Overview
Discover how our societies have shaped and been shaped by English literature, and explore different modes of performance, by studying our full-time Drama and English Literature degree in Cambridge. Choose to study abroad for one semester, and attend field trips and productions to broaden your experience. Prepare for a career in the arts or fields such as teaching – and change the way others see the world.
Careers
We work with employers to make sure you graduate with the knowledge, skills and abilities they need. They help us review what we teach and how we teach it – and they offer hands-on, practical opportunities to learn through work-based projects, internships or placements.
Find out more about our placements and work experience, or the faculty's employability support.
Our BA (Hons) Drama and English Literature will help you develop many skills for your future career, including literacy, communication, creativity, self-reliance and teamwork. You can gain practical experience as a performer or stage technician, as well as the academic understanding needed to become a teacher or director.
Other roles in which our past students have found success include journalism, television, radio, the music industry, gallery work and arts administration.
You might also decide to carry on to a Masters course after you graduate, such as our:
Modules & assessment
Level 3 (foundation year)
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Foundation in Humanities, English, Media, Social Sciences and Education
This module will provide students with the necessary skills to begin studying at level 4 in courses related to the humanities, social sciences, English, media and education. Students will be introduced to the core skills necessary to succeed in higher education, including thinking critically, researching, and referencing appropriately, demonstrating appropriate numeracy and ICT skills, and communicating effectively verbally and in writing. In addition to these fundamental study skills, Students will be given an introduction to a broad range of disciplines whose skills and theories are widely applicable. Students will study a variety of writing styles in order to recognise, deconstruct and replicate various forms of persuasive, analytical, and informative writing. Students will learn the basics of intercultural studies and how these theories can be applied to real-world problems. Students will consider social perceptions held across western cultures, and the difference between social and self-perception, participating in structured discussion and argument. Students will be introduced to the core principles of psychology and will explore various current applications of psychological theory. Students will also be introduced to ethics and will learn about some of the key theories and thinkers in the development of current ethical considerations in a range of scenarios. This module is made up of the following eight constituent elements: Interactive Learning Skills and Communication (ILSC); Information Communication Technology (ICT); Critical Thinking; Intercultural Studies; Psychology; Composition and Style; Ethics; Social Perceptions.
Year one, core modules
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A History of English Literature 1: Writing Matters
In this module you will survey the history of English Literature between William Blake and the present day. Mainly using Volume 2 of ‘The Norton Anthology of English Literature’ you will study period, genre and form through a range of texts including: the novel; the short story; the essay and manifesto; poetry; drama; letters and graphic art. Each week, you will attend a lecture which will introduce you to key issues from the text and period, followed by week a three-hour seminar. The first two hours of the seminar will be spent on close reading and discussion. These activities will allow you to develop your analytical skills as well as your abilities in communicating the research and analysis that you will apply to the literatures under discussion. Working with other students in class you will develop your social capital and critical skills in whole and small group discussions. You will develop your sense of identity as a critical and adaptable thinker, problem-solver, researcher and creative agent as you apply theoretical material to the primary literatures under discussion. You will also realise the broader social and cultural capital of the course as you engage with key ideas and concepts related to, but also transcending, the literatures under discussion. -
A History of English Literature 2: Reading Theory
In this module you will survey the history of English Literature between the Anglo-Saxon period and the end of the eighteenth century, using Volume 1 of The Norton Anthology of English Literature. The juxtaposition of pieces by well-known authors such as Chaucer, Marlowe, and Milton with less familiar texts is intended to encourage reflection upon what constitutes the 'canon'. At this same time, you will be introduced to an exciting range of social, cultural and political theories that can be used to further the analysis of literary texts. These might include psychoanalysis, Marxism, structuralism, feminism, postcolonialism, postmodernism or queer theory. In your seminars, you will apply these theories to the texts studied. Each week, you will attend two lectures; one which will introduce you to key issues from the text and period, and one which will introduce a theory. These will be followed by a two-hour seminar. The seminar will be spent on close reading and discussion. These activities will allow you to develop your analytical skills as well as your abilities in communicating the research and analysis that you will apply to the literatures under discussion. Working with other students in class you will develop your social capital and critical skills in whole and small group discussions. You will develop your sense of identity as a critical and adaptable thinker, problem-solver, researcher and creative agent as you apply theoretical material to the primary literatures under discussion. You will also realise the broader social and cultural capital of the course as you engage with key ideas and concepts related to, but also transcending, the literatures under discussion. You will be assessed by: a portfolio of writing including a 2000-word essay which analyses literary text through the lens of one of the theoretical approaches studied; a group presentation at a student conference that makes the case for a text to be included on one of the History of English Literature modules next year. -
