Designed for students interested in new ways of exploring and understanding the social world through the use of visual, sensory and other experimental approaches, this programme allows you to study sociological issues alongside innovative methods.
The MA will enable you to examine, represent and intervene in the social world. You will develop the ability to undertake empirical research and present it publicly in a variety of media and materials. You will engage with sociology as an inventive research practice, deploying creative research methods to address classic and changing sociological problems.
The MA in Visual Sociology provides an introduction to the range of debates in visual research, encouraging you to build on these by using visual, sensory and inventive methodological practices to carry out critical social research in your areas of interest, whether this is science and technology, contemporary capitalism, gender and sexual cultures, race, human rights, globalisation, or other aspects of social life.
The programme combines lectures and seminars with practical sessions and workshop-based projects in which you develop a hands-on approach to sociological research, providing a skills base in methods which could be used in public sector contexts, art/media research, design or commercial application.
As well as presenting your ideas through writing, during the MA you will have the opportunity to produce different outputs, including film/video, photography, sound and multi-media pieces. You will also organise and curate some of this work in an exhibition. Critical feedback sessions function as a testing ground for individual projects, and themed projects allow you to further develop a portfolio of research outputs geared to a variety of audiences.
Throughout the programme is a concern with the research process, and you will have the opportunity to design and reflect on your own research projects. The dissertation allows you to undertake a substantive research project on your individual interests, supporting by one-to-one supervision with a member of staff. You will have access to the Visual Media Lab, which offers post-production and editing stations, as well as equipment for photography and video. Students can also borrow equipment from the Media Equipment Centre.
The MA is based in the Department of Sociology, home of the The Methods Lab and at the forefront of research using live methods. It is taught by staff with a wide range of experience in both sociology and interdisciplinary research, including visual and experimental approaches. The course is suitable for applicants from a wide variety of backgrounds, including art, design, anthropology, media and communications, cultural studies, geography, and sociology.
In the first part of the course you will take ‘Empirical Social Research’, a module that takes you through the empirical research cycle in the context of the transformation of sociology in the age of visual, digital and other empirical methods. The module Theories and Debates in Visual Research' enables you to address debates within visual sociology, and also encompasses more recent issues surrounding the notions of media, interdisciplinarity and translation which become significant if sociology works with visual and other sensory materials. Assessment of these modules is by essay.
Alongside these modules you will take a core practical component, ‘Visual and Inventive Practice A’, that offers the opportunity to gain skills in photography, sound and video and to develop materials that engage a sociological imagination. A central focus is on how to translate a research question into a variety of materials or media and to be able to critically discuss the selection and use of these.
In the second term you continue with a practical module in inventive sociology, ‘Social Research for Public Engagement’, in which you will work individually or in groups to respond to a theme to create a visual, sensory or experimental object or media to be exhibited to a particular public. Assessment of the practical work includes a diary of research process alongside documentation of work.
These core modules are taught in Sociology. In the second term you will also take an option that may be chosen from Sociology or may be taken from departments across Goldsmiths including the Departments of Anthropology, English and Comparative Literature, Politics and International Relations, Media and Communications, Educational Studies, Music, and the Centre for Cultural Studies.
In the summer term you will complete a dissertation involving a major practical project consisting of any media and addressing a specific sociological problem. You will meet for individual supervision with a member of the Sociology staff. The dissertation is a substantive piece of research in which you develop a visual, inventive or experimental approach to a topic of your choice.
If you follow the MA part-time over two years, you will take ‘Empirical Social Research’, ‘Visual and Inventive Practice’ and ‘Social Research for Public Engagement’ in year 1, and ‘Theories and Debates in Visual Research’, the dissertation and an option in year 2.
Core modules
Option modules
You will chose an option module to the value of 30 credits from Sociology or from departments across the College including the Departments of Anthropology, English and Comparative Literature, Politics, Media and Communications, Music, Educational Studies, and the Centre for Cultural Studies.
