BA (Hons) Media Studies

Key details

BA (HONS) MEDIA STUDIES

Start Year

2023

Attendance

Full Time

Award

Degree of Bachelor of Arts

UCAS course code

P300

Entry Requirements

ABB

Duration (years)

Our everyday lives are mediated. Everything from connecting with friends and following trends to accessing information and consuming entertainment are increasingly done through media. By studying the professional practices, industry processes and creative opportunities implicated in contemporary media, you can both better understand your place and intervene in this increasingly digitised and global space.

On this course, you’ll be equipped with a wide range of skills, knowledge and theory relevant to media and encouraged to examine their relationship to power. This course has flexibility, so that you also get the chance to use media creatively and for your own empowerment.

Our BA Media Studies is ranked in the top 20 for Media and Film Studies by 'The Guardian University Guide 2023'.

About

In this degree, you’ll work with leading scholars and creative practitioners to explore a range of media sectors, products and texts alongside relevant concepts, theories and approaches. You’ll gain a firm grasp of current debates within the discipline, whilst developing and enhancing the skills involved in producing your own media content.

You’ll explore histories and theories of media, covering a diverse range of audio-visual, print and digital communications, as well as examining their wider social and cultural significance. Meanwhile, in creative practice work you’ll have the opportunity to gain skills in filmmaking, publishing, radio, podcast and digital media production as well as creating promotional materials. You’ll also have access to BLOC, UEA’s Television Studio and Media Suite, which hosts state-of-the-art media technologies (editing suites, cameras and sound equipment, a sound studio and digitisation suite). You’ll also have the chance to gain real-world experience and build industry contacts with an internship. Past students have undertaken placements at local radio stations, television production companies, and the East Anglian Film Archive.

At the beginning of the degree, you’ll become familiar with the key debates in the discipline, gaining a grounding in core media studies approaches and debates. In subsequent years you’ll choose from a wide array of modules, enabling you to specialise in the areas that interest you the most. These range from industry-oriented topics such as creative media work or the business of film and TV to videogames, digital media, popular music, journalism, film genres, publishing, scriptwriting and much more besides. You could even choose to study a foreign language or apply to spend a semester studying abroad.

You’ll develop many transferable skills on this degree course, including high-level research and communication skills, team working, leadership, and self-management, all of which are desirable transferable skills that open up a wide variety of careers.

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Important Information

Whilst the University will make every effort to offer the courses listed, changes may sometimes be made arising from the regular review of course programmes. Where this activity leads to significant (but not minor) changes to programmes, there will normally be prior consultation of students and others. Changes may for example consist of variations to the content and method of delivery of programmes, courses and other services, to discontinue programmes, courses and other services and to merge or combine programmes or courses. The University will endeavour to keep such changes to a minimum, and will inform students.

Assessment for Year 1

Throughout the degree, you’ll be assessed in a variety of ways, from essays to presentations and group work. In the first year, assessment largely focusses on ensuring you have the key critical and analytical skills needed to work more independently in your second year.

Structure

In the first year, you’ll be introduced to major debates, theories and thinkers in media studies, providing you with the foundational knowledge needed to progress with confidence into the more specialist modules of years two and three. Modules in this first year introduce you to some of the core characteristics of the media industries, consider the material, social and institutional contexts in which media forms have been produced and explore the technologies and platforms driving digital media. As well as exploring audio-visual and audio formats ranging from television to podcasts, you’ll learn how to analyse and think about media representations. Alongside your journey through these subject areas, you will develop key skills needed to analyse a range of media forms and be encouraged to develop and apply your critical voice as a researcher and writer.

Teaching and Learning

Our world-leading academics employ a range of teaching styles. Alongside the more traditional formats of lectures and seminars, you’ll learn through film and television screenings as well as practical workshops. You’ll have the opportunity to be trained to use production resources and acquire practical skills, while deepening your understanding of how the media content you are interested in is produced. In addition to timetabled lecture and seminar slots, teaching staff hold dedicated office hours where students can seek advice and guidance on a one-to-one basis. You’ll also be assigned an academic adviser who can support you through your studies.
In your first year, you’ll acquire skills vital to independent learning and develop the analytical skills which you will need throughout your course. You will have access to dedicated sessions designed to help you make the most of UEA’s state-of-the-art library facilities. Through these sessions and your academic modules, you’ll develop skills in finding resources and critically assessing sources. You will be given opportunities to practice essay writing and presentation skills as well as working in groups to develop the skills necessary for effective collaboration.

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Assessment for Year 1

Compulsory Modules

MEDIA INDUSTRIES

Code AMAM4028A

Credits 20

As knowledgeable as you may be about certain media products – like your favourite TV programmes, films, songs, video games or websites – how much do you know about the functioning of the industrial contexts from which these typically emerge? It is easy to forget that standing between us and our favourite media products is a complex structure of interpenetrating cultural sectors and organisations. This module will introduce you to some of the core characteristics of the media industries, providing you with a better understanding of how and why they operate in the ways they do. Throughout the module you will come to appreciate the distinctiveness of the media industries and their products, the implications this has for producers and the broader effects implied for the overall structure of these industries. In addition, you’ll learn about the economic and political organisation of the media industries, the policies and regulations to which they are subject, as well as the divisions of labour determined by their modes of organisation. You’ll begin with a consideration of the particular characteristics of media goods and the challenges involved in commodifying and deriving revenues from them. Following this, you will explore issues of ownership, integration and concentration, before we consider such matters as policy and regulation, creative work, digitalisation, convergence and media systems. Having considered examples of specific media organisations, franchises, texts and sectors, you’ll put your new knowledge into practice by developing your own case study project, aimed at explaining the functioning of one aspect of the media landscape. Across the module you will also gain experience in communicating your ideas in seminars as well as through workshop tasks and written work.

MEDIA HISTORY

Code AMAM4029A

Credits 20

You’ll explore media history from the perspective of departmental interests in critical media studies, cultural consumption and historiography. It will highlight the material, social and institutional contexts in which media forms have been produced, mediated and consumed and the ongoing power struggles therein. By working through different interpretations of how the media has intersected with long-term changes in society, the module will allow you to contrast ‘top down’ histories of industrial organisation, technological evolution and regulatory intervention with ‘bottom up’ histories of media as social activity.

