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  • Cultural and Critical Studies (MA)
  • 2013/2014 entry
  • Contact us
  • Assessment

    • Two core module essays; two option module essays; and a dissertation of 15,000 words.

  • Attendance
      • One evening a week part-time; two evenings a week full-time.
      • October–September.
  • Duration
      • Two years part-time or one year full-time.
  • Entry requirements
  • Fees and funding
    • Fees (2013/14)
      • Part-time (home/EU students): £2975 pa
      • Part-time (overseas students): £6050 pa
      • Full-time (home/EU students): £5375 pa
      • Full-time (overseas students): £11,995 pa
  • Location
      • Central London.
  • Teaching

    • Seminars, staff and student presentations.

Cultural and Critical Studies (MA) - 2013/2014 entry


  • Overview

    • This interdisciplinary programme explores critical and cultural debates across disciplines in the arts and humanities, offering you the chance to examine work in a diversity of media, including print culture, painting, film, new media and popular culture. It combines a thorough exposure to contemporary critical methods and debates with a diverse range of advanced study options.

      In consultation with tutors, you will be able to build a dynamic programme of study that allows you to follow themes and issues across different disciplines, and develop your interests accordingly.

  • Why study this course at Birkbeck?
      • Flexible interdisciplinary programme, which allows you to assemble a course of study suited to your individual needs.
      • Gives you the chance to cross disciplines and explore topics in literature, film, other media, history, and cultural and critical theory.
      • Aimed at people with wide-ranging, interdisciplinary interests in the humanities and those interested in contemporary theoretical debates.
      • Find out what our students say about our courses. 
  • Course structure

    • The programme starts with a theoretical core module exploring key concepts, such as spectacle, reification, fetishism, object, globalisation and space. This is followed by a choice of advanced option modules and independent research. Option modules cover a range of themes and disciplines, and are not restricted to a particular historical period or national culture.

      Core module:

      • Key Concepts in Cultural and Critical Studies (Part I and Part II).

      Option modules may include:

      • A Confusion of Tongues: Illness, Language and Writing 
      • Aesthetics and Cultural Theory
      • Asian and African Film
      • Adorno's Aesthetic Theory
      • Critique of Everyday Life
      • Exhibiting Cultures
      • Language Matters
      • Modernist Writers and the First World War
      • Modernism and Vulgarity
      • Reading Walter Benjamin's Arcades 
      • Reading Time in the Twentieth Century
      • The Book Unbound
      • Twenty-First Century Feminist Fiction and the World in Crisis.

      Dissertation is due at the end of September.

      Find out more in our departmental handbook.

  • Study resources

    • In addition to our own five-floor library, you can access libraries across London and the UK, including the British Library and Senate House Library.

      Find out more about our range of world-class research resources.

  • Further study opportunities
  • Careers information

    • Graduates go on to careers in writing and journalism, editing, publishing, research, marketing and public relations.

  • Apply now