English Language and Creative Writing BA(Hons)

Course in brief

This course is for students who are passionate about English language and want to apply their critical reading skills to writing practice.

You are encouraged to write in a variety of styles and develop an understanding of the techniques and skills involved in storytelling across different genres.

Our award-winning tutors enable you to become a motivated thinker and writer with critical and creative writing skills. You will be able to link your awareness of technique, form and style to the craft of writing and consider texts and your own work in relation to political, social and cultural theories.

Local publishers and writers work with us to develop your understanding of the craft. We also have specific modules that allow you to work with a community group or company to develop your writing and reflect critically on your practice.

There are placement opportunities available in year 2 as well as field trips to theatres, museums, schools, retirement villages and other community organisations.

Key facts

Location Brighton: Falmer

UCAS code Q310

Full-time 3 years
With year abroad 4 years

Book your open day place

Meet our students, see our accommodation and find out more about your course.

Entry requirements

A-level or BTEC
Entry requirements are in the range of A-level BCC–CCC (104–96 UCAS Tariff points), or BTEC Extended Diploma DMM–MMM. Our conditional offers typically fall within this range.

A-levels must include English language or combined English language and literature.

We will generally make you an offer if your predicted grades are at the top of this range. If your predicted grades are towards the lower end of this range we may still make you an offer if you have a good GCSE (or equivalent) profile or relevant non-academic achievements.

International Baccalaureate
27 points.

Access to HE Diploma
Pass with 60 credits overall. Humanities, history or politics courses preferred. At least 45 credits at level 3.

GCSE (minimum grade C or grade 4)
At least English language and maths.

For non-native speakers of English
IELTS 6.0 overall, with 6.0 in writing and a minimum of 5.5 in the other elements.

International equivalencies

International equivalencies by country

Albania
Algeria
Argentina
Australia
Austria
Bahrain
Bangladesh
Belarus
Belgium
Bermuda
Bosnia and Herzegovina
Botswana
Brazil
Bulgaria
Burma (Myanmar)
Cameroon
Canada
Chile
China
Colombia
Croatia
Cyprus
Czech Republic
Denmark
Ecuador
Egypt
Estonia
Finland
France
Germany
Ghana
Greece
Guyana
Hong Kong
Hungary
Iceland
India
Indonesia
Iran
Iraq
Ireland
Israel
Italy
Jamaica
Japan
Jordan
Kazakhstan
Kenya
Kosovo
Kuwait
Latvia
Lebanon
Liechtenstein
Libya
Lithuania
Luxembourg
Macedonia
Malaysia
Malawi
Malta
Mexico
Moldova
Montenegro
Morocco
Namibia
Nepal
Netherlands
New Zealand
Nigeria
Norway
Oman
Pakistan
Palestinian National Authority
Philippines
Poland
Portugal
Qatar
Romania
Russian Federation
Saudi Arabia
Serbia
Sierra Leone
Singapore
Slovakia
Slovenia
South Africa
South Korea
Spain
Sri Lanka
Syria
Sweden
Switzerland
Taiwan
Tanzania
Thailand
Tunisia
Turkey
Uganda
Ukraine
United Arab Emirates
United States
Uzbekistan
Venezuela
Vietnam
Yemen
Zambia
Zimbabwe

We can help you meet our English language or academic entry requirements.

Visit our language institute

For English language preparation courses.

Visit our International College

For academic preparation courses.

Course in detail

Why study with us?

You’ll study at our Falmer campus on the edge of Brighton and the South Downs, with its outstanding modern facilities and easy access to the city centre, and its well-established arts and social scene.

Our talented teaching team create a dynamic and supportive environment where you will be challenged and helped to learn and grow. They will guide you to think critically and creatively, develop detailed methods of analysis and interpretation and precisely communicate your ideas.

You will be able to use skills acquired through this course and enhance your individual professional and personal development by taking advantage of volunteer placements with local community projects and city schools by becoming involved with local events.

Guest speaker sessions will give you the chance to meet inspirational writers like bestselling novelist Peter James and scriptwriter Graham Duff.

There are chances for your work to reach a wider audience through submissions to online journal brightONLINE, subject-related student societies such as the Literature Society and Brighton University Drama Society (BUDS) and by taking part in a collaborative anthology and a graduate show.

You'll gain vital transferable skills including personal organisation, independent research, team working, communication and presentation that you can use throughout your career.

This joint honours degree provides good grounding for many different industries including publishing and journalism, but equally provides a solid foundation for further study or research.

Brighton University Literature Society (BULS) Open Mic Night

Checkland building, Falmer campus

Course structure

Full-time students have 10–11 hours contact time a week in lectures, seminars and workshops, but you are also expected to carry out independent study. Part-time study is possible and can be tailored to suit individual needs.

