Film and Television Studies BA

Throughout your degree you'll come across topics that really engage you and you wish you had more opportunity to explore in greater depth. The dissertation is that opportunity!

You'll agree a topic with your supervisor who'll be there to support and advise you throughout the entire project.

This individual support will be matched by more general sessions that develop your research and writing skills.

By the end of the year you'll submit a well researched and written project of 8,000 - 12,000 words.

The project will not only demonstrate your subject knowledge but also your ability to:

• critically assess evidence and sources
• argue coherently
• work independently

Essential skills any employer wants to see.

This module is worth 40 credits.

Almost every country has a cinema industry. Yet what’s shown, and why, varies wildly.

We’ll look at how films outside Hollywood are made, distributed and received globally, and how these reflect local, regional and international trends.

We’ll ask how these cinemas:

• reflect past and current international film industries setups and audiences’ tastes
• are driven by local cultural specifics and global changes
• might benefit different institutions and structures in society

We will also try to untangle categories such as national cinema, transnational cinema and world cinema, as well as to make sense of different filmic traditions, genres and modes around the world. Who creates these categories and who do they serve?

With an entire global cinema to draw from, the focus will narrow in any year to particular regions, filmic genres or movements.

This module is worth 20 credits.

The cultural and creative industries are at the forefront of government strategies across the world for developing post-industrial economies, are seen as exciting places to work, and regularly feature at the top of graduate employment destinations.

• But what are these industries, and what is it like to work in them?
• How do you gain entry to these competitive, highly skilled jobs?
• What is ‘creativity’ and why is it so important to modern economies?
• And what does the future hold for cultural and creative sectors?

We’ll examine the structure, organisation and working patterns in the creative and media industries alongside more practical exercises designed to help you to identify and evaluate your own skills and interests. This combination of industry knowledge and personal reflection is aimed to help you to find a rewarding and exciting career when you leave university.

You’ll also examine key aspects of contemporary work including:

• the concept of creativity, the knowledge economy and precarious labour
• important issues such as internship culture, exploitation and inequality

There will be plenty of opportunity to discuss and build upon your own experiences and aspirations, and to conduct independent research on areas of creative and media work that interest you.

This module is worth 20 credits.

Understand the main processes and people involved in the development and production of screen content:

• People - the key roles and responsibilities, talent development and management
• Institutions - including studios, production companies, labour organisations/Guilds/professional societies
• Ideas - development and content creation
• Money - financing, budgets and related aspects, such as intellectual property and pay structures
• Places - global production trends including flows of talent, co-productions and production contexts in different territories 

You'll come away with an in-depth knowledge of who does what and why. You'll also start to understand:

• some of the attitudes prevalent in the professional industry
• the specialist language used
• regulatory contexts production happens in.

This module is worth 20 credits.

This module examines North American short stories and novels and their film adaptations, paying attention to the contexts in which both the literary and the cinematic texts are produced as well as to the analysis of the texts themselves. In particular, the module takes an interest in literary texts whose film adaptations have been produced in different national contexts to the source material.

What is a film, television or literary classic? How has this term come under pressure and fractured over the past half century or so? In this module you will consider the concept of the mid and late twentieth century American “classic” in a variety of contrasting and overlapping contexts. These contexts will be elaborated on the basis of their formal, generic, period and/or cultural designations that will cover university and exam curricula reading lists, popular opinion and widespread critical consensus (such as the currently prevalent view, for instance, that the early twenty-first century constitutes a ‘golden age’ of US television).

This module examines the development of photography in America from roughly 1945 onwards. The module breaks the period down into themes and considers:

1. the transformation of ‘documentary’ photograph;

2. the emergence and importance of colour photography;

3. experimental, conceptual and post-conceptual photography;

4. issues of serialism and seriality;

5. landscape photography;

6. the photobook

7. analogue/digital

The module will draw on the work of a diverse range of photographers, including Walker Evans, Robert Frank, Harry Callahan, Aaron Siskind, Ed Ruscha, Lewis Baltz, Robert Adams, Robert Heinecken, Stephen Shore, Todd Hido, William Eggleston and Doug Rickard.

Many films share common traits. Together they might be classed as “action”, “made for television” or “low budget”. But how does as film get assigned a genre? Who does the assigning? And what impact does this assigning have?

During the module we’ll delve deep into a particular genre. We’ll examine it’s:

• key concepts and texts
• development
• influence and influences

Building on what you’ve learnt in years one and two you’ll also look at the genre in the context of production and consumption.

As well as knowledge of a specific genre you’ll also develop the skills to apply your learning to other genres.

This module is worth 20 credits.

Develop and expand your understanding of the relationship between screen media and their most important component – the audience.

We’ll explore widely across history including:

• pre-cinema moving images
• the changing nature of cinema space
• the impact of domestic television and VCRs
• the playing of games and use of smartphone apps
• experimental forms of screen media

You’ll also consider the impact social and political factors, and changes in daily living, have on screen media’s relationship with its audience.

Alongside the theory you’ll also get practical experience by using questionnaires and focus groups to conduct your own audience research.

This module is worth 20 credits.

This module combines the historical and theoretical knowledge you have gained with the practical task of video production. You'll investigate the ways that production activities contribute to videomaking through recording and editing techniques, and experience the many decisions that must be made through the production process. You'll spend time in media labs and in the field making a collaborative video production, alongside four hours a week in lectures and seminars.

Examine how issues of gender and sexuality relate to media and popular culture.

