Classics and Modern Languages

New College is delighted to consider applications for Classics and Modern Languages, preferably for the 5-year course, though we may be able to accept applicants for the 4-year course, provided their language is Greek.

The College is fortunate in having unusual strength in both disciplines: we have three fellows and a lecturer on the Classics side and four fellows covering three different Modern Languages, as well as having tutors in Spanish and Italian in other colleges. As mentioned, it would be an advantage for candidates to have an interest in Greek. This would mean that much of the teaching on the Classics papers that have a close bearing on the work of Modern Language students would be taught within College.

The Modern Languages side of the course allows students the obvious advantage of being able to pursue the afterlife of a number of Classical texts from the Renaissance to the present day. There are a number of options in the Modern Languages courses that allow students to make a special study of topics or authors which align with interests in Classics (e.g. the early modern period, the Renaissance, Weimar Classicism, contemporary reception of the Classics). Most of the core Modern Languages papers are taught in College.

The combined course also offers students the possibility of studying a Modern Language and Classics without reference to each other for the sheer benefit of exploring two disciplines in which they have demonstrable interest and aptitude. It is one of the strengths of the course that the links between the subjects will often suggest themselves in unexpected, and always fruitful, ways.

For further details on studying these as separate subjects New College, please see the Classics and Modern Languages subject entries.

For further information on how to apply, entrance requirements and selection criteria, please see the University website, the Faculty of Classics’ website and the Faculty of Medieval and Modern Languages' website.

6 in Classics; Classics & Modern Languages; and Classics & Oriental Studies; 13 in total for Modern Languages and Joint Schools. In practice we take someone for the four- or five-year course every other year.