The department interprets 'literature' broadly and innovatively to include a wide range of print materials. Apart from the more familiar forms of the novel, poetry, and drama, our research and teaching also examine such forms of print as newspapers, magazines, sketches, and graphic novels, from the 19th to the 21st centuries, across England, America, and South Asia. This broadens the practice of literary criticism in exciting ways: For example, Wuthering Heights is studied alongside the scandalized reviews it evoked, and the earliest South Asian novels are contextualized against the proliferation of printing technologies in 19th century India.

The university also subscribes to the Proquest's 19th Century British Periodicals database, a substantial, fully-searchable digitized archive of primary materials, which enables a wide range of research and teaching in this field.