MEDIA REPRESENTATION

Code AMAM4034A

Credits 20

How do the media represent social groups and why does this matter? These two questions are central to Media Studies. On this module, we will give you an introduction to research across a range of topics, such as the representation of women, migrants and older people. You will learn how the media have represented these groups in the past and discuss whether and why representations have changed today. You will be introduced to theories that are central to Media Studies and which you will be able to explore in depth in more specialist modules in your second and third year, for example feminist theories, post-colonialism, critical race studies, queer theory, and disability studies. The assessment on this module is a small piece of independent research. You will write a literature review, a discussion of your research methodology and you will present and analyse the findings of a small piece of media analysis. This module will teach you the necessary skills of academic writing.

DIGITAL MEDIA: CONCEPTS, TECHNOLOGIES & CULTURES

Code AMAM4031B

Credits 20

This module introduces students to the study of digital media, focusing on both the technologies and platforms that drive the 'digital age' and the cultures they have produced. We will examine how scholars have theorised digital media since the early 1990s, mapping how the production, circulation, and, consumption of new media has changed over the past twenty years. Weekly case studies will allow students to apply theories to contemporary cultural events and phenomena, which may include #blacklivesmatter, selfie culture, the Arab Spring, and SciHub.

THEORISING MEDIA AND CULTURE

Code AMAM4033B

Credits 20

This module introduces you to a range of influential thinkers whose work has shaped Media Studies. It will provide you with the foundational knowledge you need to progress with confidence onto more specialist modules in your second and third year. You will compare and contrast how different scholars have tried to explain the role of the media in creating communities, in reproducing social inequalities, but also in driving social change. You will discuss whether we need to study media audiences, media content or media industries in order to understand media power. The module will help you develop your own voice as a researcher and writer. You will learn how to effectively compare and contrast complex theoretical arguments and how to place your own argument within the context of academic debate. You will have opportunity to apply your knowledge of media theories to a small piece of media research and to express your research ideas not only through writing, but also through a creative media project.

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Important Information

Whilst the University will make every effort to offer the modules listed, changes may sometimes be made arising from the annual monitoring and review of modules. Where this activity leads to significant change to a programme and modules, the University will endeavour to consult with affected students. The University may not be able to offer a module for reasons outside of its control, such as the illness of a member of staff. Availability of optional modules may be restricted owing to timetabling, lack of demand, or limited places. Where this is the case, you will be asked to make alternative module choices and you will be supported during this process.

Students will take 120 credits (6 modules) across year 2. 60 credits in semester 1 and 60 credits in semester 2. Students wishing to enrol on the 60-credit Film and Television Studies semester abroad module AMAM5037B in the spring must first seek approval from the Study Abroad Office and Internationalisation Director.

Assessment for Year 2

In addition to practical and critical skills assessments, by the end of your second year, your assessment will have prepared you for independent research.

Compulsory Modules

DIGITAL MEDIASCAPES

Code AMAM5063A

Credits 20

You'll be provided with an understanding of media access, production, participation and use/consumption. Module content is organised around notions of space and place, thereby enabling engagement with issues including: globalisation/the global; national media and media systems; regional and local media; community and ‘grassroots’ media, domestic and ‘personal’ media. Over the course of the module, you'll develop an understanding of the range and reach of media and the multiplicity of factors determining how, when and where populations are enabled to access and participate in media activities. Parallel to the above will be an exploration, through selected case study examples, of media and cultural policy issues, spaces/places of media production as well as a critical engagement with questions of power in relation to these. The module also adopts a contemporary focus by incorporating debates about the role and potential of digital media and communications technologies in enabling new forms of media production, distribution and participation.

Optional A Modules

(40 credits)

FILM THEORY

Code AMAM5030A

Credits 20

This module explores aspects of film theory as it has developed over the last hundred years or so. It encompasses topics including responses to cinema by filmmaker theorists such as Sergei Eisenstein and influential formulations of and debates about realism and film aesthetics associated with writers and critics such as André Bazin, Siegfried Kracauer, Rudolf Arnheim and Bela Bálázs. You’ll study the impact of structuralism, theories of genre, narrative and models of film language; feminist film theory and its emphasis on psychoanalysis; theories of race and representation; cognitive theory; emerging eco-critical approaches; post-structuralist and post-modern film theory. You’ll be taught by lecture, screening and seminar. You’ll work with primary texts - both films and theoretical writings - and have the opportunity to explore in their written work the ways in which film theories can be applied to film texts.

THEORISING TELEVISION

Code AMAM5047A

Credits 20

This module explores some of the key ways in which television has been theorised, conceptualised and debated. You are offered insight into how the discipline of Television Studies has developed, as well as how television itself has developed - in terms of social roles, political functions and aesthetic form. The medium will be explored as a textual entity, a social activity (i.e. the focus on audiences and viewing), and a political agent (ideology and power). Part of our intention is to focus on how the specificities of television have been understood.

STUDYING AUDIENCES

Code AMAM5064A

Credits 20

This module seeks to provide you with an understanding of the ways in which audiences engage with media. It will introduce some of the key research on, and theoretical debates about the relationship that exists between audiences, texts and technologies of production, distribution and reception, covering work on encoding and decoding, through studies of the social activities of television consumption, to research on marketing, critical reception and beyond. It will also introduce some of the methodological issues involved in the actual practice of doing audience studies. In this way, the module will not only encourage students to learn about the study of film and television audiences, but also equip them with the tools necessary to undertake their own studies.

DOCUMENTARY

Code AMAP5045A

Credits 20

This module will introduce you to key issues in documentary history, theory and practice. You will engage with definitional and generic debates; historical forms and founders; different modes of documentary; ethical issues; and social and political uses. We will draw upon a range of national and media contexts and give you the opportunity to engage with a range of theories, archival materials, documentary styles and ethical debates within your written and practical work. At the end of module you will produce a documentary shaped by the traditions and theories you have studied, employing a range of archive film and television footage sourced from the East Anglian Film Archive.

