Department of Anthropology

Department of Media and Communications

BA Anthropology and Media 3rd Year Options 2016-17

Module descriptions and provisional timetable information for all Anthropology

and Media and Communications options running in 2016-17 are contained in this
document. In the third year of BA Anthropology and Media you take:
BA Anthropology and Media
60 credits of Anthropology Options
MC53029A Media Production Option 2*
30 credits of Media and Communications Options

Year Total

60cr
30cr
30cr
120 credits

*You can choose to do MC53001A Dissertation in place of MC53029A Media

Production. This cannot be done in conjunction with the Anthropology Individual
Project.
3rd year modules are normally also open to MA students. Both groups attend the
same lecture and you are then taught in separate seminars.
Choosing your options
You choose your options online via the MyGoldsmiths student portal from midday
on 7 March to midday 21 March.
Once you have registered your option choices online they will be sent to the
departments for approval. In most cases options will be approved by the start of
the Summer Term, unless we need to clarify information with you.
Please contact the respective department if you want to change your options once
module selection has closed - anthropology@gold.ac.uk or media-ug@gold.ac.uk
Dissertation
The option to do a Dissertation/Individual Project is available in both departments.
You can choose to do one of these.
Work Placement Module
You can choose to do a Work Placement module in either Department. Applications
have already been made for the Media and Communications module. If you made
an application remember to include the Work Placement as one of your options.
Assessment
Provisional assessment deadlines are given for each module. Please note, if you are
doing two Media and Communications options in one term, you may nominate one
essay which can be handed after the standard due date. For Autumn Term modules
this is four weeks after the deadline. For Spring Term modules the deadline is 2 May
2

2017.
This provision depends on the following:
1.
You must tell the relevant module leader and the Exams Officer in

writing before monitoring week that this provision is being invoked for a

particular module.
2.
The essay must be given in on the due date. Late essays will be treated in

the usual way.
3.
Other essays must be handed in at the correct time.
Timetable
Provisional timetable information is given for all modules. Please note that this
information is subject to change. The confirmed timetable and seminar group
allocation will be available from 1 September 2016.
MC53029A Media Production runs from 10-4 on Wednesday in the Autumn Term.
You can not choose any other modules that run at this time.
Due to the number of modules offered in both departments, it is inevitable that
some modules will clash. Be careful to check that your choices are not timetabled
simultaneously. Where it is possible we will change your seminar time to avoid
clashes.
Anthropology Inter-Collegiate Modules
Third year students can take Inter-Collegiate modules at other Anthropology
Departments at University of London Colleges with a value up to 30 credits. You
first need to collect an Inter-Collegiate Module Registration Form from the other
University of London College, then make an appointment with your Personal
Tutor to approve the form. Your completed Registration Form should be given
to the Anthropology Department Office before the end of summer term (do not
return the form to the Intercollegiate institution yourself, as it must be processed
by Goldsmiths who will finalise your registration with the host institution). The
modules count towards your Anthropology option choices.
We will not confirm your intercollegiate modules or other option choices until you
return the registration form to the Department.

Anthropology 3rd Year Options 2016-17

AN53003A Psychological Perspectives in Anthropology

AN53040A Anthropology and the Visual: Production Module

AN53005B History and Anthropology

AN53042A Anthropology and the Visual 2

AN53006A Individual Project

AN53044A Anthropology of Violence

AN53008A Anthropology of Health, Medicine and Social Power

AN53072A Indian and Peasant Politics in Amazonia

AN53013B Urban Anthropology

AN53073A Material Culture

AN53015A Anthropology of Art 1

AN53075A Anthropology in Public Practice (Work Placement)

AN53021A Anthropology and the Environment

Erasmus Study Exchanges

AN53023B Anthropology of Development

Appendix including audio descriptions, student interviews and

suggested readings

AN53026B Anthropology and Gender Theory

AN53037A Anthropology of Human-Animal Relations
AN53039A Anthropology of Rights

AN53003A Psychological Perspectives in Anthropology

15 Credits
Convenor: Visiting Professor Simon Dein
Seminar Tutor: Visiting Professor Simon Dein
Term: Spring
Provisional Timetable: Friday AM
Assessment: 2-Question Take Home Exam paper (2 x 1,500 words) in summer term (15 May 2017)
The module, which is both historical and thematic, will concentrate on
a number of key scholars who have attempted in various ways to bring
a psychological dimension into anthropology (or the social sciences
more generally). It will focus on issues such as personality and culture,
psychoanalysis, madness, cognition, and conceptions of the self and
personhood. The relationship between the self, human agency and the
sociocultural context is a central theme of the module. We will discuss the
contributions of psychological anthropology to transcultural psychiatry and
psychotherapy.