Modules in Sociology address themes such as:
Assessment consists of coursework, extended essays, reports, presentations, practice based projects or essays/logs, group projects, reflective essays, and seen and unseen written examinations.
This programme attracts students from a wide range of backgrounds, including art and design, business, and the third sector, as well as those with social science degrees. This means the careers that they are interested in pursuing are wide and varied.
Find out more about employability at Goldsmiths.
The MPhil in Visual Sociology offers you the opportunity to combine written sociological argument with film, sound, or photographic representation.
It will allow new researchers to re-think both the conduct of social research and the forms that social research writing takes in the 21st century.
Assessment will be via a thesis, visual/aural component (a video or sound feature, or a photographic project), and viva voce.
Find out more about research degrees at Goldsmiths.
We welcome students from across the social sciences and humanities. The MA in Visual Anthropology is tailored to meet the needs of different levels of anthropological and film-making experience, whether you have little or no background in formal anthropology, film-production, visual methods and photography, or if you have substantial experience in one or more of these areas.
For nearly 30 years, the University's Granada Centre for Visual Anthropology has been widely recognised as the world's leading centre for Visual Anthropology. Our graduates have produced more than 400 ethnographic films seen around the world and it is now at the forefront of the emergent dialogue between art and anthropology, including sensory ethnography and sound, experimental and practice-based methods, photographic and digital media, museum and gallery installations.
Our MA and MPhil courses combine anthropology with training in film-making and editing, visual methods, photography sensory ethnography and sound. Students are provided with professional equipment and supported by an internationally renowned staff comprising the largest visual anthropology faculty in Europe.
The Granada Centre's teaching and research continues to set the standard of excellence in the social sciences as well as arts. This was formally recognised by the ESRC (Economic and Social Research Council), and by the AHRC, awarding the master's programme the status of a Professional Preparation masters, something awarded to no other visual anthropology programme in the UK.
In 2012 the Granada Centre 's MA in Visual Anthropology received a special commendation for teaching excellence by the UK's Higher Education Authority and the Association of Social Anthropologists (ASA), and is the only such course to have been awarded this distinction.
Contact:
Admissions Tutor: Dr Rupert Cox
Email: [email protected]
As a course that teaches anthropology and practice based film and media skills, prospective candidates should be aware that the MA in Visual Anthropology is a highly intensive course and runs over 13-months rather than the standard 12 months. It extends beyond the conventional 12 months because of the additional time required for completing the audio-visual work. Editing the final film and media work is staggered over a 6 week period, from late-August to the beginning of October. Students who need to complete by the end of a 12-month period can apply beforehand in order that arrangements can be put in place. Graduation Exhibition and Film Screenings held in mid October and are organised by the students themselves. These are not a compulsory part of the programme but they have become a traditional rite of passage and opportunity to show work to the public, friends and family.
Why Manchester?
Manchester is a creative, energetic and cosmopolitan city noted for its music scene, media links and industrial past. An advantage of studying in Manchester is the cheap cost of living and accommodation in that rents are approximately half the cost of London.
The course combines conventional lectures and seminars with practical 'hands-on' instruction and workshops. Students work in teams and individually. Their final piece is an individual production, however throughout the year they will spend time working in teams so as to develop team-working & presentational skills as well as technical and artistic expertise. Work is presented to the class and receives feedback from fellow students as well as instructors. In this way, students learn to analyse their own and others works and through each other's successes and failures, generating a strong range of intellectual, practical and aesthetic resources as well as a sense of camaraderie and cooperation.
The Master’s programme in Cultural Anthropology and Development Sociology focuses on the everyday practices of people to situate them within complex challenges. You will study people who may live lives that are economically fragile, in environments damaged by pollution or disaster or feel they lack the rights of full citizens in the country where they live. You will learn to research how these people acquire the resilience that allows them to cope with them, and how they maintain continuity in a world that is often difficult to handle.
