Harris, Joseph D.Patel, Anand2013-09-302013-09-302013Patel, Anand Pankaj. 2013. The Geometry of Hurwitz Space. Doctoral dissertation, Harvard University.http://dissertations.umi.com/gsas.harvard:10901http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:11124835We explore the geometry of certain special subvarieties of spaces of branched covers which we call the Maroni and Casnati-Ekedahl loci. Our goal is to understand the divisor theory on compactifications of Hurwitz space, with the aim of providing upper bounds for slopes of sweeping families of d-gonal curves.en-USMathematicsd-gonalHurwitzThesis or Dissertation2013-09-30