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AN53005B History and Anthropology

15 Credits
Convenor: Dr Helen Cornish
Seminar Tutor: Dr Helen Cornish
Term: Autumn
Provisional Timetable: Monday PM
Assessment: Report paper (3,000 words) in spring term (6 January 2017)
There are long held tensions between the disciplines of anthropology and
history, although they share some common epistemological concerns.
Increasingly, anthropologists have incorporated historical accounts
towards expanding ethnographic possibilities, and to explore theoretical
questions of continuity, social change and periodisation, and to examine
colonialism as a set of historical conditions. As part of a historicised
practice, anthropologists have challenged assumptions about relationship
between myth and history, and explored complex temporalities. In turn,
historians have borrowed from anthropological methodologies to underpin
radical ideas about microhistories, oral history practices, which have also
contributed towards the anthropological project. More recently, both
historians and anthropologists have turned to memory as a way of accessing
the past through practice, policy and the emotions. This course sets up
these questions through three interconnected threads: the history of
anthropology, historical anthropology, and anthropologies of history. We
examine the different kinds of evidence that may be used to understand the

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past, and how the past is made sense of in the present, through archives,
images and material culture. Together this provides us with a model for
approaching the past anthropologically, in order to gain ethnographic
understandings of the dynamic processes of historicity in everyday contexts,
where the past can be deployed, imagined and evidenced.

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AN53006A Individual Project

30 Credits
Convenor: Dr Gavin Weston
Seminar Tutor: Dr Gavin Weston
Term: Autumn/Spring
Provisional Timetable: Autumn: Tues PM; Spring Thurs AM (approx 3 meetings per term)
Assessment: 8,000 word dissertation due in Summer term (24 April 2017)
An Individual Project consists of a research project of a students own
choosing and design, the topic to be agreed with the member of the
Department who acts as supervisor.
A project proposal and ethics form must be submitted and approved by the
department before any fieldwork can be undertaken. For further information
please see the Individual Project Handbook.

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AN53008A Health, Medicine and Social Power

15 Credits
Convenor: Professor Sophie Day
Seminar Tutor: Professor Sophie Day
Term: Autumn
Provisional Timetable: Friday AM
Assessment: 2-Question Take Home Exam paper (2 x 1,500 words) in summer term (15 May 2017)
An introduction to key areas of medical anthropology, ranging from ideas
about healing to questions of social inequality and a contemporary biological
turn. The module will be divided broadly into three sections, looking first
at the body, then at political economies of health, and finally therapeutics.
We shall explore ideas about biomedicine, relationships between different
medical traditions in a historical perspective, and anthropological
approaches today, including practice (applied work, activism) and currently
popular themes based around narratives and new technologies.

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AN53013B Urban Anthropology

15 Credits
Convenor: Dr Isaac Marrero-Guillamon
Seminar Tutor: Dr Isaac Marrero-Guillamon
Term: Spring
Provisional Timetable: Tuesday PM
Assessment: Report paper (3,000 words) in summer term (24 April 2017)
This course considers anthropologys theoretical, methodological and
empirical contribution to the analysis of cities and urban life. Despite the
ambiguous status of urban anthropology within the discipline, there are
a number of anthropologists working on the social, political, economic,
religious and cultural dimensions of cities across the planet. The course
surveys this work, and puts it in relation to related fields such as urban
sociology and urban geography examples of which are also part of the core
readings. We will approach the city as a socio-material entity, regulated but
also contested, and made up of networks of power, physical infrastructures,
and a myriad of small and almost invisible everyday actions. We will
discuss how cities fit within, and affect, global fluxes of capital, people and
commodities; we will look at how cities are made, maintained, and unmade;
we will discuss the dynamics and technologies of control and resistance in
urban settings.

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AN53015A Anthropology of Art 1

15 Credits
The below description and indicative reading list correspond to the module as taught in 2015-16 by Dr Chris Wright and may be subject to some change in 2016-17.

Convenor: Dr Massimiliano Mollona

Seminar Tutor: Associate Lecturer
Term: Autumn
Provisional Timetable: Thursday PM
Assessment: Report paper (3,000 words) in spring term (6 January 2017)
Arguably modern anthropology and modern art are close in terms of both
their origins and their critical reflection on the relationships between
images, objects and persons, and a concern with anthropological or
ethnographic issues is often an explicit feature of contemporary artworks.
But despite a long history of dealing with the so-called art of other
cultures, what does anthropology have to contribute to an understanding
of the kinds of artworks you might find at Tate Modern today? Through
ethnographic case studies this module will consider key anthropological
approaches to art both historically and thematically, and will explore how art
and anthropology are entangled with each other, including suggesting ways
in which anthropology can productively learn from contemporary art.

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AN53021A Anthropology and the Environment

15 Credits
Convenor: Dr Pauline Von Hellermann
Seminar Tutor: Dr Pauline Von Hellermann
Term: Spring
Provisional Timetable: Monday AM
Assessment: 2-Question Take Home Exam paper (2 x 1,500 words) in summer term (15 May 2017)
This module examines three areas of anthropological enquiry into humanenvironment relations: different societies experiences, beliefs and
knowledge about their biophysical surroundings and nature; the different
ways humans have shaped and are shaping the environment, from long
term forest-farming to large-scale rubber plantations, from traditional
irrigation methods to contemporary mining, pollution and waste as well as
climate change; and, most importantly, environmental politics, or political
ecology. This includes small and large scale resource conflict, science and
policy processes, conservation politics, and environmental activism, such
as environmental justice movements. Each topic is examined through
several studies from different regions of the world, and relating to different
elements (e.g. forests, soil, water, oil, minerals, land, animals). In this
way, the course provides an introduction to key themes and questions in
environmental anthropology as a whole, whilst also discussing many of the
most topical issues environmental anthropologists as well as activists are
currently grappling with, such as climate change, resource extraction and
land grab.

