Undergraduate BA (Hons)
Cultural Studies, Media and Journalism
Study alongside world-leading experts in media, culture and journalism on an interdisciplinary course giving a global perspective.
Are you looking to combine a contemporary, cutting-edge understanding of media and culture with valuable career skills in news media production and reporting? Our joint honours degree in Cultural Studies, Media and Journalism prepares you for a career in journalism and a variety of media, creative and advertising sectors.
As part of an NCTJ-accredited Journalism programme, this degree explores how media cultures, industries and digital innovations play a huge role in shaping the world in which we live.
In your second year, you study in the award-winning Centre of Journalism at our Medway campus. You'll receive rigorous training in practical research and creative skills in news media production, analysis and reporting. You'll also gain an excellent theoretical understanding of cultural, media and information products, practices, industries, audiences and institutions in national and global contexts.
Taught in the award-winning Centre for Journalism and home to KMTV, a local TV station for Kent.
Sociology at Kent was ranked 2nd for research quality in The Complete University Guide 2023.
Study and work with world-leading experts in media, cultural and journalism on an interdisciplinary course giving a global perspective.
Meet renowned journalists at our masterclasses and seminars at the Centre for Journalism.
Gain a National Council for the Training of Journalists (NCTJ) accredited diploma as part of your overall degree programme.
BBB
Distinction, Distinction, Merit
30 points overall or 15 points at HL
5 GCSEs grade C or above.
Pass all components of the University of Kent International Foundation Programme with a 60% overall average.
The University will consider applicants holding T level qualifications in subjects closely aligned to the course.
The University welcomes applications from Access to Higher Education Diploma candidates for consideration. A typical offer may require you to obtain a proportion of Level 3 credits in relevant subjects at merit grade or above.
The following modules are offered to our current students. This listing is based on the current curriculum and may change year to year in response to new curriculum developments and innovation.
You are required to take 120 credits in Stage 1. This includes 30 credits of compulsory modules comprising Modern Culture (SOCI3340) and Contemporary Culture and Media (SOCI3350), plus at least 30 credits from Sociology of Everyday Life (SOCI3360) 15 credits, Fundamentals of Sociology (SOCI3360) 15 credits and Sociological Theory: The Classics (SOCI4080) 15 credits from the optional modules list.
This module introduces students to discussions and debates surrounding modern culture. It looks at why culture has always been such a contested sphere and has a decisive impact on society at large. Students will look at culture in the widest sense, ranging from 'the arts' to the banalities of everyday life in our consumer society; at how culture has expressed and organised the way people think and live from the days of 'protestantism' to those of post-punk. Books, magazines, radio, TV, movies, cartoons, fashion, graffiti, the cult of celebrity, youth subcultures and pop music will be used to understand class, history, sexuality, colonialism, revolution, conflict and globalisation.
Contemporary culture is 'now-time' culture, but when did 'now' begin - and will it be over before the course starts? This module focuses on analysing contemporary culture and media and aims to demonstrate the range of possible interpretations that mediated culture can be open to. It raises questions about how culture can be viewed from aesthetic, political, ethical and economic perspectives. What is culture really for? Is it product or a process? Who owns it? Is it for fun or is it deadly serious? In order to think through contemporary issues such as gender relations, sexuality, multiculturalism and otherness, and what they might imply about our changing perceptions of space, place, and belonging, we'll be taking a case study approach to a range of cultural products and objects, media and institutions, and post-modern practices of communication. This module aims to understand the transformation of culture and media and everyday life we are living through and the way it changes who we are.
This course is designed to provide students with an introduction to the ways sociologists attempt to document and explain the social experience of everyday life. Each week the category of 'social experience' is held up for analytical scrutiny in relation to a particular component of ‘everyday life’. The course aims to illustrate the value of sociology for helping individuals to better understand the contents and conditions of their social experience of the world. It also aims to document the ways in which sociological theories and methods have developed in correspondence with the evolution of modern societies. The curriculum will include topics such as: Sex, Gender and Sexuality, Racial and Ethnic Identities, Risk and Society, Crime and Deviance, Health, Media, Religion or Family.