MAKING IT PUBLIC: PUBLISHING, AUDIENCE, AND CREATIVE ENTERPRISE

Code AMAS5056A

Credits 20

This module will provide you an introduction to the world of publishing. What does it mean to publish, which, from the Middle French publier, means ‘to make public, to make known, to make famous’? And how do you do it? On this module, with practical support from the Media Suite, you will acquire the basic skills for designing and publishing your own short publication, whether it be a book, a magazine, a fanzine, audiobook, or podcast. In seminars you will learn what it takes to be a successful editor, and, by considering issues of readership, marketing, promotion, finance, scheduling, and copyright law, you will know how to successfully plan and manage your project. You will also be introduced different kinds of publishing—commercial, independent, DIY, and digital publishing—and gain an understanding of editorial roles and processes, the ins-and-outs of pre-production, and the best way to market and publicize your creative product. Students will also have the opportunity to attend the annual London Book Fair.

DIGITAL MEDIA AND SOCIETY

Code PPLM5053A

Credits 20

For better or worse, digital technologies are hyped at having revolutionised society. This module will provide you with an introduction to the ways in which the internet and other digital technologies are (and are not) affecting society from theoretical and empirical perspectives, and how society shapes technology. Topics covered include: the evolution of the internet; the network society ; regulating new media; the radical internet and terrorism; social networking, blogs and interactivity; culture and identity in the digital age; and how the internet affects politics and the media.

FILM GENRES

Code AMAM5033A

Credits 20

Film Genres introduces students to the range of theories and methods used to account for the prevalence of genres within filmmaking. We investigate historical changes in how film genres have been approached in order to consider how genres have been made use of by industry, critics and film audiences. Genre theories are explored through a range of case studies drawn from one or more of a range of popular American film genres including the Western, science-fiction, melodrama, romantic comedy, the road movie, the buddy movie, film noir, the gangster film, the war film and action/adventure film. In exploring concepts and case studies relating to film genres the module aims to demonstrate the richness of film genre and its continuing relevance as a mode of analysis.

POPULAR MUSIC

Code AMAM5046A

Credits 20

For many people, popular music provides the soundtrack to their lives. It is intimately bound up with their sense of themselves, their attitudes and values, their friendships and social lives, their dreams and fantasies. But what can we learn about the power and place of popular music by studying it from an academic perspective? Throughout this module you will discover the range of approaches brought to popular music’s sounds, images, meanings, audiences and production through the perspectives of media studies, cultural studies and sociology. In examining songs and videos, fans, industry and performance, you’ll be encouraged to communicate your ideas in seminars and written work, engaging with key concepts and theories which will give you the tools to carry out your own research on popular music. We’ll begin with a consideration of the ‘popular’ of pop, before critically engaging with historical perspectives on popular music, tracing this through to the development of a fully-fledged ‘popular music studies’. Along the way, you’ll uncover approaches to analysing popular music’s texts, their production and the ways in which audiences and fans relate to them in the formation and expression of identities. You’ll also be encouraged to reflect on popular music’s relationship with other media (such as television, music writing and the internet), its role in everyday life, questions of representation, politics and power, and the contemporary relevance of terms such as ‘scene’, ‘subculture’ and ‘genre’. Having considered the study of popular music in this way, you will put your knowledge into practice by developing and conducting your own research project into an aspect of popular music audiences and/or culture of your choice.

ADAPTATION: CROSS-MEDIA TRANSFORMATIONS

Code AMAM5065A

Credits 20

This module explores the process of adaptation looking at key concepts and theories in adaptation studies and a wide range of case studies. The adaptation of prose fiction and graphic narratives into film will be central, looking at examples from early cinema through to contemporary film. In addition, the module will also give some attention to other manifestations of cross-media transformation, including audio/radio dramatization, digital gaming and immersive performance, from theatrical interpretations to themed and site-specific screenings. The module will be structured with encounters with key theoreticians – and emerging scholarly voices – in the field of Adaptation Studies (Linda Hutcheon, Julie Sanders, Thomas Leitch etc.) in tandem with major examples which might, for examples, span the cross-media interpretation of texts from children’s fiction, classic literature, popular genre and comic books. For assessment, there will be seminar presentations as formative and an individual research project as summative.

THE BUSINESS OF FILM AND TV DRAMA IN THE DIGITAL AGE

Code AMAP5026A

Credits 20

The module provides an intensive introduction to the business of film and television; including the development, financing, production, distribution and exploitation of films and television drama programmes. It is based around a detailed understanding of the film and television value chain, showing how different businesses and creative people work together to create and exploit programmes. It will also cover the process by which scripts or TV programme ideas are written and developed. Emphasis will be placed on UK, European and American Independent film models; and the difference between the independent model and the US studio model. It will examine the effect of Netflix and the rise of digital streaming. It includes a wide range of recent case studies and real-life examples, with companies from Pixar to Working Title. Issues raised will include the impact of new technologies; changing business models; the conflict between commerce and art; entrepreneurship and managing creative people; and the complex and difficult relationships between writers, directors, producers, executives, financiers, and distributors. It is a practical forward-looking course about current and future business practise, which will be a valuable foundation for anyone interested in working in the media, film or television sectors. It will also be valuable to anyone studying film and television programmes and culture, so that they can fully understand the financial and business context in which programmes are created. By the end of the module you will know how films and TV programmes get dreamt up, how they get developed, and how they get financed and distributed. You will learn how the industry actually works.