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AN53023B Anthropology of Development

15 Credits
Convenor: Dr Martin Webb
Seminar Tutor: Dr Martin Webb and an Associate Lecturer
Term: Autumn
Provisional Timetable: Tuesday AM
Assessment: Report paper (3,000 words) in spring term (6 January 2017)
The module aims to provide students with a critical understanding of
international development as a social, political and historical field, and
of anthropologys engagement with development and processes of
planned social change. The early parts of the module provide students
with an understanding of, the emergence of development as an idea,
the architecture and infrastructure of aid, and introduce key theoretical
approaches in the study of inequality. We also examine the tensions
inherent in anthropologys long and intimate relationship with development,
through the early production of expert knowledge about tradition and
culture; through its critical engagement with policy processes and planned
interventions, and through the professional negotiation of the fields of
development anthropology and the anthropology of development.
The module then goes on to contextualise these theoretical and critical
approaches to development through a series of interlinked topics and
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development as linear progression, or as a monolithic force acting on the

world, and instead reveal a field fractured by contradictions, contestations
and contingencies that is produced, reproduced and interpreted across
multiple locations and cultural contexts.

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AN53026B Anthropology and Gender Theory

15 Credits
Convenor: Dr Frances Pine
Seminar Tutor: Dr Frances Pine
Term: Autumn
Provisional Timetable: Friday PM
Assessment: Report paper (3,000 words) in spring term (6 January 2017)
The aim of this module is to explore the interrelationships of gender, sexuality and the body by bringing together ideas from contemporary Western social/cultural theory (including psychoanalytic, feminist and queer theories),
detailed ethnographic and historical case studies, and some classic anthropological theories and issues. In doing this, we will explore the ways in which
the body, gender and sexuality have been produced/imagined differently in
different times and places. The themes which will be covered include the
status of the body; sex and gender as biological or cultural; the sex/gender
distinction; kinship and concepts of the person. Various different approaches
to gender, sexuality and the body, including their historical and current roles
in discourses and politics of race colonialism, resistance and power, will be
examined in depth.

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AN53037A Anthropology of Human-Animal Relations

15 Credits
Convenor: Professor Rebecca Cassidy
Seminar Tutor: Professor Rebecca Cassidy
Term: Spring
Provisional Timetable: Monday PM
Assessment: Report paper (3,000 words) in summer term (24 April 2017)
Animals are famously good to think with and feature in some of the most
controversial thought experiments in anthropology. This course introduces a
pantheon of anthropological animals, from Bororo parrots and Lele pangolin
to Derridas cat and Haraways dogs. What does it mean if people can
become animals and vice versa? How do we turn animal into edible? Can
dogs be heroes? We also look at the political economy of animal production,
the largest industry in the world. The consumption of animals has recently
entered an unprecedented phase of extreme exploitation epitomised
by the factory farms of Euroamerica. At the same time, wild animals
have been commodified in zoos and rare species preserved in parks that
exclude human inhabitants. How are we to understand these apparently
contradictory impulses? Why are cows food and pandas poster children for
the Worldwide Fund for Nature? As we adapt to new forms of biotechnology
what is at stake in our exchanges with animals, of genes, organs, diseases
and labour? The course uses a wide range of resources including film,
ethnography and fiction to explore these and other questions.

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AN53039A Anthropology of Rights

15 Credits
Convenor: Dr Gavin Weston
Seminar Tutor: Dr Gavin Weston and Associate Lecturer
Term: Spring
Provisional Timetable: Tuesday AM
Assessment: Report paper (3,000 words) in summer term (24 April 2017)
The aim of the module is to introduce you to rights in terms of their
philosophical foundations, the history and shape of the UN system and
anthropological contributions. We will be exploring human rights and
humanitarian law as both discourse and practice with particular focus
on the issue of cultural relativism (historically the key stumbling block for
anthropological engagement with rights). The aim of the module is to give
you a firm grounding in the anthropology of rights and the role of crosscultural understanding of rights-based issues.
The second half of the module takes a more legalistic, case studies oriented
approach to build upon the first half of the module.

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AN53040A Anthropology and the Visual: Production Module

15 Credits
The below description and indicative reading list correspond to the module as taught in 2015-16 by Dr Chris Wright and may be subject to some change in 2016-17.