Sociology is the study of human societies. It is a discipline committed to the attempt to map out and explain the constitution of society. It also aims to attend to and explain the distinctive character of people's social experience of the world. Sociologists operate from the premise that, by working to explain human characteristics and behaviours in social terms and as relative products of society, they stand to offer insights into some of the major forces that determine our thoughts and behaviours. They work under the conviction that human beings are fundamentally social beings and are products of distinct forms of society. This course is designed to provide you with a basic introduction to Sociology. A particular focus is brought to how sociologists venture to understand the social structures and determinant social forces that shape our living conditions and life chances. It also outlines some of the ways in which such matters are addressed as problems for sociological theory and empirical sociological research.
"This module provides an introduction to the major issues and controversies surrounding the definition
The course introduces students to the language of film, from aspects of mise-en-scène (setting, performance, costumes, props, lighting, frame composition) to framing (camera movement, shot scale, lenses), sound (fidelity, volume, timbre) and editing (from requirements for spatial orientation through matches on action, eyeline matches and shot-reverse-shot structures to temporal manipulations through ellipsis and montage). The study of these elements enables students to understand the spatial and temporal construction of films, as well as the stylistic, expressive and/or dramatic functions of specific strategies.
This module introduces students to the key elements of the British political system. That system has undergone a number of important changes in recent years, and the module enhances students' understanding of what these changes consist of, why they have taken place and what their implications are. Focusing on changes in the power to shape and make policy decisions, the module explores the shifting role of key actors such as the legislature and media, and at the exercise of policy authority at the sub-national, national and international levels. The module also considers changes in the relationship between citizens and political authorities, and particularly on shifting patterns of individual engagement with politics. Throughout, the module is designed to enhance students' critical skills in being able to analyse changes in policy authority within a political system.
Crime is a major social and political issue and the source of much academic and popular debate. Key criminological issues will be examined during the course of the module within their wider sociological and social policy context. There will be a particular focus on understanding the nature and extent of crime and victimisation, analysing public and media perceptions of crime, and exploring the relationship between key social divisions (age, gender and ethnicity) and patterns of offending and victimisation.
This module is designed to help students understand and critique the numbers and research they encounter in their everyday lives. The first half of the course focuses on teaching the knowledge and skills need to critically evaluate factual quantitative claims. Each lecture uses example quantitative claims, largely drawn from the news media, to teach a particular quantitative skill. For example, highlighting a statistic based on a biased sample to teach students the principles of sampling. The seminars build on the content of the lectures and aim to teach students the practical, computer-based skills needed to evaluate quantitative claims. The second half of the module is based around students conducting their own research, and also brings in qualitative skills element. Students apply the critical and quantitative skills they have learned to conducting their own mixed-methods project.
"The teaching at Kent has shaped and changed my personality and helped me to pursue my career goals."Maria-Lore Haag, Cultural Studies and Media
You are required to take 120 credits in Stage 2. These modules are taken at the Medway campus and contribute to your journalism qualification.
This module prepares students to pass the National Council for the Training of Journalists' exam Essential Media Law and Regulation. It provides a comprehensive and practical understanding of key concepts for professional journalists including: press freedom; defamation – components and defences; privacy; copyright; breach of confidence; regulation and self-regulation of media; contempt of court.
This module provides an overview of the British political system, focusing on recent political and constitutional developments. It will investigate topics such as the roles of Parliament, the Prime Minister and Cabinet, political parties, and the electoral system. It will assess key issues facing democratic government and institutions within the UK, analysing for example the role of Europe, the challenges posed by devolution, the Treasury and the National Health Service. There will also be discussion of contemporary political behaviour, including the issue of political participation.
