of working toward a five-year BA/MA co-terminal degree.

What can you do with your degree?

There are many possible professions and career paths for Classics majors. The ability to speak other languages can lead to positions all over the world. In addition, the knowledge of languages such as ancient Greek and Latin is a rare skill that sets you apart in a competitive job market. Many doctors, lawyers, politicians, and historians have a background in classical studies.

Some students go on to do graduate work in classics or related academic areas. Others apply to professional schools, especially law and medicine. Some students elect to enter the workforce directly after graduation in fields such as publishing, museum work, or government service.

Related Programs and Centers

• Archaeology
• Program in Museums and Society

In 1883, G. Stanley Hall founded the first psychological laboratory in America at Johns Hopkins University. Since then, the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences has played a key role in the evolution of the field, investigating the most fundamental questions of behavior, mind, and brain.

Dedicated to research, the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences is one of the top-ranked psychology departments in the world. The program stresses methodology for the investigation of the biological and psychological processes underlying human and animal behavior and cognition.

The intimate size of the department gives students and faculty significant flexibility to design individual training programs, and promotes an atmosphere of exceptional collegiality. At the same time, the department has at its disposal all the resources of a major research university, as well as the advantages of its connection to one of the world's leading medical institutions.

Students have many opportunities for research, both with the Arts & Sciences faculty and in the labs at the world-renowned Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions. Internship opportunities are available at Sheppard Pratt Hospital, Kennedy Krieger Institute, and other local institutions.

What can you do with your degree?

Psychology can be applied to a broad range of fields, including health and human services, management, education, law, and sports. Psychologists might work with business executives, performers, or athletes to reduce stress and improve performance, or they recommend psychologically ideal jurors to lawyers during the jury selection phase of a trial. They team with law enforcement and public health officials following disasters to analyze the cause, or by helping the victims or witnesses recover from trauma. Psychology is applicable in a variety of real-world settings, as well as preparation for graduate work in psychology or related fields such as business, medicine, law, or computer science.

Related Programs and Centers

• David S. Olton Program in Behavioral Biology
• Undergraduate Program in Neuroscience
• The Zanvyl Krieger Mind/Brain Institute
• Science of Learning Institute

Thanks to the university’s proximity to remarkable collections in Baltimore and Washington, the Department of the History of Art offers unique opportunities for the study of art history. Students work closely with a faculty of research scholars on aspects of European and American art. In small classes and informal excursions, they integrate their direct experience of works of art with knowledge acquired through historical research.

The department’s faculty members are among the most distinguished in the fields of ancient Roman, medieval, Renaissance, baroque, and modern art history; in addition, Johns Hopkins routinely welcomes visiting scholars and museum curators to offer courses on the arts of Asia, Africa, the Middle East, and Latin America.

Internationally renowned artists and art historians visit campus to discuss their work in lectures and seminars. Intensive classroom study is complemented with excursions to world-class museums in Baltimore and Washington, D.C. Access to these collections supplements undergraduate course work with the excitement of direct interactions with great works of art.

The university also maintains an extensive art library, which includes the Fowler Collection of treatises on architecture. Research materials in numerous regional libraries and museums and in the Library of Congress are also accessible to art history students.

What can you do with your degree?

Because the department emphasizes the historical, cultural, and social context of art, art history is an excellent program for undergraduates interested in a humanistic education as well as for those preparing for a career in the field.

The Department of Political Science provides undergraduate and graduate training in American politics and law, comparative politics, international relations, and political theory. It offers a rich and diverse understanding of the theoretical and practical aspects of politics, including the processes through which policies, rules, institutions, and political cultures are established, contested, and changed.

The programs of the political science department are designed to help students attain a deeper understanding of politics in its various dimensions. The department encourages students to become analytically sophisticated, to study politics in global and comparative perspectives, and to appreciate how citizens can be responsibly assertive in the community.

A broad and diverse faculty offers a range of courses about politics and government at local, state, national, and international levels. The university's proximity to Washington, D.C., provides a wide variety of internship opportunities.

What can you do with your degree?

Political science majors pursue a diverse range of careers in law, public service, finance, policy research, media, international development, and academia.

Related Programs and Centers

• International Studies
• Institute for Health and Social Policy
• Racism, Immigration, and Citizenship

Johns Hopkins is one of a few universities with a Department of Cognitive Science. Cognitive science is the study of the human mind and brain, focusing on how the mind represents and manipulates knowledge and how mental representations and processes are realized in the brain. Cognitive scientists explore functions such as perception, memory, and language using a variety of methods, such as behavioral studies, functional neuroimaging, linguistic analysis, and computational modeling.