Through the experience of ethnographic research, you will learn how to enter, participate in and understand another world. To this end, our staff members co-opt students into their own research specialities and train them to work in field research sites that they select and organize together. Intensive coaching by individual supervisors, course teachers, and field research trainers prepares students for your personal field research project. This also speeds up the process of settling in a field site, understanding its research context, and acquiring the skills of reporting results to an audience in an academically responsible way.
The Master’s programme in CA/DS offers a unique set of choices: you can join staff members in their Global Ethnography research specialties; you can work with a company, a museum or an NGO in a Policy in Practice project; or you can set up a Visual Ethnography project (subject to previous training). Staff members are actively involved in our ‘Field Research and Training’ opportunities in West Africa (Ghana), Southeast Asia (the Philippines) and the Netherlands, because they offer students the most effective road to a good research result. Alternative sites become available, however, through Global Ethnography projects.
The general objective of this programme is to communicate an anthropologically-informed understanding of social life in both Western and non-Western societies. By confronting students with the remarkable diversity of human social and cultural experience, its aim is to encourage them to question taken-for-granted assumptions and to view the world from a new perspective.
Through a set of core modules, comprising about a third of coursework credits, students are provided with a comprehensive grounding in classical as well as contemporary debates in social anthropology and are introduced to the distinctive research methods and ethical positions associated with the discipline. Students then complete their coursework credits by choosing from a broad range of around 50 different modules offered around the Faculty of Humanities. Through these options, students apply the social anthropological theories and methods learnt on the core modules to particular substantive themes and topics. Diploma students complete their coursework in May and formally graduate in July. Over the summer vacation, MA students carry out research for a 15,000 word dissertation that is submitted in September. They then would normally expect to graduate formally in December.
Most of the coursework optional modules have been organized into pathways based on particular themes and topics. Go to the Study Details tab for more details on the Visual and Sensory Mediapathway. Pathways are designed to ensure both an academic and timetabling fit between the options. Students are encouraged, on the basis of past experience and/or future goals, to select a pathway shortly after registration in consultation with the programme director. MA students' dissertation topics will normally also relate to this pathway. In addition to the Visual and Sensory Media pathway, there are currently six others.
Please note that it is not compulsory to select a pathway and all students will be awarded the same generic degree, MA in Social Anthropology
In each semester students take a small number of 15 credit core modules, and a selection of optional modules that they choose shortly after arrival. Many optional modules are worth 15 credits, though some are worth 30 credits. In total, students are required to achieve 120 coursework credits. Over the summer vacation, students are required to write a dissertation which is worth a further 60 credits.
Some 50 optional modules are available, not only in Social Anthropology but across many other disciplines in the Faculty of Humanities, including Visual Anthropology, Archaeology, Museum Studies, Latin American Studies, Development Studies, Drama, Sociology & History. Drawing on this broad range of disciplines, a number of pathways have been devised in order to maximize the academic & timetabling coherence of the options chosen by students.
The Visual & Sensory Media pathway draws exclusively on modules offered by Social Anthropology & the Granada Centre for Visual Anthropology.
In each semester, students take two 15-credit core modules, & up to 30 credits of optional modules. Many optional modules are worth 15 credits, though some are worth 30. In total, students are required to achieve 120 coursework credits. Over the summer vacation, MA students write a dissertation worth a further 60 credits.
Most modules are assessed by means of an extended assessment essay. Typically, for 15 credit modules, these must be of 4000 words, whilst for 30 credit courses, they are normally of 6000 words. But certain options involving practical instruction in research methods, audiovisual media or museum display may also be assessed by means of presentations &/or portfolios of practical work. The dissertation that MA students are required to submit is normally 15,000 words though this may be reduced in length if work in other media is presented in conjunction with the written text.
