Introduction to Cinema:

Over the last century it is the images of television, film and video that have come to dominate our mass mediated world. These images come to us in films, news, documentaries, soap operas, music videos, and advertising. This module examines the history and development of what can collectively be termed the moving image. Examples from all areas of moving image production illustrate theories such as genre, narrative and realism. This module is concerned with perhaps the most influential form of media content, enabling students to gain thorough insights into its history, language and construction.

The Media in Britain

This module examines the major communication institutions and structures in Britain in an historical and contemporary context. It explores the development of the press from the16th Century to the present day, the formation and development of broadcasting in Britain, and the emergence of new communications technologies. Pertinent issues such as media freedom, privacy and media intrusion, state censorship and secrecy are considered both historically and in relation to newer technologies such as cable and satellite broadcasting and the internet. The overall aim of the module is to provide students with a solid grounding in the history of the British press, radio and television and an understanding of the theoretical perspectives which underpin contemporary media scholarship.

The Study of Media Audiences:

A popular view of mass media audiences renders them "couch potatoes" who passively consume whatever media fare is placed in their lap. More recently, others have argued for a more celebratory view of the media audience. Indeed, in place of a naive and vulnerable audience (in the singular sense) we encounter audiences (in the plural sense) who are able to resist media power in creative, pleasurable and meaningful ways. The module addresses these conflicting accounts of media audience(s) as they take us to the heart of media effects.

The Media in the International Context

This module explores media structures and processes in an internationally comparative context. It seeks to integrate theories with relevant case studies from around the world in order to analyse the impact of global communications on different nation states and their media systems. Within the timeframe of the last two to three decades, the module examines the rise of global media transnationals, the world flow of media products, business systems and policies and the important counter tendencies, the continuing (and even increasing) strength of national, regional and local media. Overall, the module provides students with an understanding of globalisation both in theoretical terms and as historical phenomena -which can be traced back to the nineteenth century and the world telegraph based news agencies.

Social Change, Identity and Behaviour

The module begins with a brief introduction to the nature of the discipline. The lectures introduce sociology by demonstrating its capacity to enable us to understand and explain the world we live in, our sense of who we are, and our responses to change. The overall aim is to show how sociology can address interesting questions in interesting ways.

The Sociological Imagination

The module begins with an account of the development of sociology in the context of modernity and the range of issues and themes this gave rise to. These include social inequality, the relationship between the individual and society, history and social change, sociology as a ‘science’, sociology and 'common sense'. In the module as a whole, we examine theoretical and empirical work that enhances our understanding of social processes and structures, and of the personal and social uses of sociology as a discipline.