The department provides theoretically oriented research and training opportunities in a focused environment that is dedicated to the multi-disciplinary intellectual challenge of integrating contemporary approaches to the study of the mind/brain.

Programs in cognitive science at Johns Hopkins University reflect the interdisciplinary nature of the subject, requiring students to approach the study of the mind/brain from several different investigative perspectives. The programs in cognitive science draw on courses offered by several other departments, as well.

What can you do with your degree?

Graduates of the Department of Cognitive Science typically go on to graduate, medical, law, or business school, or directly into jobs in health care, information technology, or other fields.

The major provides excellent preparation for PhD programs, not only in cognitive science, but also in psychology, linguistics, computer science, philosophy, neuropsychology, and speech pathology.

Either before or after additional study, our graduates pursue careers in academia, health care, information technology, law, technical writing and publishing, government agencies, and non-profit organizations.

Related Programs and Centers

• Undergraduate Program in Neuroscience
• Science of Learning Institute
• The Zanvyl Krieger Mind/Brain Institute

The goal of every program of the Department of Mathematics is to provide the highest quality education in mathematics at all levels, including the most recent developments and discoveries in mathematical research.

Johns Hopkins has a long history of preeminence in mathematics research and education, dating back to its founding in 1886 by J.J. Sylvester. In fact, the oldest running mathematics journal in the Western Hemisphere, the American Journal of Mathematics, is directed and edited by the Department of Mathematics and is published by the Johns Hopkins University Press.

Today, a vibrant scientific environment continues through the interaction of our faculty, postdoctoral researchers, graduate and undergraduate students, and visiting mathematicians. Our areas of expertise include analysis, partial differential equations, algebraic/complex/differential geometry, mathematical physics, number theory, and algebraic topology. Seminars take place weekly and address a range of topics, and lecture series and conferences bring in top experts from around the world. The department is also home to the Japan-U.S. Mathematics Institute, which sponsors visitors and seminars throughout the year.

Whether you are in our undergraduate BA program, our four-year bachelor’s/master’s program, our doctoral program, or our Future Scholars Program (for outstanding high school students), you will engage with internationally renowned department faculty, two of whom were recently awarded Simons Fellowships, and nine of whom are Fellows of the American Mathematical Society.

What can you do with your degree?

While our PhD graduates go on to conduct research at major institutions around the country, undergraduate math majors at Johns Hopkins finish with a degree that prepares them for PhD programs in mathematics, as well as a wide spectrum of career opportunities. Our graduates have worked in fields as diverse as business and management, education, operations research, data mining, and finance. Our undergraduate program, when supplemented by courses in other departments, also prepares students for graduate or professional programs in other fields, such as economics, physics, engineering, and medicine.

Related Programs and Centers

• Future Scholars Program
• Japan-U.S. Mathematics Institute

Chemistry is an interdisciplinary subject with natural, robust ties to the other sciences and engineering that, in general, involves the study of matter and the changes it undergoes. Advances in chemistry will be required to meet global challenges of clean air, safe water, healthy food, dependable medicine, advanced materials, eco-friendly products, and sustainable energy.

Our understanding of the fundamental nature of the world is grounded in chemistry. Molecular transformations are central to the production of food, medicines, fuel, and a countless array of materials. Chemists seek to understand the fundamental nature of matter and the changes it undergoes on a molecular or atomic level. While this goal was once limited almost exclusively to chemists, there is an increased effort toward molecular-level characterization in most areas of science and technology. Chemistry has therefore emerged as the "central science."

The Department of Chemistry at Johns Hopkins University has a long tradition of excellence that began with Ira Remsen, the discoverer of saccharin, dating back to the inception of the University in 1876. Today, Hopkins chemistry is made up of internationally recognized faculty involved in contemporary chemical science, including interdisciplinary areas that interface chemistry with the fields of biology, medicine, physics, materials, and environmental science. Chemistry faculty train students interested in pursuing Bachelor’s, Master’s, and Doctoral degrees in the classroom and in the laboratory.

What can you do with your degree?

The central nature of chemistry affords its majors more flexibility in careers. Fields of employment include medicine, industry, education, business, law, health services, and much more.