Convenor: TBC
Seminar Tutor: Ricardo Leizaola (Film) and Dave Lewis (Photo)
Term: Spring
Provisional Timetable: Friday AM
Assessment: one 5-10 minute video/film, a photographic project, or a 5-10 minute sound project in summer term (24 April 2017); AND
one 2,500 word report ( 2,500 words) in summer term (24 April 2017)
Arguably modern anthropology and modern art are close in terms of both
their origins and their critical reflection on the relationships between
images, objects and persons, and a concern with anthropological or
ethnographic issues is often an explicit feature of contemporary artworks.
But despite a long history of dealing with the so-called art of other
cultures, what does anthropology have to contribute to an understanding
of the kinds of artworks you might find at Tate Modern today? Through
ethnographic case studies this module will consider key anthropological
approaches to art both historically and thematically, and will explore how art
and anthropology are entangled with each other, including suggesting ways
in which anthropology can productively learn from contemporary art.

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AN53042A Anthropology and the Visual 2

15 Credits
The below description and indicative reading list correspond to the module as taught in 2015-16 by Dr Chris Wright and may be subject to some change in 2016-17.

Convenor: TBC
Seminar Tutor: TBC
Term: Autumn
Provisional Timetable: Friday AM
Assessment: Report paper (3,000 words) in spring term (6 January 2017)
This module will creatively explore the role of visual representation in
anthropology in terms of both the history of its use within the discipline,
and also the potential it holds for new ways of working. We will look at
work in a wide range of media photography, film/video, sound and the
ways in which they might be used in an anthropological context, and this will
involve looking at work from outside anthropology such as photojournalism
and contemporary art, as well as the work of visual anthropologists.
The intention of the module is partially to provide a strong theoretical
background for those students going to take the Anthropology and the
Visual Production Module in the Spring Term, and also to give students a
challenging and creative view of the potentials of visual material within
anthropology.

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AN53044A Anthropology of Violence

15 Credits
Convenor: Dr Gavin Weston
Seminar Tutor: Dr Gavin Weston
Term: Autumn
Provisional Timetable: Thursday AM
Assessment: Report paper (3,000 words) in spring term (6 January 2017)
In this module we will be looking at the ways in which anthropologists have
explained violence, the methodological problems of researching the topic,
the complicity of anthropologists in military projects and other issues. We
will explore the ethical and practical complexities of researching, writing and
engaging with violence through anthropological sources among ideas from
other disciplines and areas of thought. Some of the readings, lectures and
other sources we might look at in this module inevitably deal with issues,
descriptions and images of violence. Please be aware of this before taking
the module.

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AN53072A Indian and Peasant Politics (in Brazilian Amazonia)

15 Credits
Convenor: Professor Stephen Nugent
Seminar Tutor: Professor Stephen Nugent
Term: Autumn
Provisional Timetable: Monday PM
Assessment: Report paper (3,000 words) in spring term (6 January 2017)
Amazonia was colonised 500 years ago, yet maintains - not least in
anthropological terms - a reputation as a primarily natural domain in
which society is problematically tolerated. This course looks at Amazonian
societies from pre-history to the present - indigenous, peasant, colonial,
developmentalist - and includes discussion of modern social movements
(Landless Peoples Movement) as well as classic themes of Levi-Strausss
world on the wane, human ecology and extractivist economies.

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AN53073A Material Culture

15 Credits
Convenor: Dr Charlotte Joy
Seminar Tutor: Dr Charlotte Joy
Term: Spring
Provisional Timetable: Thursday PM
Assessment: Report paper (3,000 words) in summer term (24 April 2017)
Beginning with Franz Boas, the study of material culture has formed an
integral part of the discipline of anthropology. The study of material culture
encompasses everything from consumption practices, art, architecture,
cultural heritage, cultural landscapes, dress, memorials and museums. This
module will take a critical perspective to investigate how things and people
relate and are related to each other, the way in which objects can mediate
social relationships and the entanglements of objects and memory.

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AN53075A Anthropology in Public Practice

15 Credits
Students must have submitted their application and been accepted to the work placement module in Autumn term 2015-16 in order to select this option

Convenor: Dr Dominique Santos

Seminar Tutor: Dr Dominique Santos and Ms Alison MacGregor (Work Placement Manager)
Term: Summer of year 2 and Autumn of year 3
Provisional Timetable: Wednesday PM
Assessment: Research Report (2,000 words) due in Autumn term (11 October 2017) (75%) AND
Reflective Report (800-1,00 words) (20%) AND Presentation (5%) due in Autumn term (11 October 2017) OR Structured Presentation
with detailed slides (25%) due in Autumn term (11 October 2017). Attendance on the Placement is assessed on a pass/fail basis.
Students must achieve an attendance rate of 90% or above to pass the module.
This module enables you to take up a workplace learning experience
designed to enhance your studies by bringing theory and real-life practice
together.
The module takes place during the Summer between year 2 and year 3 and
the Autumn term of Year 3.
The Placement is at the core. It will take place over a two-week period
or may be spread over a longer period with a minimum of 10, eight-hour
working days.
Each student will have an academic supervisor who will guide them in the
preparation of the research report. At the outset, and with input from their
academic supervisor, students will select the subject of their report, confirm
the contribution which will be made by the placement experience, and

identify relevant publications. During the placement, three seminars within

the department will allow students to share experiences and approaches
and to receive further guidance on how they can relate the resources of the
placement to their research.
Students will use the placement experience to test out and provide evidence
of their skills, values and personality traits; gain knowledge of roles and
structures within a specific sector; and map out their career plans. In
achieving these outcomes, they will be supported by WPM, through the
initial seminar and office hours.