Practical support and advice for current students and applicants is available from the Disability Advisory and Support Service. Email: [email protected]
Past graduates of the MA in Social Anthropology have gone on to many different careers both inside and outside academic life. As it is a 'conversion' course aimed at those who want to explore anthropology after undergraduate studies in another field, or at least within a different anthropological tradition, it often represents a major change of career direction, opening up a wide range of different possibilities.
About 20% of our graduates carry on to do a doctorate, be it here or elsewhere. But the MA in Social Anthropology also represents a very appropriate preparation for careers in which an informed awareness of the implications of social and cultural diversity are important. Some past students have been drawn to the voluntary sector, either in the UK or with development agencies overseas, others have gone on to work in the media or cultural industries or in education at many different levels. Others again have found opportunities in business or the civil service, where ethnography-based methods are increasingly popular as a way of finding out how people - from consumers to employees - interact with their everyday worlds.
The MA in Social Anthropology also trains students in a broad range of transferable skills that are useful in many walks of life, including social research methods and the ethics associated with these, effective essay-writing, oral presentational skills in seminars and other contexts, basic computing skills, using the internet as a research tool and conducting bibliographic research.
Socio-cultural studies attracts people with social science backgrounds who wish to work on interdisciplinary topics, and also those from an arts or humanities background who want to gain skills and experience in social research.
Our PhD students can apply to the Arts & Humanities Research Council and some have already been successful in applications for doctoral research funding to the AHRC.
The MSc by Research in Socio-Cultural Studies may be taken as a stand-alone, one-year course or as a stepping stone to the PhD. It offers training in a range of qualitative methods.
Indicative courses include:
The dissertation element of the degree can take the form of either a small piece of independent research or a detailed proposal for a PhD.
You will work with a supervisor on an original research dissertation and participate in advanced sociology research-training workshops, work-in-progress seminars and a writing workshop.
The Graduate School provides a suite of research training courses for social science students across the University. We are developing an exciting package of flexible, web-based training courses as well as training in innovative methods addressing topics such as visual sociology, in line with the increased emphasis on ongoing training throughout your doctoral studies.
Find out more about scholarships and funding opportunities:
This MA introduces you to recent debates on gender in the disciplines of sociology and media and communications studies, and to the interdisciplinary domains of feminist social and cultural theory.
Drawing on the internationally recognised and pioneering expertise of staff in the Department of Sociology and Department of Media and Communications, as well as the Centre for Feminist Research (CFR), the programme offers you the opportunity to develop cutting-edge critical skills in relation to cultural approaches to gender formation and gender theory.
As well as these theoretical and analytical points of orientation, the MA in Gender, Media and Culture aims to help you grasp the importance of epistemology and methodology for the evaluation of empirical investigations of gender formations.
The programme therefore introduces you to, and offers training in, the key socio-cultural methods for the study of gender in the contemporary world, including methods for the study of visual culture; the body and affect; and memory.
These two elements of the programme are brought together in a dissertation study, which involves tailored supervision in the application of research methods to a specific topic.
This programme relates to the following disciplines:
Core components of the programme will familiarise you with the wide range of debates integral to the fields of gender studies, feminist theory, and cultural studies. These include:
You complete one core module and one option module each term, as well as a dissertation module in the spring term. The first core module introduces key debates and developments in feminist theory, cultural theory and, in particular, feminist cultural theory. It introduces both early debates which defined these fields and contemporary developments and departures. More specifically, you will be introduced to social constructivist and post-structuralist perspectives, to ‘new materialism’, to debates on feminism and the critique of universalism; to key questions in relation to feminism and biology; to debates on psycho-analysis and the emergence of queer theory and its intersection with feminist theory.
