The Cultural and Critical Studies MA at University of westminster is part of the Cultural and Literary Studies Suite, a cluster of four MAs that bring together academics, curators and practitioners who share a commitment to investigating modern and contemporary culture from aesthetic, critical, literary and experiential perspectives. You'll share classes with students from the Art and Visual Culture MA, the English Literature: Modern and Contemporary Fictions MA and the Museum, Galleries and Contemporary Culture MA, joining a fruitful and intellectually rigorous environment designed to facilitate interdisciplinary thinking.
The Cultural and Critical Studies MA offers you the rare opportunity to study contemporary critical and cultural debates across a wide range of fields. Exploring a variety of different visual, textual and popular forms of culture, the course will particularly appeal to those with wide-ranging interests in the arts and humanities, as well as those interested in cutting-edge theoretical debates.
We also draw upon a long tradition of practical engagement with the applied arts and culture. Our location in the cultural heart of London offers a unique educational experience and as one of the most internationally diverse universities in the UK, you’ll also be studying alongside students from a wide range of different cultural backgrounds. You'll be supported on the course through a series of academic skills workshops, on subjects such as improving academic writing and undertaking research projects, which are designed to support you in your progression to essay and dissertation writing at postgraduate level.
Aims
Work experience
Study our Work Placement in Cultural Institutions module to gain industry experience and develop your professional or freelance profile.
Recent work placements on the module have taken place at institutions including:
- British Film Institute
- British Museum
- Film London
- Jessica Carlisle Gallery
- Museum of London
- Wellcome Trust
Graduate employers
Graduates from this course have found employment at organisations including:
- BBC
- Plan International
- Queen Mary University of London
- Stonewall
- United Nations Development Programme
Job roles
This course will prepare you for a variety of roles, including:
- Editor
- Educator
- Journalist
- Digital content producer
- Museum, gallery, library or archive professional
- Public relations or communications professional
- Researcher
The Cultural and Critical Studies MA is delivered in both full-time and part-time modes, with both September and January start dates. This means that when you start your course you will be joining a lively community of new and continuing students.
The course is modular, with each single module valued at 20 credits, and the dissertation at 60 credits. For the MA, you'll be required to accumulate the total of 180 credits over the course of your degree. Normally, full-time students take one core module and two options per semester and work on the dissertation in the summer. Part-time students would typically take one core module and one option module per semester in the first year and complete further two option modules and the dissertation in their second year of their MA.
The course consists of two core taught modules, Problems and Perspectives in Cultural Studies and Capitalism and Culture, which establish a theoretical framework for the close analysis of central debates around the production of culture. A core dissertation of 12,000 words, which can be written on an appropriate topic of your choice, will also be completed at the end of your studies. You'll also be able to choose four additional modules, of which the following are indicative of what you could choose from
TBC...
