Literature MA

Degree and/or experience:

• Applicants should normally have an undergraduate
• honours degree (usually at 2:1 level or above) or equivalent in a relevant subject area, for example English literature, English language, linguistics, philosophy, sociology or politics. Related areas such as history, cultural theory and TEFL are also acceptable.
• Applicants without a good first degree may be required to provide written evidence (for example an assignment from a training course or an essay set by the admissions team) of their analytical and reflective skills in writing.
• Applicants should also be able to demonstrate that they are capable of undertaking masters-level study and sustained academic work.

English Language Requirement:

• IELTS 6.5 overall.

Practising Rhetoric
Rhetoric and rhetoric studies offer a third way between creative and critical approaches to the theory and practice of writing, and enable you to see your own and others' writing within a long and valued tradition on the form, place and function of effective communication. You are encouraged to analyse a variety of genres and modes of writing, from conventional literature to political speeches and advertisements, and to practise your own writing in critical, creative and professional contexts.

Cultural Theory
This module looks at cultural theory and its use in literary analysis. Based around close readings of key texts, it critically interrogates central cultural concepts and themes in the work of eminent cultural theorists working in the last half of the twentieth century and into the twenty-first. More generally, the module aims to examine the nature and purpose of cultural theory in the contemporary world by tracing theoretical shifts and reconceptualisations of culture in relation to social, political and geographical contexts.

Writing the City
This module uses Brighton as a case study to move from a local to a global understanding of the relationship between texts and contexts, literature and location. As you examine representations of cities as well as work from their communities of writers and artists, you are encouraged to theorise texts in terms of place and to reframe political topographies and geographies. Developing your understanding of how texts engage with sociocultural contexts and enter into dialogue with representations of the past, present and future, the module encourages critical and creative reflection on the student experience of the city and promotes your role in representing location in literature.

Research Skills and Training
Studies are framed around the broad question, 'What is research?', and seek to place your own practice and academic work in this context. Having considered the value of research in arts and culture, a series of seminars and workshops will introduce you to key research methods. These will be discussed in the context of your own plans for research. As these discussions develop, you move towards direct consideration of a research proposal that will in turn form the basis of the assessment.

Dissertation
The dissertation is the culmination of the degree and provides an opportunity for you to explore your research in a focused and organised fashion through a project of your own design. Building on the learning they have benefited from throughout the programme, students will be encouraged to develop their thinking on the dissertation. The intention is to develop a reflexive and critically engaged dissertation that makes a genuine contribution to debates in literature.

Options

• Twenty-first Century Literature
• Performing Gender
• Writing Black British Culture
• American Poetry in Twentieth Century History
• The Ethics of Fiction
• Cultures in Conflict
• Knowing Through Writing
• Victorian Journalism
• Screenwriting
• Writing: Craft and Creative Practices