Studio Performance
This module will introduce you to effective working methodologies in both performance and production. This will be tested through the production of a studio-based collaborative live performance, which will also explore selected key moments in theatre and performance history through practice. We will begin by considering the historical context of the text chosen for performance, its genre and performance conventions. Your tutors’ expectations of professional discipline in practical work will be set in this introductory module. While they will direct performance and production work, you will be expected to develop your own independence and initiative. You will contribute creatively to performance and production work, to appreciate the importance of collaborative practice on your degree. You may take a variety of roles as a performer or choose to concentrate on the production processes that are essential to effective live performance. You may help to design lighting, sound, projection or video for the performance, working with professional technical staff. You may alternatively work on creating effective set design, choreography, or costume and make-up. One or more student stage-managers will be needed for the whole performance, working in collaboration with all other performance and production roles. You will be expected to actively participate in all the aspects of the rehearsal and production processes that are relevant to your role. You must demonstrate reliability as collaborative performers and production staff by full attendance, punctual arrival at rehearsals and high levels of concentration within sessions. These factors and your creative contribution will inform your mark for the process of rehearsals week by week. This will be 30% of the module mark. The remaining 70% of your mark will be based on the quality of the live performance, whether you appear as a performer or make your contribution in a production role. -
Staging and Production
This module will involve you in staging a directed public performance. You will form a company and take on a performance and/or significant backstage role to work alongside your director in the realisation of a contemporary performance text. You will engage in a full rehearsal process, in which you will analyse and explore your chosen text within the context of your wider studies of C20th to contemporary performance and associated theories. Your rehearsal process will involve active participation in the interpreting and staging of your text, requiring you to engage with post dramatic practices such as the adaptation and deconstruction of course materials. This module requires professional discipline, including a willingness to take direction from others and to contribute ideas and work positively towards creative solutions. You will be assessed on the final ensemble performance piece in the moment of live delivery for 70% of your mark. The remaining 30% will reflect your conduct, attendance, contribution and participation in the creative process throughout rehearsals.
Year two, core modules
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Reading Beyond Britain
This module engages actively with widespread calls to decolonise the curriculum of English literature by considering some of the best writing from beyond Britain. You will consider applied theories that enable you to think deeply about issues of colonialism, postcolonialism, race, gender, empire, and canon. It is a sweeping module, covering not just 150 years but also oceans and continents, equipping you with the critical tools needed to participate knowingly in today’s trans-global economies of thought, culture, and labour. This module deliberately turns on its head new political and social movements towards nationalism and localism to think through diverse voices and non-UK perspectives. It seeks to tear down literary and cultural walls to develop empathetic critical reading practices and encourage reading beyond ‘identification’ and towards activism. The final assignment is a free-form 3000-word submission, creative, critical, and/or pragmatic, on the theme of ‘global literature and equality’. Accepted submission forms include blogs, YouTube videos, Twitter streams, essays, radio dramas/features, political protest plans/reports, short stories, artefact(s) with critical commentary, or (recorded) time-based art. -
The European Novel: Desire and Transgression
This module will introduce you to a representative selection of some of the most memorable and significant European novels, ranging from ancient Greek prose narratives and Renaissance romances to contemporary fiction. You will compare the ways in which different writers have handled elements of the novel such as characterisation, dialogue and narrative voice, as well as consider different sub-genres of the novel, for example magic realism and the epistolary novel. Texts will be selected to complement the novels you have studied on other modules, giving you a fuller understanding of the origins of the genre, and of its wider European context. Desire was a key focus of the very first European proto-novels, and continues to be a preoccupation today. You will engage with some of the changes and continuities in fictional depictions of romantic and sexual relationships, examining the ways in which topics such as same-sex desire, elopement and adultery have been depicted. The first assessment element, a 1000 word critical analysis, will test both your close reading skills and your understanding of the contexts and conventions of the early novel. The second assessment element, a 2,000-word essay, will require you to demonstrate an understanding both of your knowledge of set texts and your grasp of key ideas that have informed the course. -
Making Performance