WRITING THE AMERICAN SCRIPT

Code AMAP5051A

Credits 20

For much of the twentieth century, the screenplay was synonymous with Hollywood, the Studio System, and “The Movies”: films as brash and bold as booming American power, written by screenwriting giants, such as Preston Sturges, Herman J. Mankiewicz, Billy Wilder, Anita Loos and Paddy Chayfsky. But much of what we love about more recent American film-making has been the work of writers outside the mainstream: John Cassavetes, Joan Micklin Silver, Charlie Kaufman, Spike Lee, Nora Ephron, Quentin Tarantino, and the like. Throughout, American screenwriting has produced work as dynamic and expansive as the nation itself. In this module you will move through the high points of American scriptwriting, using scripts, texts, and creative pastiche to develop an understanding of the form. Your work may be assessed through a mix of creative and critical work, writing exercises and a complete short script. In broadly the first half of the semester you will use pastiche and other techniques to develop basic screenwriting skills. The remainder of the term will be devoted to developing and workshopping an original script. You will be introduced to the basic dramaturgy of cinematic storytelling, screenwriting form and format, and skills in pitching and story development. This module will therefore help you develop your creative capacity, your communication skills, and will help broaden your commercial awareness.

FILM AND VIDEO PRODUCTION

Code AMAP5123A

Credits 20

Film is frequently described as a ‘director’s medium’, while simultaneously defined as a ‘collaborative effort’. How is that possible? How do the director, cinematographer, designer and editor work together to create the suspense, romance, or comedy that we expect from our favourite films? What does the film director actually do? What are the choices that see one director lauded as an ‘auteur’ and another derided as a ‘hack’? Why does a cinematographer choose the specific lighting, framing and camera style for a scene? How does the director work with a script and coax performances out of the actors? What prompts the editor to use one angle, rather than another? This module attempts to answer these questions, as it introduces you to the practical application of film and television grammar and explores the fundamental questions of cinematic and televisual storytelling. A series of filmmaking exercises give you the chance to experiment with elements of camera and blocking, the use of sound, and multiple editing options. Other exercises look at script as a dramatic text and introduce basic techniques of working with actors. The final project asks you to work with professional script material to produce a video scene study. The module encourages students to understand the choices and decision-making processes involved in filmmaking, and the pros and cons involved in any creative decision.

THE POLITICS OF STORYTELLING

Code AMAS5054A

Credits 20

We all tell stories. Some stories are based in fact. Others are fictional and deliberately play with and distort realities. But how do we decide on which stories get told and which stories don’t? What does this tell us about the political structures that shape our society? Or indeed the relationship between history and power? Can the stories we tell play a role in our political present? Relevant to all students studying the arts and humanities, this module explores the politics of storytelling. It interrogates the relationship between fact and fiction, while encouraging students to think through the societal forces that shape their subject and their own work. Drawing on the expertise from a range of disciplines - from film studies, history, literature, politics and creative writing - it shows how stories can remake our reality and have the potential to profoundly shape our present moment.

LGBT AND BEYOND: SEXUAL CULTURES, QUEER IDENTITIES, AND THE POLITICS OF DESIRE

Code HUM-5007A

Credits 20

How do notions of gender and sexuality shape culture, and how are in turn our understanding and experiences of gender and sexuality shaped by cultural production? How important are other times, places and identifications – associated with class, race, ethnicity – to these understandings and experiences? And to what extent can a film, an image, a testimony, or a place capture such complexity? Addressing these questions from an interdisciplinary approach, the aim of the module is to explore the ways in which gender and sexuality are constituted through a broad array of experiences, practices, and cultural products. The module focuses on issues raised in classical and contemporary research in history, politics, media, cultural studies and visual cultures such as: representation and cultural production; subjectivity; identity; identification; bodies and embodiment; performance and performativity; among others. Overall, by exploring theory in conjunction with queer cultural production that explores questions of power, identity, and desire across different racial, national, and cultural landscapes, the module aims to problematise how gender and sexuality are not stable identities or classifications but are instead processes involving normalisations, hierarchies and relations of domination that can be challenged, troubled and/or queered.

Optional B Modules

(60 credits)

THE HOLLYWOOD STUDIO SYSTEM

Code AMAM5042B

Credits 20

Is there really 'no business like show business'? This module will develop your understanding of how silent-era, classical and post-classical Hollywood has developed as an industry, balancing the twin demands of creativity and commerce. Our aim is to encourage you to analyse how Hollywood works as an industry, the kind of films it produces, and the ways in which they are consumed by domestic and global audiences. You will engage with a variety of Hollywood films and be introduced to a range of theories and approaches for analysing how they are produced and consumed.

LATIN AMERICAN CINEMA

Code AMAM5053B

Credits 20

This module is designed to provide students with an understanding of the history and structure of the cinema industries, practices and people of Latin America. Combining film and cultural studies modes of inquiry this module will examine different approaches to film style and theme in this region, as well as looking at the social and cultural role of cinema and its importance as an area of economic and political activity. Covering a range of relevant theories and concepts, the module will provide students with a critical understanding of the key issues at stake in how films are made, circulated and received by audiences, both within relevant national borders and beyond. An indicative weekly outline is as follows: • History and socio-cultural context of Latin America (including legacies of colonialism and religion; what/where is ‘Latin America’ ) • National cinema theories and perspectives • Genres in Latin American cinema • ‘New’ Latin American cinema and ‘Third Cinema’ theory of the 1950s and ‘60s • Indigenous filmmaking and representations of indigeneity • Gender in Latin American cinema • Representations of economic deprivation in Latin American cinema • Censorship and government regulation • Role of co-productions, film festivals and awards (including issues to consider around the reception of sub-titled films) • Focus: Perú (Barrow) • Focus: México and/or Colombia (Aveyard) The proposed weekly structure for the module is as follows: • 2 hour film screening • 1 hour lecture • 1 hour seminar

FILM AND VIDEO PRODUCTION

Code AMAP5125B

Credits 20

LIVE TELEVISION STUDIO PRODUCTION

Code AMAP5127B

Credits 20

This module introduces you to television studio production, using the resources of the campus television studio. You will learn basic skills of both live and recorded studio production (including directing, vision and sound mixing, camera-work, lighting, floor management and editing), using practice-based training. You will produce a short television programme, researching the appropriate genre characteristics, style and narrative to create the final work. The live broadcast will be accompanied by written reports analysing and evaluating the production process and the finished product. PLEASE NOTE - This module needs a minimum of 12 students enrolled to run; if that enrolment is not met, the module may be withdrawn.