Using the intersectional fields of feminism, queer theory, and media and cultural studies we'll ask some crucial questions such as:

• How are gender and sexuality represented in media and popular culture?
• How do media and cultural industries structure gender and sexual inequalities?
• How are identities and practices of media audiences and users gendered and sexualised?
• How can gender and sexual norms be challenged in creative and radical ways?

This module is worth 20 credits.

This module will examine cultural production during Italy’s fascist regime. There will be an emphasis on the experience of visual culture in public settings such as the exhibition space, the cinema, and the built environment. A wide range of cultural artefacts will be examined, paying attention to material as well as visual aspects. Visual material will be situated in the social, cultural and political circumstances of the period. Topics will include: Fascism’s use of spectacle, fascist conceptions of utopia, the regime’s use of the past, the relationship between Fascism and modernism, Fascism as a political religion, the cult of Mussolini, urban-rural relations, and empire building. The module will also consider the afterlife of fascist visual culture and the question of ‘difficult’ heritage.

You'll start with an introduction to women's history in the period 1300-1600 in an Italian context. This will include women's domestic and political roles across ages, marital status and class.

We'll then then look at the role of the Renaissance (1400-1600) woman in art:

• How have women been represented
• How did women play a part in the consumption and commissioning processes
• How did women, if at all, become active as the creators of art

Classes will focus on:

• the role of biblical and patristic writings in shaping attitudes towards women
• the role of the family and marriage in fashioning gender relations
• representations of good and bad women
• women as patrons and producers of art

We'll use methodologies from a variety of disciplines, such as history, art history and gender studies.

This module traces the development of performance art from the 1950s to the 1980s.

It considers the work of a number of artists in America and Europe in terms of:

• their focus on the body of the artist
• the dematerialization of the art object
• the changing role of the audience or viewer.

Students will engage with a range of theories of:

• identity, gender and selfhood
• phenomenology and participation
• duration, temporality and impermanence pain, endurance and abjection.

Exploring performance art’s relationship with other visual art forms, including dance, experimental music, film and television, this module considers and evaluates the art historical genealogies of performance art and body art and examines the ways in which performance art has shifted the terms of art history.

In addition, it will consider the issues at stake in constructing a history of performance art, and in documenting, exhibiting, and writing about ephemeral, invisible, or indeterminate practices.

This module is worth 20 credits.

There is growing consensus that the climate and ecological crisis is the most pressing concern facing humanity today. In this module, we’ll examine the various ways in which the media impacts the climate crisis in terms of:

• production - environmental impact of the media industries
• content – documentaries, fiction, and climate news
• consumption – social media and activism

Every week, we will examine a challenge in its context, and debate and develop possible solutions. You’ll get to understand the role of the media in both exacerbating environmental issues, and potentially offering ways forward for a more sustainable society.

For your assessment, you will research and analyse an environmental case study, and reflect on your own use of the media to consider how you can be part of the change.

This module is worth 20 credits.

This module will explore, in the broadest sense, politics and visual culture:

• how films, television, art and online forms of visual communication can be understood politically (i.e. how they say particular things about the societies they represent)
• how they present and, in some cases, comment upon specific political events and changes around the world
• how certain forms of visual culture have been produced and designed in order to act as agents of political change and activism, sometimes challenging the political structures of our society
• how individual artists, filmmakers and content producers can be said to have deliberate political motivation and intent, and the ways they interact with and are challenged by the organisations and institutions to which they are often beholden.

We will be looking at different genres, modes, forms and styles to examine how we can understand the interaction of politics and visual culture.

Students will work in small groups, led by a member of academic staff, on a collaborative research project. These projects will take one of two forms:

1. An ongoing research project led by a member of department staff.
   
2. An ‘industry challenge’ or ‘live brief’ identified as relevant to the creative and cultural industries (screen, media, heritage, arts, gallery sectors), which will be overseen by a member of staff in collaboration with an industry partner. These partners will primarily be drawn from local organisations, contributing to the university’s civic ambitions and acting as a template for potential future department-city collaborations around teaching.
   

The specific nature of these projects will change each year, based on current staff research priorities and the concerns impacting the creative and cultural industries. This will allow students to work on areas that are at the cutting edge of film and television studies, history of art or media studies or that are directly relevant to cultural or creative sectors that many aim to enter after graduation. Specific topics will be made available in the Spring of the preceding academic year, when students make their module choices.

The module will be structured around independent and collaborative working practices, echoing the nature of work within the cultural and creative industries. Employability skills are embedded throughout the module. Each group will have an academic lead who will guide and support students throughout the module, but they will be expected to plan their work independently and collectively. Weekly meetings will act as a check that students are making good progress and allow staff to offer direction as necessary.

Franchises dominate the mainstream global media industries. Since the 1990s, franchising as a commercial, creative and industrial strategy has become increasingly prevalent across the cultural industries: for example, in 2022, all of the top 10 highest-grossing films worldwide are franchise instalments produced by global media titans such as Disney and Warner Bros. These powerful corporations have wings that spread across various media and cultural sectors, from screen industries such as film, TV and games, to audio industries such as music and podcasts, to tourism industries such as theme parks, and retail industries such as product licensing and merchandising.

The increasing global and mainstream production – and popularity – of franchises means that they are indelible parts of many media consumers’ lives, including our own. But how much do we understand about how franchising works as a commercial strategy, where it originated, and why it is so successful? How are franchises produced, distributed, sustained, marketed and consumed? What kind of textual and generic themes predominate and why?

Offering a detailed look into the contemporary media industries’ most lucrative and influential production strategy, this module will situate the rise of franchising within relevant historical, social, and industrial contexts, using a variety of global franchise case studies to shed light on broader developments that have shaped the media and creative industries we know today.