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Anthropology Erasmus Study Exchanges

Deadline for applications: 23 March 2016
Departmental International Liaison: Dr Pauline Von Hellermann
Available to: Year 3 UG students by application only
Credits: Dependent on the number of modules you choose to
study at Goldsmiths, you would normally be expected to take the
equivalent of 30-45 UK credits at a European Institution.
In order for placements to be secured students must submit an
application by the last day of Spring term
Erasmus exchanges last one term, and are be taken for credit towards your
degree.
Universiteit van Amsterdam (Amsterdam, The Netherlands)
University of Copenhagen (Copenhagen, Denmark)
Universidade Nova De Lisboa (Lisbon, Portugal)
University of Warsaw (Warsaw, Poland)
To be eligible for an exchange you will need to be in good academic
standing, with a satisfactory attendance record.
As you take modules on exchange for credit, it is important to ensure that
you are undertaking sufficient credit at the partner institution to complete
your year of study. You should also be aware that the marks you receive will
impact your final degree classification.

Term: Autumn
Dates: Vary by Institution, but normally September-January
Summative Assessment: Students complete assessments at the
partner institution. Marks will be counted towards their degree
at Goldsmiths.

Before you apply:
Look at the module catalogue of the partner institutions and find modules
you are interested in studying. Please ensure that they fall in the appropriate
term.
Ensure you have indicated your full 120 credits of Year 3 optional modules
at Goldsmiths - if your exchange goes ahead you will be able to drop
modules as appropriate.
Discuss your decision with the Departmental International Liaison and/
or the Goldsmiths Erasmus Coordinator. It's important to fully discuss the
implications, restrictions, and expectations of the exchange before making
your application.
Check with the Media department about the implications of an exchange it will not always be possible to accommodate this
More details available on the Erasmus web pages
The deadline for applications is 5 pm Wednesday 23rd March 2016.
Application forms can be found on the Anthropology Virtual Office VLE page

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Media and Communications 3rd Year Options 2016-17

MC53001A Dissertation

MC53054A Promotional Culture

MC53003B Political Economy of the Media

MC53059A Archaeology of the Moving Image

MC53021B Structure of Contemporary Political Communications

MC53060A Politics of the Audiovisual

MC53023B Media Audiences and Media Geographies

MC53046A Social Media in Everyday Life

MC53031B Race, Empire and Nation

MC53036C The City and Consumer Culture
MC53038A Music as Communication and Creative Practice
MC53039A Embodiment and Experience
MC53040B Strategies of World Cinema
MC53046A Media Law and Ethics
MC53048A Media, Ritual and Contemporary Public Cultures

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MC53001A Dissertation
30 Credits
Convenors: Dr Richard Smith and Dr Veronica Barassi
Term: n/a
Timetable: n/a
Assessment: A detailed dissertation proposal of 2,000 words to be submitted after Reading Week in the Autumn Term 2016 (20% of
overall mark). One 8,000-10,000 word Dissertation to be submitted on 2 May 2017 (80% of overall mark).
The dissertation is an 8-10,000 word research project on a media-related
topic of your choice. You will develop a critical approach to your research
drawing on an appropriate theories you have encountered on the degree.
You will be encouraged to undertake primary research of media texts to
provide material for your case-study and to develop an appropriate research
method such as discourse analysis, content analysis or research interviews
and focus groups. Support for your dissertation will be provided by regular
meetings with a supervisor a member of academic staff who will have
knowledge relevant to your chosen topic.

There is a compulsory programme of five workshops students are required

to take in the first half of the Summer Term 2016 to ensure adequate
preparation for the dissertation.
Please note: Students wishing to do a dissertation need to submit a proposal
outlining the main aims of their research and the methods of study by
21 March 2016. Students choosing the dissertation should also list two
alternative theory options on the proposal form in case the dissertation
application is not successful.

To apply for the dissertation programme you must complete the proposal
form in which you outline your intended topic, research methods and
background literature. Acceptance is dependent on the submission of a
coherent proposal and previous academic performance.

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MC53003B Political Economy of the Media

15 Credits
Convenor: Professor James Curran
Term: Spring
Provisional Timetable: Tuesday AM
Assessment: One 4,000 word essay. Deadline: 21 April 2017.
Different perspectives on the relationship between ideological and
economic power, with reference to mass media. Comparison of culturalist
interpretations with studies emphasising the role of the state, media
ownership, advertising and market structures as forms of media control.
Media representations in relation to debates over the construction and
mediation of meaning and audiences response to these.