WISHING UPON STARS: DISNEY'S AMERICA

Code AMAS5053B

Credits 20

The plaque at the entrance of Disneyland Park, opened in 1955, reads, ‘Here you leave today and enter the world of yesterday, tomorrow and fantasy’ Escapism is and always has been a key Disney approach, but by being absorbed in nostalgia, and fantastic imaginings of worlds to come, what happens to the political present, and what are the effects of its exclusion? Disney has had a long, successful, and influential career over the 20th century and into the 21st, and whilst it has moved with the times, often spearheading the changes in terms of technology, its choice of story-lines, and its underlying, and largely conservative views on American life and morality have too often been problematic. This is especially true in terms of those it chooses to represent in its productions, and the nature of this representation. Throughout its history, Disney has been significantly racist, homophobic, misogynistic and imperialistic in its world views. Much has changed in the last 20 years, but it still maintains a sense of a largely apolitical idealized America. On this module you will explore Disney from multiple approaches, employing historical, political, and cultural analysis to explore Disney’s Dream America, and to see the extent these dreams really do come true

ARTS AND HUMANITIES PLACEMENT MODULE

Code HUM-5004B

Credits 20

This module will provide you with the opportunity work within a creative/cultural/charity/ heritage/media or other appropriate organisation in order to apply the skills you are developing through your degree to the working world and to develop your knowledge of employment sectors within which you may wish to work in the future. The module emphasises industry experience, sector awareness and personal development through a structured reflective learning experience. Having sourced and secured your own placement (with support from Careers Central), you work within your host organisation undertaking tasks that will help you to gain a better understanding of professional practices within your chosen sector. Taught sessions enable you to acquire knowledge of both the industries in which you are placed as well as focusing on personal and professional development germane to the sector. Your assessment tasks will provide you with an opportunity to critically reflect on the creative and cultural sector in which you have worked as well as providing opportunities to undertake presentations, gather evidence, and articulate your newly acquired skills and experiences.

CHILDREN'S FILM AND TV CULTURES

Code AMAM5061B

Credits 20

Children’s television is dynamic, diverse and often controversial. In this module, we examine how television has constructed childhood and how children have, in their turn, shaped television. One of the particular challenges with children’s television is that it is usually made by adults for children. As society has shifted over time, therefore, children’s television programming becomes caught up in debates about who and what children are; about how (much) they should watch; and, about what they should (not) be allowed to see. Because childhood is a highly debated cultural and social category, there is a large and growing body of scholarship on the topic of children’s television. We use these theoretical and methodological maps to investigate the past and present of children’s television, including things like: cultural studies, media ethnography, genre studies, gender studies and production studies. We look at a range of topics that may include: Saturday Morning Television, children’s variety shows, animation, children’s broadcasting, children’s satellite channels, censorship, consumerism, pressure groups and gender.

TEENAGE KICKS: MEDIA, YOUTH AND SUBCULTURE

Code AMAM5066B

Credits 20

DIGITAL MEDIA THEORY & PRACTICE

Code AMAP5128B

Credits 20

This module provides an introduction to the practical and theoretical study of digital media. By exploring the historical and contemporary aspects of various media, including audio-visual and social media you will consider how the digital turn has affected media production and consumption. You will also gain awareness of the technologies which underpin digital media, the interfaces for delivering media online, and the cultural and social aspects of digital society. By the end of the module, you will be able to evaluate digital media in their contemporary and historical contexts, and understand the principles which influence the digital remediation of media forms. You will gain hands-on experience of a variety of digital media, drawing on sessions based in UEA’s Media Suite, and use these creations to explore cutting edge digital approaches to media texts. These practical sessions will introduce students to: digitisation of text and images; creation of 3D models and image processing; creation of audio-visual media; editing of Wikipedia/Wikimedia. Each of these sessions will serve to illuminate particular theoretical issues, including social media, reproduction and restoration, and the problems associated with ephemerality and preservation in the digital age.

VIDEOGAMES: THEORY, PRACTICE, AND RECEPTION

Code HUM-5008B

Credits 20

This module offers students the opportunity to develop a comprehensive understanding of the cultural, political, and economic contexts of the videogames industry, and the techniques and principles used in game design. The module will give an overview of the key academic debates from video game history from production to reception, considering the current state of the industry, issues of representation in games, and study of games culture within a broader context. The module will provide students with the opportunity to play and critique a variety of games hardware and software. In addition, the module provides an understanding of hardware platforms and software tools used in the creation of videogames, making use of UEA's Media Suite to offer a practice-based component to aid in the understanding of the principles behind games development. Students will be able to learn entry level games design practices. No previous experience of coding or games development is required to undertake the module, just an interest in the subject.

MEDIA, GLOBALISATION AND CULTURE

Code PPLM5003B

Credits 20

What role do media and communication play in processes of globalisation? How is an ever more global media creating cultural change? In this module you will explore the cultural implications of global media and culture by investigating audience practices and media representations. It begins by introducing the main theoretical approaches to mediated globalisation, before examining how these work in practice. Indicative topics include the power of global branding, global celebrity culture, global publics and local audiences, transnational cultures, and representations of migration.

LIES, ALGORITHMS AND CONCERTOS: UNDERSTANDING MEDIA AND CULTURAL POLICY

Code PPLM5005B

Credits 20

How should we deal with the dissemination of 'fake news'? What role do algorithms play in the media we consume, and is it concerning? What kind of government intervention is there in media markets and in cultural life and how does this get decided? This module will enable you to understand the dynamics and issues of media and cultural policy and how various levels of governance are involved in regulating media cultural sectors. The module will start by introducing you to public policy and policy making processes, covering multi-level governance, multi-stakeholderism, and the policy cycle. It will then enhance your understanding though deep dives into current issues in media and cultural policy, such as audiovisual media policy, arts institutions, net neutrality, harmful content on platforms, sports and premium content rights, urban regeneration through culture, evolving models of (self/co-)regulation. The module will draw on examples from across the globe and at various level including local, regional, national and supra-national policy making, with special efforts made to integrate ones from non-Western contexts. You will have the opportunity to work on real policy issues and practice professional skills in simulations and assessment activities. This module is for anyone interested in media and culture or in public policy in general. It covers topics that touch our daily lives so would be useful to anyone concerned about the shape of our society.