There are placement opportunities available in the second year as well as field trips to theatres, museums, schools, retirement villages and other community organisations. You are also welcome to study abroad after your second year.

Year 1

Modules

Practices of Reading and Writing
Narrative Literary Texts
Storying the Self
The Structure and Grammar of English
Text Design: Genre and Style
Perspectives on the History of the English Language

Year 2

Modules

Creative Writing: Process and Craft
Research and Practice
Image and Text: The Language of Comics and Graphic Novels
Power and Persuasion

Options*

Videogames Cultures
Science Fiction: Screens, Texts, Theories
British Television Drama
Memory, History and Trauma On-screen
Intercultural Awareness Module
Studying Travel Writing
Queer Writing
Literature in Practice
Literature and Art History
American Literature 1850-1945
Multilingualism
Sign Language Linguistics
Regional Englishness
Writing for Stage, Radio and Screen
Media in Practice
Introduction to Journalism
Television and Studio Production
Photography: From painting with light to zeros and ones
Documentary Filmmaking: Theory and Practice
Power and Persuasion
Contested Stories
French (Reflective Language Learning Module)
German (Reflective Language Learning Module)
Spanish (Reflective Language Learning Module)

*Option modules are indicative and may change, depending on timetabling and staff availability

Final year

Modules

Dissertation
Final Year Conference

Options*

Screen Comedy
Children's Screen Cultures
Framing Women: The 'Female' in Popular Screen Culture
Community Engagement in Practice
Russian Literature and Culture: The Golden Age and Beyond
(Re)viewing Shakespeare
Apocalypse, Utopia and Dystopia
Literature and Philosophy
Post-War American Literature
Women's Writing and Feminist Theory
Restoration Drama
Adaptations
Creative Writing Project
Goths: Texts and Contexts
Victorian Sexualities
Brighton Rocks
Writing the Contemporary
Postcolonial Literatures
European Literatures and Film
Culture Wars: Revisiting the Great Divide
Language, Culture and Ideology
World Englishes
Language of Gender and Sexuality
Approaches to Analysing Discourse
English Language Teaching
Television News Production
Popular Culture: Europe and Beyond
From Script to Screen
Images of War
The Autobiography and the Screen
Media Ethics and Conflict
French (Cultural Project Module)
German (Cultural Project Module)
Spanish (Cultural Project Module)

Students must take at least one language-related module and one writing-related module.

*Option modules are indicative and may change, depending on timetabling and staff availability

Staff profile

Jess Moriarty

Jess Moriarty researches in the field of pedagogy in writing practice, especially in auto-ethnographical academic writing and in creative writing with undergraduates.

She graduated from the University of Sussex with a Creative Writing MA in 2002 and joined the University of Brighton soon after. Jess won a Teaching Excellence award for her workshops with undergraduates, in which she aims to ignite inspiration and motivation with the writing process.

Jess is the co-founder of Work Write Live, which provides a range of writing short courses and volunteering opportunities for students in the College of Arts and Humanities to develop the vocational and academic skills they are acquiring on their degree programme. She has been interviewed by the Times Higher Educational Supplement about her workshops and won an Innovation Award for her retreats, where participants are encouraged to develop confidence with writing and speaking. Under the banner of Work Write Live, students are able to run open mic evenings, produce creative writing anthologies and organise an end-of-year graduate show.

Jess's doctorate looked at how to make academic writing more personal and creative and included a play based on her autobiographical and researched experiences with academic life. Her work looks at cross-disciplinary practice, community engagement and linking creative processes with the employability agenda.

Careers and employability

The course will help you to develop skills in critical thinking, storytelling, presenting, teamwork and independent research. You will also develop an advanced knowledge of the discipline and its place outside the classroom.

Our graduates are equipped with the knowledge and transferable skills needed to pursue a career in many related areas, including publishing, social media, marketing, teaching, journalism, public relations and human resources. Graduates may go on to further study, for example through our Creative Writing MA.

Fees and funding

Your fees

UK/EU (full-time) 9,250 GBP

International (full-time) 12,660 GBP

The fees listed here are for full-time courses beginning in the academic year 2017–18. Tuition fees are payable for each year that you study with us.

Where UK/EU students are subject to regulated fees, the annual fee increase cannot exceed the UK government’s maximum regulated tuition fee limit set for the relevant year. For all other students, ie those not subject to regulated fees, tuition fees are subject to a maximum annual increase of the higher of 5% or RPI.

You can find out more about our fees in the the university's student contract and tuition fee policy (pdf).

The tuition fee you have to pay depends on a number of factors including the kind of course you take, and whether you study full- or part-time. If you are studying part-time you will normally be charged on a pro rata basis depending on the number of modules you take.

What's included in the fee?

