English Studies BA (Hons)

Develop your critical and creative skills. Apply close reading techniques to a range of texts and voices, and deepen your understanding of writing and reading. Explore critical approaches to texts including novels, poetry and drama.

Consider how romantic and Victorian literature is influenced by so many factors - the political revolution in Europe and beyond, a rising discussion of rights, the Woman Question, and industrial, economic and scientific transformations. You focus on the period between the French Revolution and Queen Victoria's death in 1901 to explore the dynamic relationship between their historical and cultural context.

Critically write about class, gender and race to explore the ideological assumptions covered in late 18th and 19th-century literature.

This is a 40-credit module.

You investigate key writers, past and present, who have played or continue to play a role in social change. You address questions about why studying literature and creative writing matters.

You consider the opportunities available after graduation including becoming an educator, publisher, facilitator, communicator and creative. And you write your own manifesto, alongside a personal development plan, to achieve your goals after you graduate.

This is a 20-credit module.

Explore why you write, who your readers are, and what you need to consider in terms of voice, register and form when writing for different audiences and reasons. Look at a range of forms of professional writing including online articles, reviews, how to guides, interpretative texts used in exhibitions and live texts using augmented reality technology.

Examine colonial-era and postcolonial literary texts, including poetry, fiction, short fiction, drama, and life-writing. Consider different historical perspectives on, and legacies of, empire, from a range of country contexts including South Asia, Africa, Australasia, as well as America and Europe. Explore pressing concerns about how far such texts have questioned, and may continue to contest, dominant and often damaging perspectives on race, ethnicity, class and gender in changing colonial, postcolonial, neo-colonial and decolonising contexts.

Develop graduate skills in preparation for further study, employment or lifelong learning, through engagement with our Student Futures team and humanities practitioners. Gain insight into career pathways and explore the opportunities available to humanities graduates, including as educators, policy-makers, publishers, facilitators, communicators, and creatives. Work on an individual project, either work focused or academic focused.

This is a 20-credit module.

Explore modernism as one of the most innovative and artistic movements of the 20th century, whilst examining your own experimental writing practices.

You examine the diverse ways of writing in the early 20th century by experimenting with new methods of writing whilst reflecting on your own style. You investigate literature and other forms of cultural expression such as visual art, music and film to understand the relationship between modernism and modernity. You also learn how past artists and writers responded to historical and cultural change. And you analyse if current writers continue to innovate new styles in the same way.

This is a 40-credit module.

It is believed that our sense of who we are and how we perceive others is tied to the way identities are constructed through cultural representation. How does the way our perception is constructed tend to privilege some groups over others? Examine key theoretical perspectives on the representation of identity in relation to a range of concepts – such as class, gender, race, sexuality and disability – as constructed in and represented by contemporary culture. Investigate these ideas in relation to a contemporary cultural text of your choosing and present your research as a paper at a student conference.

This is a 20-credit module.

Gain the skills and knowledge to devise, develop and execute an extended independent research project in an area of critical or creative practice. Develop advanced research skills including reflective practice, critical research, creative practice-based research, self-management, and research project management, preparing you for your dissertation and creative writing project. Explore the work of researchers in English and creative writing through research specialism workshops, which showcase recent and active research projects, providing insights into the wide-ranging research practices underpinning this work.

This is a 40-credit module.

Study literary genres and movements and their historical, social and political contexts. You focus on the 19th century to the present, including aestheticism and decadence, black, Asian and minority ethnic writing, detective and crime fiction, the feminist movement and contemporary historical fiction. You consider the context of the texts' production and receipt. You also examine the diverse formal, technical and stylistic properties of the texts, exploring critical and theoretical perspectives.

This is a 40-credit module.

Examine literary genres and movements and their historical, social, and political contexts. Focus on the nineteenth century to the present, exploring aestheticism and decadence, Black, Asian and minority ethnic writing, detective and crime fiction, the feminist movement and contemporary historical fiction. And consider the circumstances within which the texts were produced and received. Discuss the diverse formal, technical and stylistic properties of the texts, and explore critical and theoretical perspectives, using sophisticated critical vocabulary.

This is a 20-credit module.

Examine examples of speculative writing from the 17th Century to the present day. Consider how literature responded to the possibilities of new technologies and geographical discovery, how it articulated fears about issues such as revolution and capitalism, and how it imagined visionary possibilities for the future of society.