In addition to an outstanding faculty and generous financial support, SMU offers its graduate students world-class research facilities.

SMU's library system supports a full range of print and electronic media resources.  It is also home to two world-renowned special collections.  The Bridwell Library at SMU's Perkins School of Theology is  a world-class theological library with over 500,000 volumes, and a 50,000-volume Special Collections which includes many print editions from the Middle Ages and Renaissance to the present day, as well as manuscripts going back to the first century.  The holdings of the DeGolyer Library include extensive collections of material related to the European discovery and exploration of the New World, Western Americana, and railroad history, as well as an eclectic range of works by English and American texts in a variety of literary genres, from a 16th-century edition of Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales to dime novels and comic books.

For students interested in the literature of the southwestern United States, the Clements Center for Southwest Studies sponsors frequent lectures and conferences.