When costs such as health or DBS checks, or use of specialist materials are incurred as a mandatory requirement of the course they are included in your tuition fee.

You may incur additional costs depending on the optional modules or activities you choose. The cost of optional activities is not included in your tuition fee and you will need to meet this cost in addition to your fees. Before you apply check with the school that provides your course using the contact details in the Find out more tab (at the end of this page) for advice about what is included and what optional costs you could face so you can budget accordingly.

See our finance pages for advice about funding and scholarships as well as further information about fees and advice on international and island fee-paying status.

Location and living here

Location

About Brighton

Brighton has been called the happiest place in the UK, and it’s easy to see why. With five miles of pebble beach, more than 300 pubs and a packed festival calendar, Brighton is the ideal place to spend your student years.

Arts and culture: The Royal Pavilion is the most famous landmark in Brighton, opening its doors to around 400,000 tourists every year. Right next door is the Brighton Dome, the south coast’s premier multi-arts venue, and the Brighton Museum & Art Gallery, which holds a diverse collection of decorative arts, textiles and archaeological artefacts.

Festivals: The Brighton Festival is now the largest arts festival in England and a major milestone in the international cultural calendar. Meanwhile, The Great Escape has been established as the UK’s leading event for new music, with over 300 bands playing 30 venues across the city over three days.

Nightlife: Aside from the many nightclubs that line the city’s seafront, student favourites include The Haunt, Concorde 2 and Patterns, which attract leading bands and DJs from around the world. If you don’t feel like dancing, you can take your pick from the many hundreds of pubs and bars that dot the city centre.

Shopping: The quirky North Laine district houses Brighton’s finest collection of boutique shops and independent cafes, while the narrow, winding streets of the South Lanes house collections of jewellery and antiques. Churchill Square is the city’s main shopping centre and serves all of your high street needs.

Sports: Brighton’s seaside location offers the perfect opportunity to try paddle boarding, kayaking and windsurfing. Further into the city, The Level has a skate park for skateboarders and BMX riders to practise their skills.

Campus where this course is taught

Falmer campus

Surrounded by the South Downs National Park and just five miles from the centre of Brighton, our Falmer campus has benefited from over £60million of investment over the past 10 years. 7,000 students are based here, studying subjects including English, education, social science, nursing and medicine.

Recent developments include the Falmer Sports Centre – with its fitness suites and sports hall – and the innovative Checkland Building, which has natural ventilation systems and an insulating green roof.

Falmer has also recently installed more than 600 solar panels, which reduce the campus’s carbon emissions by more than 80 tonnes. The renovation has made us one of the top universities in the UK for on-site renewable energy production.

Accommodation

Brighton

Our Brighton halls of residence are located across the city in Grand Parade, Moulsecoomb, Varley Park and Falmer.

Our Grand Parade campus is in central Brighton and has one hall of residence, Phoenix Brewery, within walking distance. We have around 300 rooms available in Phoenix Brewery, which are all ensuite and self-catered.

Moulsecoomb is two miles from the city centre and also has one hall of residence, Moulsecoomb Place, on campus. All accommodation in Moulsecoomb Place is catered, offering breakfast and an evening meal during term time. There are more than 150 rooms available here, with six to eight rooms per flat.

Varley Park offers the biggest choice of student accommodation with ten halls of residence. The site is four miles from Brighton centre but within walking distance of Falmer train station. You can also catch a free bus service to Grand Parade, Moulsecoomb and Falmer campuses, which is operated by local bus service The Big Lemon.

Falmer campus has two halls of residence: Great Wilkins and Paddock Field. Great Wilkins offers 150+ self-catered single rooms and one-bed couples flats, while Paddock Field offers 450+ catered and self-catered single rooms only. All rooms in Falmer are en-suite.

Aside from halls, you have the option of Unihomes, which we let out to our students on behalf of private landlords. The rent covers all utilities and includes £5,000 of contents insurance for your personal belongings.

You can also choose to join the many students who live away from campus in private rented accommodation. We have a list of high-quality, university-endorsed private sector accommodation and can help you find housemates to move in with.

Find out more on our Brighton accommodation webpages and if you have any questions, our accommodation team will be happy to help. You can contact them by email at accommodation@brighton.ac.uk or by telephone on 01273 644100.

Paddock Field

Moulsecoomb Place

Maps

Accommodation

University building

Falmer campus and Brighton and Sussex Medical School map

Unistats

Unistats and key information sets

Unistats is an organisation that collects specific data about university courses in the UK which enables you to compare information that is important in your decision-making when choosing a university. All universities publish Unistats data on their online course pages.

Wherever we can we have provided extra information here to help put the data into context so that it is as useful as possible when you are making decisions.

Programme specification

The programme specification is the official university document for each course. They are updated each year, and give a very detailed breakdown of what your course might look like.

Programme specification