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MC53021B Structure of Contemporary Political Communications

15 Credits

Convenor: Professor Aeron Davis

Term: Autumn
Provisional Timetable: Monday PM
Assessment: One 4,000 word Essay. Deadline: 6 January 2017.
This module examines the actors and communication processes involved
in contemporary political communication, in its local, national and
international contexts. It combines theoretical insights and empirical
information from the fields of media studies, journalism, sociology and
political science. It mainly focuses on democracies, particularly in the US
and UK, but literature and examples are also drawn from other types of
political system and country. Topics covered include: the crisis of politics and
media in established democracies; comparative political and media systems;
mass media and news production; political parties, political marketing and
elections; government media management, spin and journalist-source
relations; symbolic and cultural political communication; media effects
and audiences; campaigning in civil society (unions, social movements
and corporations); power and the policy process; digital media and online
politics; globalisation and international political communication. Particular
case area topics, such as war and terrorism, the financial crisis and austerity
politics, welfare and environment, will also be covered. Much of the material

for this course is highly contemporary, so students are encouraged to

maintain an awareness of current developments in political communication
in the UK and elsewhere.

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MC53023B Media Audiences and Media Geographies

15 Credits
Convenor: Professor Dave Morley
Term: Spring
Provisional Timetable: Thursday AM
Assessment: One 4,000 word essay. Deadline: 21 April 2017.
Drawing on a range of interdisciplinary perspectives (including cultural
studies and anthropology) this module will address the role of teletechnologies (technologies of distance - such as the telegraph, telephone,
and television) in constructing the post-modern geography of the
contemporary era, The module takes a non media-centric perspective,
focusing on the different historical and cultural contexts within which
these technologies operate and on the articulation of material and virtual
geographies
We begin by focusing on the moral panics that have always accompanied
each new medium - from the radio, to the cinema, etc. The module
highlights the role of what we have come to know as television - as the
most important medium of the last half century, with a particular focus
on its contexts and modes of consumption. The question of technological
change will be approached from a historical perspective, for instance,
in relation to the late 19th century as a period featuring a particularly
rapid rate of technological change, compared with our own times. We

shall review a range of micro-studies of the household (and public) uses of

communications and information technologies, and the module will offer a
critical approach to the futurological discourses concerning the supposed
powers and effects of todays new communications technologies. We
conclude by examining the role of various media (big and small) in processes
of identity/boundary construction (at different geographical scales) within
the broader context of processes of globalisation. We will also address
the role of the media in articulating the private and public spheres, in the
construction of national, disaporic and transnational identities, and in
relation to the various mobilities (not only of information, but also of people
and commodities) that characterise our era of time-space compression.
A note on teaching methods: the lectures are extemporised on each
occasion, so there are no lecture notes for distribution. They do not
employ visual aids such as power-point but simply a whiteboard, on which
explanatory diagrams will be drawn.

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MC53031B Race, Empire and Nation

15 Credits
Convenor: Dr Richard Smith
Term: Autumn
Provisional Timetable: Monday AM
Assessment: One 4,000 word Essay. Deadline: 6 January 2017.
This module will examine how histories of Western imperialism have shaped
the landscapes of the present. Our task is to explore how contemporary
racial and national formations (ideas about Britishness, whiteness, and
so on) exist in a complex and intimate relationship to longer histories of
empire. In addition to introducing key concepts from critical race and
postcolonial studies, lectures will also draw on phenomenology to explore
how race structures the present often by receding into the background,
as well as theories of affect and emotion to explore how security regimes
become racial regimes. Our concern is with how histories of empire get
under the skin, and set reading include works that reflect on the experience
of being or becoming strangers, or bodies out of place. We attend to the
intersection between race, gender and sexuality throughout.

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MC53036C The City and Consumer Culture

15 Credits
Convenor: Professor Angela McRobbie
Term: Spring
Provisional Timetable: Friday AM
Assessment: One 4,000 word essay. Deadline: 21 April 2017.
This is a wide-ranging module which draws on sociology, cultural studies,
cultural geography, feminism and social theory in order to undertake an
analysis of the changing cityscapes as a result of cultural and economic
changes in the last decades. The module begins with the idea of the
postmodern city (in particular Los Angeles) and drawing on the seminal
writing of Marxist social and economic geographers, Fred Jameson,
Ed Soja and David Harvey it also queries as to whether this concept of
postmodernism still is useful or has been surpassed by process of neoliberalism and the entrepreneurial city? We also discuss the limitations of
these approaches from the viewpoint of race and gender. We then move
a little back in time to consider the idea of urban modernity and the
important discussions which took place in regard to the work of Marshall
Berman, drawing in turn on Walter Benjamin and the poet Baudelaire. We
discuss the flaneur and the dandy. The remainder of the module looks
in detail at more current issues in particular gentrification (in London and
elsewhere) and here we draw on the also seminal work of Sharon Zukin
indeed her recent books, especially The Naked City, are key texts for the
entire course. We consider the changing landscape of urban consumer

culture, the rise of the hipster economy and its critics. We pay some
considered attention to the growth of the urban creative economy from
Richard Florida to my own recent book Be Creative: Making a Living in
the New Culture Industries. In this part of the course we also investigate
the rise of fast fashion and how this impacts on shopping culture and the
high street. Finally we end the module by considering debates about the
poor, the disenfranchised, young people and gang culture and urban social
exclusion in cities such as Detroit but also London, Paris and elsewhere. Here
we use the seminal work of the French sociologist Loic Wacquant. Although
the module focuses on cities with which the lecturers are familiar there is
a good deal of scope for students to draw from their experience of urban
culture from across the world. There is a field trip in lieu of one session on
week 9. Students are encouraged to view a wide range of relevant films, as
well as visit exhibitions and public talks in London by relevant academics.