The second core module examines the place of gender, affect and the body in feminist theory and feminist practice. The course offers you different angles on what has become known as “the affective turn,” placing a strong emphasis on the history of feminist contributions to the study of affect and emotion as well as the body. We ask how bodies are constructed, experienced and lived from a variety of feminist perspectives, attending to questions of corporeal difference, as well as the intimacy of bodies, spaces, objects and technologies. We also reflect on the significance of affect and the body for feminist and queer cultural practices, as well feminist and queer activisms. This module therefore offers instruction in some of the most cutting edge issues in contemporary feminist theory. A team of leading feminist scholars based in the departments of Sociology and Media Communications at Goldsmiths teach this module on the basis of their research specialisms.
There will be a series of dissertation workshops to help you plan and develop your dissertation, especially in regard to issues of methodology and method. Each student will be assigned a supervisor who will work with you to develop your proposal and undertake independent research.
Core modules
Option modules
You have 60 credits at your disposal, you can choose any 30 credit modules related to gender from postgraduate modules across the University. You can choose either a regular option (30 credits) or two ‘mini-options’ (2 x 15 credits).
For your other options, you can choose modules from either the Department of Sociology or the Department of Media and Communications as they co-convene the programme. You can also choose from the following departments across Goldsmiths:
Please note that not all modules are suitable for students from all academic backgrounds; you will discuss your choices with the Programme Convenor at the start of your degree.
Assessment
Assessment consists of coursework, extended essays, reports, presentations, practice based projects or essays/logs, group projects, reflective essays, and seen and unseen written examinations.
Graduates from this programme gain conceptual and methodological knowledge of the key concepts and debates in the study of gender and culture; the skills of critical analysis; the ability to distinguish and appraise a range of socio-cultural research methodologies; the skills to design and develop a research project; and the ability to recognise and account for sensitive ethical issues relating to research and representation.
The two core courses provide you with the necessary skills to understand the relationships between early debates in the fields of gender studies, feminist theory and feminist cultural theory, and the ability to critically engage with new developments in these fields. Furthermore, you will gain a critical appreciation of the role and place of the body and affect in the development of feminist cultural theory and gender theory, and the challenges that contemporary socio-cultural changes bring to the theorisation of the body.
Previous graduates have embarked on professional careers in social research, think tanks, the arts and cultural sectors, government and public administration, development, human rights, NGOs, and in media and communications globally. They have also progressed to PhD study.
Find out more about employability at Goldsmiths.
Explore the creative interplay between urban theory and the visual representation of urban cultures and places.
This programme has been developed by the Centre for Urban and Community Research to encourage creative interplay between practice and theory. You'll have the chance to consider cutting-edge debates in cultural and social theory in a research setting that actively encourages the development of photographic practice.
The programme offers working photographers, visual artists and media practitioners space to reflect critically on their practice.
It also offers those with a background in sociology, urban and cultural geography, cultural studies or anthropology the opportunity to combine visual forms of representation with standard forms of research techniques in investigating urban life and the physical environments of the city.
Core modules
As well as these modules, you will complete a Dissertation and Major Visual Project (60 credits).
The Dissertation can comprise two parts: a portfolio and a 5-6,000-word Dissertation, or you may submit a 10-12,000-word written Dissertation. The Dissertation will consist of: an account of the rationale of the photographic project; a critical evaluation of photographic practice and issues of reflectivity and knowledge production. In combination with the written part you will be expected to provide evidence of a sustained and coherent body of photographic work focusing on an aspect of urban culture for assessment. Previously, work from Final Visual Projects has been shown on a virtual gallery space linked to the CUCR website.
Assessment consists of coursework, extended essays, reports, presentations, practice based projects or essays/logs, group projects, reflective essays, and seen and unseen written examinations.
This MA develops skills in urban photography, visual ethnography and urban research, communications for urban planning, community arts and visual arts practice.
Graduates of the programme have progressed to the following areas and careers:
Find out more about employability at Goldsmiths.
This MA examines contemporary issues concerning justice. You will learn how to conceptualise and study the possibilities of human rights, going beyond legal formulations to look at the conditions in which human rights claims are made.
