BA (Hons) Media and Communication with Foundation Year Bachelor's degree at York St John University

Explore theories and concepts relating to the analytical interpretation of the media. Introduction to major issues that relate media to social and cultural contexts. Assess and evaluate approaches to critical and analytical investigation.

Build skills needed to succeed in higher education, specifically for researching and analysing media. Includes researching, referencing, critical thinking, academic writing, presenting and group work.

Investigates the relationship between media and power. Discussion of the role of new media technologies in allowing self expression and agency through creations like mash ups and fan fiction. Exploration of how these technologies impact traditional forms of media. Includes exploration of positive and negative aspects of social media, from activism to surveillance and privacy concerns.

Think critically about how media informs, intersects and engages with concepts of identity. Engage with contemporary discussion and debate surrounding identity, including race, gender, nationality and age. Evaluate theoretical, historical and socio-political influences and implications of contemporary mediated identities.

Introduction to media ecology, an approach which understands media as anything through which meaning or communication takes place. Explore the deep history of media and allied technologies (writing, printing and painting) to examine how media can determine the possibilities of communication, creative activity and understanding. Examine how traditional, new and emergent technologies influence our relationship with information and culture.

Explore the concept of ideology by analysing the viewing behaviour and beliefs of media audiences. Study media communication models and their histories, engaging with research surrounding audiences. Explore the nature of contemporary mass communication and consider how ideology and meaning impact the communication process.

Engage in debates about the production, reception and contexts of media and cultural products that have caused controversy. Includes debates about taste and reception of text in different traditional, new and emergent media. Introduction to terminology of aesthetic discussion and dispute: propaganda, artistic licence, canonical status, acceptability, pornography, censorship.

Considers various forms and uses of music within cultural production, focusing on evolutions of processes and movements as indicators of cultural change. Explore possibilities for social, political and cultural exploration offered by music study, considering its use in counter-cultural production, innovation, reception, distribution, protest and socio-cultural moments. Discuss concepts and theories surrounding authorship, activism, mode of production, meaning and representation.

Become familiar with important critical debates surrounding visual culture. Appreciate the vital relationship between word and image, from traditional illustration through to contemporary internet culture. Investigate how visual strategies can be used to communicate complex ideas.

Opportunity to engage with vocational elements of working with media and explore entrepreneurial potential. Work in groups to produce a creative portfolio and pitch idea to a panel. Could be a magazine, film festival, or exhibition. Must take into account marketing and advertising, business cases, product development, and effective communication of ideas.

An understanding of globalisation is essential for engaging with processes of cultural, political and social change in the modern world. Introduction to major theoretical debates and ideas surrounding globalisation. Examine the role media plays in reflecting and reacting to processes of globalisation and its influence on emergent, resistant and dominant cultures.

Introduction to theory and practice of convergence technology, transmedia activity and network theory. Discuss continuing development and evolution of communication technologies and how they shape everyday lives. Consider these developments in relation to social, political and cultural factors and speculate on how they may affect production and consumption of meaning and content through media.

Opportunity to demonstrate abilities as an independent learner through an extended piece of research. Produce an extended critical and analytical examination of chosen topic, engaging with existing literature and offering original take on the subject. Apply analytical and research skills developed over the course of degree. Dedicated academic tutor supports throughout the research process.

Explore how new and emergent media, communications and technologies shape our way of living, acting and understanding the world and our place in it. Building on previous modules, learn about development of various technologies and consider our changing relationship with them. Evaluate how they contribute to and challenge philosophy, ethics, morals and meaning. Think about how developments might influence aesthetic trends in production, consumption and cultural value.

Explore and analyse different forms of animated film and video games. Includes analysis of different visual styles and genres in animation. Examine production, distribution and consumption of animated films and video games in contemporary culture. Consider both large media companies like Disney and Studio Ghibli and smaller, independent studios, engaging in debates about realism, hybridity and ideology in animation.

Explore and analyse concepts and issues surrounding globalisation, localisation, regionalism and national identity, particularly in relation to city cultures. Consider representations, symbolic and social structures, development, uses and experiences of the modern city. Involves experiential exploration of contemporary cities and investigating technological advances and futuristic narratives of the city. Opportunity to take part in international field trip; previous locations have included Istan

Engage in debates concerning American mass culture and its relationship to social formation, cultural movements and modes of expression. Examine contemporary popular culture as site of ideological, political and cultural discourse, considering how it uses and subverts America's ideas and imagery. Assess how popular forms react to social and cultural changes including animation, comic books, movies, television, websites and music.

Engage with a wide range of media representations of gender and sexualities. Critically assess how certain forms, formats and practices of media transgress, reinforce or challenge assumptions and prejudices relating to gender and sexuality. Builds upon previous discussions about identity and representation from other modules, encouraging cultivation of nuanced responses towards contemporary debates. Reflect upon the evolution of critical perspectives on gender and sexualities.