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MC53038A Music as Communication and Creative Practice

15 Credits
Convenor: Dr Anamik Saha
Term: Autumn
Provisional Timetable: Friday AM
Assessment: One 4,000 word Essay. Deadline: 6 January 2017.
The module will focus on music and sounds as forms of communication. It
rests upon a simple yet complex question: why does music matter so much
in our lives? We use this question to explore the personal, social, cultural
and political meanings of music and sound. We look at the relationship
between music, emotion and affect and its capacity for human flourishing.
We also look at music and its ability to produce collectivity and community,
not only amongst particular groups defined by gender, race, sexuality and
class, but across difference - and time and space. In doing so we explore
music in its live and mediated contexts and the value of participating in
music together. In addition we look at the issue of commodification and the
question of who owns and profits from the production of popular music,
and what implications this has on musics capacity for flourishing. Students
are not expected to have technical knowledge or a background in music
theory, but they must have an interest in analysing songs and finding their
deeper meanings, that go beyond lyrics. An open-mind is a must as we will

be listening to a wide variety of music from dubstep to disco to death metal.

Students are encouraged to share their own musical examples too, either in
class or on the modules collaborative Spotify playlist.

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MC53039A Embodiment and Experience

15 Credits
Convenor: Dr Louise Chambers
Term: Autumn
Provisional Timetable: Thursday AM
Assessment: One project based 3,000 word examined essay and a 1,000 word journal. Deadlines tbc.
What does it mean to be embodied and to have a body? Given we are so
entangled with media is there such a thing as a natural body? Do bodies
begin and end at the skin or rather should bodies be considered entangled
processes (symbolic, technical, biological, psychological, historical)? What
does it mean to bring the body into media and cultural theory and what
are some of the exciting challenges that wait for us? This module will
consider these questions by drawing from a variety of perspectives that have
attempted to theorise somatic forms of knowing, embodied dispositions
and habits, and the role media play in augmenting, modulating, extending
and amplifying feelings, emotions, sensations, intensities, atmospheres,
contagions and presence. The module will draw from an exciting
interdisciplinary field of body studies, which crosses the arts, sciences and
cultural theory. The theories and concepts we consider will allow us to
consider all the ways in which media touch our lives in registers that exceed
rational, conscious experience. The module explores this field in the context
of a variety of media (film, gaming, social media) but also takes the student
into more unconventional fields to consider these issues: body image and

body-without-an-image, affect studies, narratives of health and illness,

human/animal communication, mental health and the media (including
eating disorders and the phenomena of voice hearing), technologies of
suggestion and attention, and the challenges that gender queer bodies
make to theories of mediation. As part of the module the student is invited
to consider an aspect of their own embodied experience as a topic and
resource in order to reflect on the theoretical issues at stake.

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MC53040B Strategies in World Cinema

15 Credits
Convenor: Dr Gareth Stanton
Term: Autumn
Provisional Timetable: Friday PM
Assessment: One 4,000 word Essay. Deadline: 6 January 2017.
Examining a selection of films from around the world, this module adopts an
inquisitive and critical stance on how world cinema is defined. The course
will adopt three guiding themes: global(ised) economies, activism and
populism. The early weeks will concentrate on how mobile, trans-national
capital shapes world cinema, paying particular attention to overseas
funding stipulations, trade protectionism, the role of film festivals and the
ways in which cinema interconnects with other industries, such as tourism.
After that, there will be sessions devoted to branches of cinema that
forthrightly aim to thwart some of the inequalities set in motion by trade
liberalism and (neo-)colonialism. Here the emphasis will be on the perceived
scope for revolutionary praxis, the role that intellectuals and filmmakers
might play in overturning social injustice and the various movements to
indigenize movie production. Lastly, the module will interrogate notions of
the popular by thinking through what it means for Latin American, African
and Asian films to appeal to a broad fan base, either in their countries of
production or overseas. Here the popular often becomes a complex fusion

of economic, political and even mythic concerns. A combination of lectures

and screenings will provide both a critical and an engaging way of looking at
cinema from around the world.

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MC53046A Media Law and Ethics

15 Credits
Convenor: Professor Tim Crook
Term: Autumn
Provisional Timetable: Lectures Tuesday PM and seminars Wednesday PM
Assessment: One 4,000 word Essay. Deadline: 6 January 2017.
Knowledge and skills to avoid the transgression of defamation and
contempt and other principal media laws in the UK, the USA and Australia;
An appreciation and ability to critically apply principles of ethical conduct
in all fields of the media; A critical understanding of the cultural, social
and political context of media law making and professional regulation; A
critical appreciation of alternative methods of media law and those factors
contributing to self-regulation by media practitioners.