Human rights mobilise millions of supporters across borders, inspiring passion and hope. And they operate at and between all the scales involved in globalisation: local, national, international, transnational. They are moral claims to justice. Although often associated with law, human rights are not the same as legal rights – human rights can be claimed where no legal rights are codified, even if changes in the law are invariably called for as part of attempts to realise human rights in practice.
Human rights are carried by different actors:
These different actors are often at odds with each other in defining and defending particular justifications of what human rights are and should be.
In this Masters you will learn about how human rights are constructed, exploring framings of human rights through case studies; and you will begin to practice some of the methodologies and methods that are currently used in NGOs and grassroots activist networks trying to remedy global injustices.
The focus on culture that runs through the programme makes for an emphasis on concrete, situated practices and meanings. Can human rights contribute to a global culture in which injustices figure as ‘wrongs’? Or are human rights invariably skewed, constructing injustices in ways that suit international elites better than they suit people who are suffering? Do human rights do violence to local cultures? Are they an appropriate response to local violence? In this MA we contextualise the study of how human rights are constructed in micro-processes, in the media and face-to-face in relation to debates over macro-structures, processes of globalisation and the institutions of global governance.
In terms of social justice, the MA is set up to study human rights beyond narrow, legalistic definitions. We look at what really makes a difference in terms of realising human rights in practice. Can human rights really be constructed in ways that challenge and overturn established social structures? Can rights be claimed in such a way that they can really protect us as human beings against the ‘creative destruction’ of global capitalism, state repression, the subjugation of women, and hatred and violence against minorities of all kinds – sexual, ethnic, religious?
This course covers the following disciplines: sociology, politics, anthropology, law, geography, english, literature, cultural studies, criminology
The MA in Human Rights, Culture and Social Justice is taught in the Department of Sociology, where there are a number of people who are working on areas broadly related to human rights as well as directly on how human rights are constructed and claimed.
In the first part of the course you will take the core module ‘Constructing Human Rights’ in which you will be introduced to debates over the possibilities of human rights, different ways of conceiving culture and the role that is played by a diverse range of organisations involved in challenging injustices connected to globalisation. You will also consider practical attempts to realise human rights.
You will take two short, skills-oriented modules 'Researching Human Rights' and 'Organising Human Rights' in which you will be introduced to methods and skills that will be of direct practical use in working for NGOs (eg evaluating user engagement, team-building and decision-making through role play, tracing the media impact of a campaign).
In the second term, you will choose among a number of options. You can choose to take 'Practicing Human Rights' and make use of some of the skills you have learned in a placement. Students who choose this option find and negotiate a placement in an organisation or a grassroots campaign whose work can be related to human rights and attend a series of workshops that allow them to reflect on the practical work, on their professional skills and on the broader significance of their observations.
While the core modules of the programme are taught by lecturers in Sociology, you may choose your option modules from those that are run here or in other departments, including Politics, Media and Communications, and Anthropology.
Finally you will write a dissertation based on research you will carry out, possibly related to the NGO or network you have worked in, and making use of a range of concepts and methods taught in the Department. You will be supervised by someone with expertise and interest in the topic you are studying and the methodologies and methods you plan to use.
Core modules
Option modules
You will choose option modules worth 60 credits in Sociology, Media and Communications, the Centre for Cultural Studies, English and Comparative Literature, Anthropology, Politics, Music and Educational Studies.
Assessment consists of coursework, extended essays, reports, presentations, practice based projects or essays/logs, group projects, reflective essays, and seen and unseen written examinations.
As issues of globalisation and justice are frequently in the media, and government policy in the UK, US, and elsewhere in Europe is now supposed to be guided by considerations of humanitarianism and human rights, there is a need for graduates with knowledge of human rights.
There are openings for careers in organisations including charities, humanitarian and human rights NGOs and even multi-national corporations, many of which are now concerned with their image in terms of human rights.
Find out more about employability at Goldsmiths.