Graduates of the chemistry department have gone on to assume positions of scientific leadership in private industry, as well as in some of the finest academic institutions in the world. The success of the department in attracting and training outstanding students can be measured by the distinguished careers of our recent graduates and postdoctoral fellows.

Related Programs and Centers

• Chemistry-Biology Interface Program

The Henry A. Rowland Department of Physics and Astronomy combines a strong research program, world-renowned faculty, and state-of-the-art facilities. The instruction and research programs within the department reflect two features which have a long tradition at Johns Hopkins: an emphasis on graduate study and research, supplemented with a strong undergraduate program; and a flexibility that is possible only in a department of our size.

Our undergraduate and graduate courses are purposefully designed to provide a core group of basic subjects at the appropriate levels, which naturally lead to courses in a variety of specialized areas. All students are encouraged to engage in independent work outside of the classroom, such as special projects or independent study. The atmosphere is enhanced by the presence of NASA’s Space Telescope Science Institute—home of the Hubble Space Telescope—located just across the street.

Research in the Department of Physics and Astronomy primarily centers on three areas: astrophysics, condensed matter physics, and particle or high energy physics. The Center for Astrophysical Studies comprises areas within the discipline: cosmology, extragalactic astronomy, galactic astronomy, numerical simulations, large datasets, and instrumentation. The condensed matter physics group maintains active experimental and theoretical research programs at the forefront of both hard and soft condensed matter physics. The particle physics group conducts research in both theory and experiment.

What can you do with your degree?

A degree in physics can lead to many diverse career paths. Many of our students apply and are admitted to graduate school, either here at Johns Hopkins or at another one of the nation’s top universities. Others want to pursue research and teaching positions. Physics and astronomy graduates can also be found in the fields of engineering, law, and medicine. Still others secure employment in government or industrial laboratories.

Related Programs and Centers

• Institute for Quantum Matter
• Space Science Telescope Institute

The Department of Sociology concentrates its teaching and research on two broad areas: global social change, which focuses on cross-national, comparative research; and social inequality, which primarily focuses on family, education, work, race, gender, policy, and immigration.

These concentrations trace back to the department’s founding in 1959 by renowned sociologist James Coleman. The department has since earned a reputation as one of most selective, personalized sociology departments in the U.S. Its small size creates an intimate scholarly atmosphere, in which faculty and students interact and collaborate frequently. Through the department’s two areas of concentration and its honors program, highly motivated students can customize a program of study and engage in self-initiated, original research.

What can you do with your degree?

A major in sociology offers undergraduates a variety of post-graduation opportunities. Graduates from the department have found positions in financial institutions, education, non-governmental organizations focusing on international development, research departments of major corporations, and local government social service agencies. Others continue to graduate school in sociology, public health, law, urban planning, or education.

A major in sociology can also be combined with the pre-medical course sequence, resulting in a medical school candidate who is well versed in the hard science of the human body and the social science of the human experience.

Related Programs and Centers

• Joint Program in Applied Mathematics and Statistics
• Arrighi Center for Global Studies
• East Asian Studies

The Department of English at Johns Hopkins is an intimate, highly selective department with a long history of innovative scholarship, research opportunities, and superior teaching.

The department’s distinction begins with its renowned faculty. Every professor teaches both undergraduate and graduate courses, and they all teach primarily in small seminars, so undergraduates get the best of what a research university has to offer while getting the kind of personal attention ordinarily only possible at a small liberal arts college. Courses provide both the core of a liberal arts education and the basis for the advanced study of literature.

Faculty members’ specialties range from early modern to contemporary, with particular strengths in critical theory and interdisciplinary approaches to literature.

Courses provide the core of a liberal education in the humanities and, for those who intend to pursue careers in teaching and scholarship, the basis for advanced study of literature. These range from historical surveys of English and American literature and introductory courses in critical methods to advanced courses and seminars in particular periods, authors, genres, and literary questions.

What can you do with your degree?

Earning a degree in English at Johns Hopkins will enhance your appreciation of some of the world’s finest literature and help you develop a variety of skills. Through reading and writing about literature in classes led by distinguished scholars, you will learn to think critically and argue persuasively about complex issues, while also having the opportunity to pursue independent research. Many of our undergraduates go on to pursue graduate studies in English or in fields such as history, philosophy, psychology, and education. Others choose to pursue professional careers in medicine, government, law, business, publishing, and media.

Related Programs and Centers

• Department of Comparative Thought and Literature
• Film and Media Studies Program
• Expository Writing
• Jewish Studies
• The Writing Center