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MC53048A Media, Ritual and Contemporary Public Culture

15 Credits
Convenor: Dr Veronica Barassi
Term: Spring
Provisional Timetable: Friday PM
Assessment: One 4,000 word essay. Deadline: 21 April 2017.
This module explores to what extent theoretical frameworks already
developed in the anthropology and sociology of ritual can help us analyse
contemporary media processes, from television to social media. The module
begins with a general introduction to ritual theory where key theoretical
concepts are outlined: sacred and profane, symbolic power, ritual boundary,
liminality, and media rituals (two lectures). Afterwards the module will apply
the theory to the analysis of the following media processes: media events
and public ritual; celebrity and ordinariness; fandom and the construction
of mediated spaces; mediated self-disclosure (from talk shows to social
media); reality television and everyday surveillance; and the mediation of
symbolic protest (total six lectures). All lectures will consider the difference
between the mediated processes that define our everyday engagements
with mainstream media on the one hand and social media on the other, and
will critically engage with questions on the ideological and emotional power
of the media in our everyday lives.

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MC53054A Promotional Culture

15 Credits
Convenor: Professor Aeron Davis
Term: Spring
Provisional Timetable: Monday PM
Assessment: One 4,000 word Essay. Deadline: 21 April 2017.
This module looks at the rise of promotional culture (public relations,
advertising, marketing and branding) and promotional intermediaries and
their impact on society. The first part of the module will discuss the history
of promotional culture and will offer some conflicting theoretical approaches
with which to view its development. These include: professional/ industrial,
economic, political economy, post-Fordist, audience, consumer society,
risk society, and postmodern perspectives. The second part will look at
specific case areas of promotional culture. These are in: commodities and
services, popular media and culture, celebrities and public figures, politics,
civil society, and financial markets. In each of these areas questions will
be asked about the influence of promotional practices on the production,
communication and consumption of ideas and products as well as larger
discourses, fashions/genres and socio-economic trends.

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MC53059A Archaeology of the Moving Image

15 Credits
Convenor: Dr Pasi Valiaho
Term: Autumn
Provisional Timetable: Thursday PM
Assessment: One 1,000 word essay (Deadline: tbc) and one 3,000 word essay (Deadline: 6 January 2017)
In order to be able to make sense of what is happening now in our culture
of moving images, we need to understand its past not in the sense of
teleological development but in terms of how untimely sensibilities and
ideas embodied in obsolete images and technologies keep on reappearing,
inadvertently perhaps, in the present. This module situates itself within
the emerging field of inquiry called media archaeology, which searches
through the archives in order to account for the forces that make up the
contemporary world. The module will look at the deep history of audiovisual
mediations through specific turning points so as to understand the
recurrent forces, motives and forms of experience that have animated the
movement of images for the past 400 years. Furthermore, it seeks new
methodological approaches to understand the history of technical images,
which bridge the rift between criticism and creation, that is, between
thinking about and (re)inventing images.

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MC53060A Politics of the Audiovisual

15 Credits
Convenor: Professor Sean Cubitt
Term: Spring
Provisional Timetable: Monday AM
Assessment: One 1,000 word essay (Deadline: tbc) and one 3,000 word essay (Deadline: 21 April 2017)
Since the beginning of moving images, the world has moved from industrial
and imperial to digital and global. Among the political movements that have
been most important in the period since the invention of the movies are
(neo)liberalism, Marxism, fascism, nationalism, feminism and anti-colonial
struggles. These trends are inescapably bound up in the technologies,
techniques and forms of the moving image and the sound arts, from the
early days of cinema to contemporary handheld and immersive media. This
module investigates the politics of these forms and technologies as attempts
at controlling the dispositions of minds and bodies as well as struggles
for their emancipation. It will address a broad range of topics from the
power of images and visual apparatuses in the 20th and 21st centuries to
the relationship of politics and aesthetics, the problem of democracy, and
ideology critique.

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MC53064A Social Media and Everyday Life

15 Credits
Convenor: Dr Mirca Madianou
Term: Spring
Provisional Timetable: Tuesday PM
Assessment: One 4,000 word essay. Deadline: 21 April 2017.
This module takes an ethnographic, grounded approach to understanding
the social uses and social consequences of social media in non-western
contexts. Theoretically, the module brings together the interconnected
literatures on globalization and social shaping of technology while we
will also address contemporary debates on digital media, consumption,
social change and power. Empirically, the module will draw on media
ethnographies from China, Ghana, Jamaica, Kenya, Malaysia, Nigeria, The
Philippines and Trinidad and will address a number of substantive topics
such as socialities, intimacy and parenting, migration and social class. The
lectures will follow a trajectory from the mediation of personal processes
(such as friendship through the Chinese platform Wechat) to the relationship
between social media and macro processes such as migration, social class
formation and inequality. Ultimately, rather than reporting on a collection of
international case studies, the module aims to draw on these non-Western
contexts to revisit assumptions about social media as well as about key
concepts in social science, such as intimacy and parenting, or social class

and power. We will showcase the local appropriations of digital technologies

and in turn explore whether these are catalyzing processes of social change
or entrenching existing power asymmetries. The tension between cultural
particularism and social change is central to the module which will end with
a broader theorization of social media

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