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Important Information

Students will take 120 credits (4 modules) across year 3. 60 credits in semester 1 and 60 credits in semester 2. Students to take ONE dissertation module.

Assessment for Year 3

In the final year, you will also have the opportunity to work closely with an expert supervisor in completing a dissertation on a topic of your own devising.

Compulsory Modules

Optional A Modules

(90-120 credits)

ARTISTS' FILM AND VIDEO

Code AMAA6016B

Credits 30

Since the 1960s the proliferation of artists working with film and video has resulted in screen-based installations becoming a common feature of most contemporary art exhibitions. Surveying the activity of a diverse range of film and video makers this module will explore how artists have sought to develop a critical mode of practice that distinguishes their work from commercial forms of cinema and television. With a particular focus on European and American film and video artists, this module will examine in detail how their work relates to established histories of avant-garde cinema and experimental film making. Through direct engagement with film and video artworks this module will investigate how artists have sought to challenge and subvert our viewing habits and in turn question our psychological and social relationship to the moving image. Artists discussed include: Andy Warhol, Maya Deren, Barbara Rubin, Carolee Schneemann, Stan Brakhage, Nam June Paik, Joan Jonas, Bruce Nauman, Bill Viola, Tacita Dean, John Akomfrah and Steve McQueen.

CRIME AND PUNISHMENT ON SCREEN

Code AMAM6002A

Credits 30

Module Description (This module is about) This module explores the ways in which cinema and television have engaged with discourses of crime and punishment across the history of the two mediums. It will look at the ways in which screen cultures have circulated and contested historical understandings of crime, criminality and justice, but also ongoing debates regarding cinema and television’s influence on the propagation and perception of criminal behaviour. The module will explore a range of film and television genres that focus on crime, investigation and the penal system, and that have incorporated scientific and technological innovations with regard to surveillance and detection, including: gangster films, police procedurals, delinquency films, true crime, prison dramas, crime appeal programmes, superhero movies, and forensic crime dramas. We also map the ways in which these genres have responded to different historical, national and social contexts, and explore the ways in which a range of converging identities (gender, sexuality, class, race, ethnicity, generational identity) have influenced these contradictory depictions and discourses. This interdisciplinary module will explore the relationship between media history, theory and representation, drawing upon theories from fields including film studies, television studies, cultural studies, gender studies, sociology, criminology, psychology, and science and technology studies.

CONTEMPORARY SCREEN DISTRIBUTION AND EXHIBITION

Code AMAM6025A

Credits 30

This module is designed to provide students with an understanding of the structure and workings of the screen distribution and exhibition industry in the UK and its global context. The module will look at different approaches to distribution and public exhibition of screen content and audience development, including large-scale commercial enterprises and studios, independent companies, community cinema (and other forms of local cinema) and film festivals. Covering a range of relevant theories and concepts, the module will provide students with a critical understanding of the key issues at stake in how screen content is circulated and accessed by audiences. Key themes will include the influence of industry regulation (by government and industry), impacts of public funding, professional work practices, content diversity and social inclusion This module requires students to organise and participate in the hosting of a pop-up film event on campus. This involves work that needs to be done in collaboration with other students and occurs largely outside timetabled classes.

GENDER AND TELEVISION

Code AMAM6045A

Credits 30

This final year module will pick up on the theoretical frameworks that you gained during your first two years of study and use them to focus on discussions about the ways in which gender, as well as class, race and sexuality are represented across various television genres. We use the concept of postfeminism as one which frames the ways discourses of gender in popular culture as a theoretical basis from which to proceed. We explore the medium of television as a textual entity, a social activity (i.e. the focus on audiences and viewing), and a political agent (ideology and power) and focus specifically on the ways in which these intersect with and inform the representational politics of the texts under discussion. The predominant texts under discussion in this module will be drawn from British and American Television enabling us to examine the specificities and similarities of these two cultural contexts

FILM, TELEVISION AND MEDIA STUDIES: DISSERTATION (AUTUMN)

Code AMAM6079A

Credits 30

This module provides the opportunity to work on an independently-researched dissertation on an aspect of Film, Television and/or Media Studies; you will choose and negotiate the topic of your choice to gain approval. You are able to choose whether you do the dissertation module in the Autumn or the Spring Semester of your final year, whichever fits in better with your schedule of modules. You need not relate directly to material taught in previous modules, although it is expected that dissertations will draw on and reflect upon perspectives and methodologies introduced earlier in the degree course.

FILM, TELEVISION AND MEDIA STUDIES DISSERTATION (SPRING)

Code AMAM6080B

Credits 30

CREATIVE WORK IN THE MEDIA INDUSTRIES

Code AMAM6086B

Credits 30

What is it like working in the media industries? What are the key opportunities and challenges which face aspiring and established media professionals? In engaging with such questions, this module offers you the opportunity to gain an understanding of the industries in which you may well wish to work. Throughout the module you will engage with academic research and other writing, both historical and contemporary in nature, to provide you with an understanding of the potential to find pleasure, fulfilment (and a steady income), as well as pressure, frustration and precariousness in media work. As well as developing skills in communicating ideas, principles and theories, you will conduct your own research into the nature and conditions of media work. To help you understand media work, we reflect on changes in the nature of work itself in modern societies, considering historical and recent developments in working cultures and questions of work-life balance. Following this, you will gain insights into work in the media and creative industries through an engagement with academic research, policy developments and the accounts of media workers themselves (across sectors such as film, television, music, magazines, advertising and digital media). We also look at questions about the extent to which it is feasible to do ‘good work’ and produce challenging, innovative, ground breaking, thoughtful or just genuinely entertaining media products in a seemingly ever competitive and commercial media landscape. Having developed a grasp of some of the key dynamics at play in creative labouring, you’ll put this knowledge into practice by carrying out and reflecting upon your own research into the challenges and opportunities bound up with media work. The module will not only provide you with a range of valuable insights into the realities of media work but will also help you develop skills in conducting research, organising and communicating your ideas and weighing your own arguments against those of others.

