Media and English Literature BA(Hons)

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Year 1 

In year 1, you will study the principal concepts and approaches to the study of the media in both theoretical and practical ways. These core media modules illustrate the complexities around representation, narrative and communication. The core literature modules will enable you to engage with a variety of genres and approaches, and to unravel meaning with a variety of critical and theoretical tools and approaches.

Modules

• Critical Approaches to Media 1

  This module will introduce you to a range of critical academic approaches to media. It tackles the most cutting-edge topics in media studies and introduces canonical approaches used in their analysis. An introduction to these approaches will enable you to understand the workings of media audiences, industries and texts. The module will focus on media experiences that are relevant to your everyday life, ensuring that as well as academic development, the module will give you the tools to analyse your own engagement with, and consumption of, the media.

• Producing and Consuming Digital Media

  This module explores your critical understanding of consuming and producing social media in  personal and professional settings.

• Stories and Storytelling

  How do stories create and communicate experiences, identities and cultural meaning? How do they work to perpetuate and challenge social structures? On this module you'll study fairy tales, myth, novels, short stories and visual narratives (for example, film, comics and graphic novels, gaming) to discuss these questions. Through reading and guided research you'll identify and pursue your own interests in critical, creative and reflective ways and produce a reading and research journal.

• Critical Approaches to Media 2

  This module introduces key media studies theories and concepts and applies them to the analysis of real-world issues. You will develop skills and techniques to critique media representations, showing the importance of media analysis in everyday life. By analysing media technologies, you will engage with the most innovative media content, forms and practices of the day. By questioning mediation, the module will bring to life the role of media in society and enable you to critique the media in terms of culture, politics, innovation and environment.

• Staging Politics

  How might theatre engage audiences with the politics of class, race, gender, sexuality and the environment? You'll examine a range of plays in context, exploring how provocative stories develop through characterisation, stage directions, dialogue and dramatic action. Learn to think critically and creatively about theatrical texts and how to write scripts for stage in inclusive collaborations with your peers.

• The World, the Text and the Critic

  Taking inspiration from Edward Said’s book The World, the Text, and the Critic (1983), this module enables you to explore some of the key debates in contemporary literary studies. Organised around decolonial, feminist, queer, ecocritical and other approaches to texts, you'll develop critical writing skills and knowledge of social, cultural and political contexts in the interpretation of literary works and the wider world. 

Our courses are reviewed and enhanced on an ongoing basis in order to make sure that what you learn with us is relevant and that your course enables you to develop appropriate skills. When you apply to study with us, we will inform you of any new developments in your chosen programme through Student View.

Year 2 

In year 2, you will study the history and theory of film, followed by a module examining digital media and culture. You'll also develop your understanding of literature in context, from the sixteenth century to the present. You'll also start to develop the independent study and research skills required in your final year dissertation or creative project.

You can also choose option modules from across our humanities and arts subjects.  

At the end of your second year of your Media and English Literature degree you will have the opportunity to study abroad for a year extending your degree to four years. 

Core modules

• Visual Media Cultures
• The Nineteenth Century in Literature
• Research Methods
• British Literature and Twentieth-century History

Options*

Two from:

• Queer Writing
• Twentieth Century Literary Experiments  
• Stories that Transform: Reading and Writing for Change
• Reading the Graphic Novel
• Spoken and Written Language

• Mind and Language
• Linguistics and Grammar: Concepts and Analyses
• Literature and Art History
• Poetry and Process
• Introduction to Journalism
• Genres
• Reading the Graphic Novel
• Writing for Stage, Radio and Screen
• Professional Practice and Placement
• Power and Persuasion
• American Literature 1850-1945
• Documentary Storytelling: Theory and Practice  
• Video Production 2
• Social Media for Activist and Community Groups
• Community Radio
• Branding and Public Relations
• Film Studies  
• Videogame Cultures

You can also choose option modules from across our humanities and arts subjects. 

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

Placement 

In year 2 you can choose a placement module which will allow you to gain professional experience in industries such as publishing, broadcasting, social media marketing, PR and the charity sector. 

Recent placement hosts include:

• Action Medical Research
• Action Tutoring
• Airstream Photo Booth
• Brighton Dome and Festival
• British Forces Broadcasting Services
• Epoque Press
• Factory Films
• The Old Market Theatre
• Little Green Pig
• Men’s Health Magazine
• Prsnt

In year 3 you can choose the Community Placement module aimed at further building your professional experience. This is 30 to 50 hours of voluntary work with a not-for-profit or community organisation. The placement is assessed and contributes to your degree.

Mia Kurian, graduate

“My placement was with Metropolitan City Church Brighton as their Social Media Manager. I learnt a lot about myself and my interests and the type of career I may want to pursue. I got to try my hand at website design, something I had never done before, and it was a great opportunity for me to expand my creativity. Professionally, I gained a lot of experience that has been extremely useful in my career today. I learnt about creating brand cohesion and creating a brand image from scratch, something I’ve never done before.

"I absolutely loved it. It was an incredible learning experience as well as insightful. It allowed me to learn a lot about myself and the future I want. My placement manager was lovely and supportive and allowed me the freedom to explore my creativity.”

Final year

In year 3, besides your dissertation, you have the choice of a wide range of options, from popular culture to postcolonial literature, and from personal documentary to television news production.

Core modules

• Dissertation
• Ethics, Power and Professionalism

Options*

Three from:

• Apocalypse, Utopia, Dystopia
• Literature and the World Wars
• From Script to Screen
• Women’s Writing and Feminist Theory
• Gothic: Texts and Contexts
• Citizen Journalism: Theory and Practice
• Post-War American Literature
• Postcolonial Literatures
• Adaptations 
• Community Placement: Theory in Practice
• World Englishes
• Language of Gender and Sexuality
• Analysing Big Data: Quantitative Methods in Language Research
• Approaches to Analysing Discourse
• English Language Teaching
• Victorian Sexualities
• Conflict, Migration, Borders

• Writing the Contemporary
• Culture Wars: Class, Race, Gender and the Politics of Taste
• Russian Literature
• Literature and Philosophy
• Approaches to the Study of Meaning
• European Literatures and Film
• Brighton Rocks
• Restoration Dramas
• (Re)Viewing Shakespeare
• Media Policy
• Special Case Study: Screening Sexualities
• Promotional Media Cultures
• Digital Marketing
• Community Project
• TV Production

You can also choose option modules from across our humanities and arts subjects.

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

Meet the team 

Patricia McManus, course leader

Patricia's teaching crosses contemporary media theory and mass-mediated forms of narrative, with particular interests in feminist, Marxist and post-Marxist theoretical traditions.

Her research has primarily examined the history of the novel, particular the interaction with film and of television drama in terms of story-telling practices. Read Patricia's full profile.

Other staff who teach on the course include:

• Dr Vy Rajapillai

Course fees

The fees listed here are for the first year of full-time study if you start your course in the academic year 2023–24.

You will pay fees for each year of your course. Some fees may increase each year.

UK undergraduate and some postgraduate fees are regulated by the UK government and increases will not be more than the maximum amount allowed. Course fees that are not regulated may increase each year by up to 5% or RPI (whichever is higher).

If you are studying part-time your fee will usually be calculated based on the number of modules that you take.

Find out more

• Fees, bursaries, scholarships and government funding info for UK and international undergraduate and postgraduate students
• Student finance and budgeting while studying
• About the university’s fees by checking our student contract and tuition fee policy (pdf).

Campus where this course is taught

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