International Media and Communications Studies BA

This module aims to further your understanding of research processes and practices with specific focus on the process of developing a research question and design.

You will practice identifying appropriate and operable research questions, reflecting critically on published research to understand its processes. Through encounters with guest researches, you will be shown research in a variety of contexts as an embedded practice and the importance of research skills in your future careers.

This module is worth 10 credits.

In this module you will carry out a small group project which will give you further insight into the principles and processes of research as practice in your chosen discipline.

You will be instructed in a range of academic and transferable project leadership and management skills, preparing you for life after your degree. By the end of this module you will have practiced the process of going from a research topic to a question, to a methodology, to practical research design, to a completed project.

Through tasks such as writing research proposals, project documentation, effective communication, and ethical conduct, you will have gained a grounding in project management, setting you up for success in the working world.

This module is worth 10 credits.

How does your social and cultural position effect the impact and value you perceive from media, art, and screen culture? 

Learn how experiences with media, art and screen culture are shaped by factors such as race, gender, class, sexuality, and disability, and how this influence can change over time. 

You will examine the history and critical theories of cultural experience and reception and discuss questions of interpretation and meaning. You will be encouraged to reflect on your own experiences and how they have been influenced by various forms of technology and your daily environment.

After studying this module, you will be confident to:

•  identify how an individual’s position influences how media and art is received 
• reflect on your own experiences with media, art, and screen culture
• describe how factors such as race, class, gender, sexuality, and disability shape experiences
• consider relevant theoretical models and practical methodologies
• use academic and cultural industries research methods
• understand and reference empirical audience research methods and analytical approaches.

This module is worth 20 credits.

This module explores the historical development of the technologies and objects through which media is created and experienced.

You will interrogate the concepts of ‘technology’ and ‘object’ and question your own assumptions about what constitutes both categories.

You will directly engage with academic debates concerning the role of technology in shaping media, are and screen experiences, and the impacts of technologies and objects on the environment and global communities.

This module will explore a range of case studies revolving around technologies and objects from the printing press, paints, and paper to the internet, smartphones and automated systems such as algorithms and AI.

This module is worth 20 credits.

This module will take a global perspective on the role of journalism and the news media in society within the context of a rapidly changing information ecosystem.

It will look at models of journalism, the social and political roles of journalism, media ownership, media audiences and the emerging technological innovations and disruptions, and how these shape journalistic practices and forms, including the production, distribution and consumption of news.

This module will explore propaganda, public relations, rhetoric and disinfomation as means of political persuasion and manipulation in the context of differing political and media systems around the world.

The module will address the ways in which a range of democratic theories have modelled public debate and deliberation in ideal form, debates about the legitimacy of rhetoric, and the role of media technologies in facilitating and/or corrupting a political public sphere.  It will examine the way that values underpin our political beliefs but can also lead to selective exposure to arguments, motivated reasoning and other irrational responses to information and arguments that challenge our convictions.

It will enable students to evaluate the risks of polarisation and the possibility of genuine consensus

This module introduces students to key concepts and theories in media and communication studies in relation to issues of identity and difference. It asks: how do we conceptualise and communicate our identities? How are identities shaped in historical, social, cultural and industrial contexts and what do they tell us about power relations? How can we respect individual and cultural differences and at the same time keep demanding social justice? What roles do media and communication play in representing, misrepresenting and shaping identity and difference? How can identity and difference be better understood and articulated through media?

This module will help students develop critical skills in analysing media and cultural texts and practices in relation to identity formation, representation and contestation. 

This module will explore the British Empire not simply as a vast political and administrative entity driven by trade and commerce (and in many places rooted in slavery and indentured labour), but as an exercise in institutionalised cultural power which laid the foundations for the global and local cultural flows, as well as the neo-colonial structures, characteristic of today’s globalised world.

Students will be equipped with the theoretical tools to analyse the ways in which the Empire promoted a visual, auditory, and material culture - ranging from art and literature, to radio, cinema and television - that shaped the everyday lives of millions of people. 

This module invites students to consider the histories, cultures, and politics of collecting and collections, cutting across art, audio-visual media, memorabilia and fan objects, animals and specimens, archives, museums, galleries, zoos, and public and private cultures of display. It will examine the processes of curation, both institutional and personal, and link these to the social, cultural, and political contexts that shape these practices.

The module will examine the history of collecting and collections and will account for both professional practices of collecting and amateur, private cultures of collecting.

Students will gain an insight into issues of conservation relating to art, object, and media collections. Students will also gain a sense of the contemporary politics of collections management and custodianship.

This module will introduce students to key concepts of narratology and storytelling. Using an interdisciplinary perspective, we will learn how to identify narrative patterns in media texts of different genres and origins, how narrative structures shape world views and how many stories are deeply embedded in global popular cultural narratives, travelling through historical time.

The module will also interrogate the neo-coloniality of popular media narratives and story journeys that include long-standing powerful colonial and racist registers and codes. 

This module tackles the politics of emotion, affect and the senses within art, media, and culture, concepts which have not always been taken seriously within analytical, intellectual contexts.

Emotions and feelings are experienced individually, but are shaped and impacted by cultural norms, linguistic formulation, and social organisation. The module involves questions of how emotions and affect have been captured, represented and expressed in art and across media forms. It asks what role art, audio, visual, and haptic media play in shaping our sensing bodies and private emotional selves. It addresses the methodological challenges posed by researching affect, emotions and the senses, as well as engaging with how we might study emotion, affect and the senses in a rigorous fashion. 

This module involves employability skills training in the Autumn semester followed by a part-time placement (one day a week, or equivalent, up to eight weeks) in an external organisation in the spring semester. The module is aimed at developing hands-on work experience and enhancing employability skills in a workplace relevant to arts graduates. Skills developed during the placement will be intrinsically relevant to various work environments.  

Students will apply for placements in relevant local organisations from an established list created by the faculty placement team, but may also use personal contacts to arrange their own placement, subject to approval. Placements will be provided across a range of sectors relevant to the arts including the creative and cultural industries, media, marketing, heritage and museums, the music industry, education, charitable and third-sector organisations, but are subject to change each year. In the autumn term lectures and workshops will be organised across the faculty, with input by the Careers and Employability Service to provide learning support on professional development and skills assessment, networking, successful applications and interviews, self-presentation and self-reflection.   

Assessment will comprise an online portfolio of materials, including application materials, reflective writing and a research report situating the work and function of the placement organisation in the context of the wider sector of which it is a part. Throughout, students will be encouraged to reflect individually and in groups on their own employability, and plan for their ongoing professional development.