SCIENCE FICTION

Code AMAM6121A

Credits 30

Science Fiction films and television series have provided a significant focus for addressing social, cultural and political issues. You will look at the historical development of the genre, with an emphasis on situating examples of films and television programs within their historical and cultural context. The module also concentrates on issues surrounding human identity, as played out in this genre. A range of films and series episodes from both the US and UK will be screened and various clips will also be discussed in seminar.

CREATIVITY, INNOVATION AND ENTREPRENEURSHIP

Code AMAM6124A

Credits 30

How have new technology and media start-ups changed the world? What is the effect of leadership on creativity and innovation in media business today? Managing creativity and innovation are increasingly important for all companies in the current fast-changing business landscape. Digital disruption and new business models have made a huge impact on many businesses, including the media. The aims of this module are to introduce a theoretical and practical understanding of the nature of entrepreneurship and start-up culture; managing and motivating creative people; and the leadership strategies used by organisations to encourage different types of innovation, with a focus on media companies.

ALTERNATIVE MEDIA

Code AMAM6133B

Credits 30

This module looks at a range of print, broadcast and online alternative media in the USA and Britain from largely the 1960s counterculture onwards. This includes pirate radio, underground press, guerrilla television, fanzines, subvertising, video activism, Indymedia, community media. It maps the history and development of alternative media, explores connections and tensions with technological innovations, the cultural politics of alternative media, the relationship with and impact on mainstream media forms, and assesses the significance of alternative media for social change. There is an emphasis on historical and cultural material theorised through aspects of media, subculture and social movements.

INVESTIGATING AUDIENCES AND RECEPTION

Code AMAM6144B

Credits 30

In this module you will investigate a range of changing audience practices and cultures in the twenty-first century. You will be introduced to some of the key research on, and theoretical debates around, audience practices in relation to changes in distribution, technology and evolving forms of engagement. You will also study social practices and fan cultures surrounding new technologies, transmedia storytelling, branding, steamed media, event cinema, theme park attractions and other participatory cultures. Investigating Audiences will enable you to expand your critical and analytical skills, and also to develop your abilities as an audience researcher. You will evaluate and assess published academic writing on audience research methodologies, which will then enable you to exercise critical judgement in the design of your own empirical research project.

DIGITAL POLITICS

Code PPLM6077A

Credits 30

Today's political world is more than ever influenced by digital technologies, from innovative social movements to 'fake news' and digital election campaigns. We will explore how the technologies influence political processes and how political processes in turn influence technology. We will examine the impact of digital media on electoral politics, examining key election campaigns (including recent UK and US elections) and the impact of social media, big data, and targeted advertising on their results. We will investigate how social movements (from Black Lives Matter to the Alt-Right) have been transformed through their use of digital networks. We will navigate the world of online politics, with a particular focus on the new culture wars being fought out in online environments. Finally we will explore the politics of the everyday, and the political effects of the technology platforms on which we live our online lives.

Optional B Modules

(0-30 credits)

BRITISH FILM SINCE THE 1960s

Code AMAM6012B

Credits 30

How has British cinema developed through the 21st century? What has it learned from the successes and failures of its own past? By focusing on British film and British film culture from the 1960s to the present day, this module will give you new and different perspectives on the modern British film industry, and the films it produces. You'll get a grounding in the important movements, directors, genre, cycles and stars within the last 6 decades of British film. You'll learn how to examine and analyse those people, films, and movements within a cultural and industrial context, considering the social, technological, artistic and ideological motivations underpinning the creation of 'British' film. Central to this will be your exploration of how 21st century British cinema understands and exploits its own history, from Ealing Studios and Hammer Horror to claims of the 'boom and bust' economic cycle of British production.

GENDER AND GENRE IN CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN CINEMA

Code AMAM6062B

Credits 30

This module offers an overview of critical and theoretical approaches to gender and genre in film and television, focusing particularly on North American media, over the last decade. The module is taught by seminar, tutorial and screening and the topics explored may include: the articulation and development of postfeminism in film and television; popular and independent film; feminism and authorship; media responses to the political and cultural contexts of postfeminism; responses to the recession; race and the limits of feminist representation; motherhood and fatherhood; representations of queerness.

ADAPTATION AND SCRIPTWRITING

Code AMAM6115A

Credits 30

Today more films are made from adaptations than wholly original screenplays. All scriptwriters preparing for work in the business today should therefore be aware of the process and nature of script adaptation. You will explore the practice of scriptwriting, dramaturgy and story structure; and explore key theories of adaptation, from the earliest ideas of ‘fidelity’ to the source, to later approaches emphasising intertextuality, and the movement of narratives across media. You will examine a series of different examples of narrative adaptation across literary and media contexts.

MEDIA PRACTICE PROJECT (AUTUMN)

Code AMAP6097A

Credits 30

You’ll be able to make use of your practical skills to produce a significant practice-based project investigating some aspect of Media, Film and/or Television studies. You’ll produce a significant practical work that refers to, and makes use of, relevant theoretical debates and issues, and will also write a critical evaluation of your work. Projects are individually negotiated with supervisors, and will build upon an area of practice that you have previously covered (film-making, screenwriting, digital media, magazine or sound media). Before taking this module students MUST have completed one of the following modules: AMAP5119B – Television Studio Production; AMAP5123A – Film & Video Production; AMAP5124B – Digital Media Theory and Practice; AMAM5052B - Writing the American Script; AMAM5051A/AMAM5052B – Writing The American Script: Hollywood and Beyond; LDCC5002A or LDCC5008B – Creative Writing: Scriptwriting.