Students will learn to identify what makes a story, develop newsgathering techniques to draw information from a range of sources and hone their writing skills to produce clean, accurate copy to a deadline. Students will consider how journalists should conduct themselves in public with reference to the Independent Press Standards Organisation code and other professional standards. Students will learn the difference between hard news, comment and features and be able to produce work for a range of outlets and audiences. This module will also prepare students to pass the National Council for the Training of Journalists' professional exams in reporting and journalism ethics.
This module equips students with the skills to produce journalism for TV, radio, print and multimedia online platforms to a professional standard. It includes the professional use of cameras, editing software and television studio production facilities; professional use of audio recording equipment, editing software and radio studio production facilities; print production software and facilities; and advanced use of multimedia authoring software and image manipulation software. It involves team work in radio, television, print and online news production. It also considered the culture, history and development of British journalism and the impact of online technologies on planning, reporting, producing and disseminating news. The skills learned on this module will prepare students to take several professional exams set by the National Council for the Training of Journalists (NCTJ).
You are required to take 120 credits in Stage 3 with AT LEAST 90 credits at level 6. This includes 30 credits of compulsory modules comprising Digital Culture (SOCI6570) and Popular Culture, Media and Society (SOCI7500), plus one of Narrative, Myth and Cultural Memory (SOCI6210) 15 credits, Cultures of Embodiment (SOCI6760) 30 credits and Emotions, Media and Culture (SOCI7420) from the optional modules list. Your remaining credits must be taken from a list provided by the School/Division.
This module will examine the impact of digital technology on our social and cultural lives. It will concentrate on how the Internet in particular has challenged some of our more traditional notions of identity and self, the body, relationships, community, privacy, politics, friendship, war and crime, economics, among others. Lectures will show how some of the basic components of culture such as notions of identity, space, the body, community, and even the very notion of what it is to be human, have been complicated by the rise of virtuality and cyberspace. We will also examine these issues through case study phenomena unique to digital culture, currently including gaming, music, cybersex and social networking.
This module introduces and applies ideas in critical, cultural and communications theory to debates and issues surrounding media and popular culture, focusing on such themes as cultural elitism, power and control, the formation of identities, the politics of representation, and the cultural circuit of production and consumption. It investigates the relationship between the development of contemporary society and societal values and the changing technological basis of mediated culture.
The module combines theoretical and methodological approaches from sociology, cultural and media studies, history and literature to examine how our understandings of the past, present and future are formed, framed, mediated and remediated in a variety of social, cultural and political contexts. It aims to introduce students to key themes and issues related to the social experience of time. It will encourage them to reflect on how this experience informs our approaches to social problems, relationships of power and inequality, and the formation of collective identities. Over the course of the term, we will debate and critically explore the roles of heritage, nostalgia, the imagination, narrative and experience at the heart of both processes of social change and cultural continuity. We will question what it is that forms the constitutive narrative of a cultural identity, its foundations, expression and trajectory. We will also examine the material and symbolic construction of social groups such as generations, classes and communities.
Images of 'trim, taut and terrific' bodies surround us in contemporary consumer culture. They look down on us from billboards, are increasingly central to advertisers' attempts to sell us clothes, cosmetics, cars, and other products, and pervade reality television programmes based on diet, exercise and 'extreme’ makeovers. These trends have occurred at the same time that science, technology, genetic engineering and medicine have achieved unprecedented levels of control over the body: there are now few parts of the body which cannot be remoulded, supplemented or transplanted in one way or another. In this course we explore how culture represents and shapes bodies, and also examine how embodied subjects are themselves able to act on and influence the culture in which they live. We will seek to understand the relationship between the body and self-identity, embodiment and inequalities, and will explore various theories of the body. In doing this we range far and wide by looking at such issues as work, music, sex/gender, cyberbodies, Makeover TV, film, transgender, sport, music, work and sleep. Embodiment is the enduring theme of this course, though, and we will explore its many dimensions via a range of disciplinary and interdisciplinary perspectives, and by asking and addressing a range of questions such as ‘How and why has the body become increasingly commodified?’, ‘Why has the body become increasingly central to so many people’s sense of self-identity?’, ‘If we live in a culture that has been able to intervene in the sizes, shapes and contents of the body like never before, have people have become less sure about what is ‘natural’ about the body, and about how we should care for and treat our bodily selves?’