MEDIA PRACTICE PROJECT (SPRING)

Code AMAP6098B

Credits 30

You’ll be able to make use of your practical skills to produce a significant practice-based project investigating some aspect of Media, Film and/or Television studies. You’ll produce a significant practical work that refers to, and makes use of, relevant theoretical debates and issues, and will also write a critical evaluation of your work. Projects are individually negotiated with supervisors, and will build upon an area of practice that you have previously covered (film-making, screenwriting, digital media, magazine or sound media). Before taking this module students must have completed one of the following modules: AMAP5119B – Television Studio Production; AMAP5123A – Film & Video Production; AMAP5124B – Digital Media Theory and Practice; AMAM6032A – Adaptation and Screenwriting; AMAM5038B – Adaptation and Transmedia Storytelling; AMAM5049B – Writing The American Script: Hollywood and Beyond; LDCC5002A or LDCC5008B – Creative Writing: Scriptwriting

WE'RE HERE, WE'RE QUEER: GLOBAL SEXUALITIES AND CONTEMPORARY QUEER CULTURES

Code HUM-6005A

Credits 30

The transnational movement of bodies, images, and capital has transformed modern conceptualisations of gender and sexuality. Sexual practices, identities, and subcultural formations have been altered through processes of migration and globalisation, as well as by the advent of new media technologies and the wide-reaching circulation of categories such as gay, lesbian, and transgender. In this context, this module aims to situate categories of gender and sexual difference within specific cultural and political contexts, and investigate non-normative gender and sexual formations in relation to emerging discourses on race and class and to anti-colonial theories of modernity and global capitalism. At the centre of the module sit questions such as: How have queer subjects been incorporated into nationalist projects and consumer culture? How has the liberal framework of human rights reshaped the struggles of queer movements outside the West? In what ways have transnational discourses on multiculturalism reshaped notions of queer community and belonging in global cities and in postcolonial metropolitan spaces? What role have media technologies and various forms of visual culture played in the reconstitution of gender and sexual identities and of representations of queer desire, affect, and kinship? Addressing these questions from an interdisciplinary perspective, and drawing on case studies from different geographical regions and from different disciplinary fields, the overall aim of the module is to explore the varied ways local histories and geographies interact with the forces of political, economic, and cultural globalisation, focusing especially on the experiences of sexual minorities in the Global South and of queer diasporas in the Global North.

MULTICULTURALISM

Code PPLX6072B

Credits 30

This module looks at the political implications of the rise of multicultural societies in Europe and North America since the end of World War II. (Canada is given consideration because of its importance to these debates both as a practical model as well as a source of influential theorists.) The aim is to introduce students to a range of contemporary theoretical perspectives on multiculturalism and facilitate critical assessment of the strengths and weaknesses of such approaches in the face of competing political discourses such as nationalism and alternative forms of liberalism. Theorists under examination may include; Parekh, Kymlicka, Levy, Taylor and Modood as well as major liberal alternative views; Barry, Rawls and Raz. Among the module themes the following will be addressed; group differentiated rights; institutional racism, Islamophobia, recognition vs toleration and cultural offence. The module will also look at divergent policies adopted within European states (eg: France and Germany) and give attention to the attempts to operationalize multiculturalism in the UK in particular via the Parekh Report.

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Important Information

Entry Requirements

A Levels

ABB

T Levels

Not accepted

BTEC

DDM excluding BTEC Public Services, Uniformed Services and Business Administration

Scottish highers

AAABB

Scottish highers advanced

BCC

Irish leaving certificate

3 subjects at H2, 3 subjects at H3

Access course

Access to Humanities & Social Sciences pathway. Pass the Access to HE Diploma with Distinction in 30 credits at Level 3 and Merit in 15 credits at Level 3

European Baccalaureate

75%

International Baccalaureate

32 points

GCSE offer

You are required to have Mathematics and English Language at a minimum of Grade C or Grade 4 or above at GCSE.

Additional entry requirements

UEA are committed to ensuring that Higher Education is accessible to all, regardless of their background or experiences. One of the ways we do this is through our contextual admissions schemes.

We welcome and value a wide range of alternative qualifications. If you have a qualification which is not listed here, please contact us via Admissions Enquiries.

If you do not meet the academic requirements for direct entry, you may be interested in one of our  Foundation Ye ar Programmes

Important note

Once enroled onto your course at UEA, your progression and continuation (which may include your eligibility for study abroad, overseas experience, placement or year in industry opportunities) is contingent on meeting the assessment requirements which are relevant to the course on which you are enroled.

International Requirements

We accept many international qualifications for entry to this course. View our International Students pages for specific information about your country.

INTO University of East Anglia

If you do not meet the academic and/or English language requirements for direct entry our partner, INTO UEA offers progression on to this undergraduate degree upon successful completion of a preparation programme. Depending on your interests, and your qualifications you can take a variety of routes to this degree:

International Foundation in Business, Economics, Society and Culture (for Year 1 entry to UEA)

International Foundation in Humanities and Law (for Year 1 entry to UEA)

Students for whom english is a foreign language

Applications from students whose first language is not English are welcome. We require evidence of proficiency in English (including writing, speaking, listening and reading): 

IELTS: 6.0 overall (minimum 5.5 in all components) for year 1 entry
IELTS: 6.5 overall (minimum 6.0 in all components) for year 2 entry

We also accept a number of other English language tests. Review our English Language Equivalencies for a list of example qualifications that we may accept to meet this requirement.

If you do not yet meet the English language requirements for this course, INTO UEA offer a variety of English language programmes which are designed to help you develop the English skills necessary for successful undergraduate study: 

Interviews

Most applicants will not be called for an interview and a decision will be made via UCAS. However, for some applicants an interview will be requested. Where an interview is required the Admissions Service will contact you directly to arrange a time. 

Gap year

We welcome applications from students who have already taken or intend to take a gap year.  We believe that a year between school and university can be of substantial benefit. You are advised to indicate your reason for wishing to defer entry on your UCAS application. 

Intakes

This course is open to UK and International applicants. The annual intake is in September each year. 

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Course Reference Number: 6775264

BA (Hons) MEDIA STUDIES