This module invites students to explore the critical links between emotion, media and culture in the context of contemporary cultural, socio-political and economic relations. It examines what is meant by 'the affective turn' within the humanities and social sciences and introduces students to a range of interdisciplinary literatures concerned with theorising the cultural politics of emotion and the mediation of affect. Through various case studies and examples, the module investigates how social, cultural and media theorists have addressed the relationships between emotion, affect, power and identity in the context of postcoloniality, multiculturalism, neoliberalism and various social justice movements. Attending to contemporary cultural debates concerning happiness, empathy, hope, fear, hate, disgust and melancholia, it explores how personal feelings are linked to social norms and power structures and considers how we might disrupt an assumed division between ‘good’ and ‘bad’ emotions. The module explores how emotions, feelings and affects are produced, mediated and circulated through a range of cultural forms, practices and technologies, paying particular attention to the role of film, television, news media, digital culture, literature and popular science.
We use a variety of teaching methods, including lectures; case study analysis; group projects and presentations; newsroom workshops; individual and group tutorials. Many module convenors also offer additional ‘clinic’ hours to help with the preparation of coursework and for exams.
Assessment is through a combination of unseen written examinations, assessed coursework, timed newsroom exercises, assessed presentation and individual portfolios.
As a joint honours student, you will study in depth two disciplines and will experience different teaching and assessment styles appropriate to each discipline.
Contact time is not arranged by campus and will depend on which modules you choose. For this reason you may be required to visit both campus sites in one day.
For a student studying full time, each academic year of the programme will comprise 1200 learning hours which include both direct contact hours and private study hours. The precise breakdown of hours will be subject dependent and will vary according to modules. Please refer to the individual module details under Course Structure.
Methods of assessment will vary according to subject specialism and individual modules. Please refer to the individual module details under Course Structure.
For programme aims and learning outcomes please see the programme specification.
Cultural Studies, Media and Journalism prepares you for a career in journalism and a variety of media, creative and advertising sectors, as well as beyond. Our graduates have proven very successful on the job market, gaining employment across a variety of fields, including:
When you’re taught by passionate people, it rubs off on you and helps you to engage with different perspectives.
The 2023/24 annual tuition fees for this course are:
For details of when and how to pay fees and charges, please see our Student Finance Guide.
For students continuing on this programme, fees will increase year on year by no more than RPI + 3% in each academic year of study except where regulated.*
The University will assess your fee status as part of the application process. If you are uncertain about your fee status you may wish to seek advice from UKCISA before applying.
Find out more about accommodation and living costs, plus general additional costs that you may pay when studying at Kent.
Kent offers generous financial support schemes to assist eligible undergraduate students during their studies. See our funding page for more details.
At Kent we recognise, encourage and reward excellence. We have created the Kent Scholarship for Academic Excellence.
The scholarship will be awarded to any applicant who achieves a minimum of A*AA over three A levels, or the equivalent qualifications (including BTEC and IB) as specified on our scholarships pages.
We have a range of subject-specific awards and scholarships for academic, sporting and musical achievement.
Next steps
We are no longer taking applications for the 2023/24 academic year. Please visit the 2024 online prospectus for a list of current undergraduate courses.
We welcome applications from students all around the world with a wide range of international qualifications.
Student life
Kent ranked top 50 in the The Complete University Guide 2023 and The Times Good University Guide 2023.
Free membership for undergraduates living on campus in 2023.
Kent has risen 11 places in THE’s REF 2021 ranking, confirming us as a leading research university.
An unmissable part of your student experience.