This module offers you the opportunity to perform in, design and produce a large-scale public performance, created from a selected source text. While production work will be led by a tutor, students also must agree effective methods of decision-making, show full commitment to rehearsals and production meetings and demonstrate a willingness to participate in all aspects of work on the production. This module is designed to develop your skills in performance and production work to a high level; there will be a variety of roles on-stage and back-stage for your group to manage and deliver effectively. Collaborative production modules require professional conduct from all students; measurements of such conduct will include reliable attendance, punctual arrival at rehearsals, high levels of concentration within sessions and a willingness to take direction from others. You will liaise closely with professional staff at the theatre venue during intensive technical rehearsals and your own developing professionalism will be tested during this time. For assessment, 70% of the mark will be based on the quality of the live performance and 30% on a consideration of attendance, professional discipline and your creative contribution throughout the production process. -
Community Theatre Performance
This project-based module will give you direct experience of working as a performer and facilitator within the local community. This will increase your awareness of employability contexts, develop your ability to work with and for vulnerable groups, and hone a wide range of transferable skills. Working as an applied theatre company, you will be set a brief to design and deliver a performance project for an outside organisation, such as a local charity, museum, Sheltered Housing Unit, school or health care provider. Practical workshops and seminar style teaching will introduce you to the given context, the ethical and practical challenges related to it, and a range of performance styles and methodologies appropriate to successfully meeting the project brief. You will then engage in a collaborative process to devise and deliver a performance off-site. This module will offer you direct engagement with the local arts community, such as children’s theatre companies at the Junction, primary or secondary schools, or local charities. The preparation of your project will develop your awareness of the ethical, practical and creative issues that must be considered when making performance for specific target audiences and in off-site locations. You will explore the diverse career opportunities within this field, while gaining real-world experience in Community Theatre.
Year two, optional modules
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Writing World War One: Trauma, Memory, Resistance
This module examines a range of texts to consider current understandings of WWI and its representations. You will begin the module by looking at the poems that have famously memorialised the experience of soldiers on the Western Front before widening your outlook to explore different forms of texts (including novels, autobiography, short stories and graphic novels) that present a more diverse range of wartime experiences on the ‘home front’ and ‘forbidden zone’. This will include experiences by ‘enemy’ authors, racial minority groups, the ‘insane’, women in war zones, and animals. Each two-hour seminar will have a (mini) lecture with a thematic focus. The (mini) lecture will be followed by close reading and discussion of related texts in the seminar group. These activities will allow you to develop your analytical skills as well as your abilities in communicating the research and analysis that you will apply to the literatures under discussion. Working with other students in class you will develop your social capital and critical skills in whole and small group discussions. You will develop your sense of identity as a critical and adaptable thinker, problem-solver, researcher and creative agent as you apply theoretical material to the primary literatures under discussion. You will also realise the broader social and cultural capital of the course as you engage with key ideas and concepts related to, but also transcending, the literatures under discussion, such as: the role of propaganda and the rise of anti-war writing (literatures of resistance); changing definition and realities of war through developing technologies; the politics of remembering and forgetting war and military conflict in general; new understandings of WWI derived from global history, race and gender theories; the relationship of war to literary and visual modernism; the psychological realities of war on combatants and civilians. Each seminar will offer you opportunities for formative feedback on your work and ideas, so allowing you to adapt to the challenges of the module and develop strategies for planning and completing your assessment. You will be assessed by means of a final 3000-word essay, allowing you to demonstrate your understanding of what has been covered, including your knowledge of set texts and your grasp of key theories and ideas that have informed the course. -
Modern Science Fiction
In this module you will study the development of modern science fiction, concentrating on major texts from the postwar period. You are expected to acquire a detailed knowledge of the history of science fiction and a critical understanding of the problems of defining it in relation to other forms of literature. You are also expected to gain an understanding of the distinctive pleasures which science fiction offers its readers. The emphasis is on science fiction as a literature of ideas. In this module you will be concerned primarily with science fiction as a literary form rather than with its manifestations in other media, but the demands of adapting science fiction to other media will be considered. You will read short stories, novels, and critical essays enabling you to develop a detailed knowledge of science fiction from the 1930s to the present day, and gain an understanding of some key science fiction tropes and sub-genres. -
Romantic Conflicts
This module will develop your knowledge of the Romantic Period, which usually covers literature produced between 1770 and 1832. In this course you will develop your analytical skills as well as your abilities in communicating the research and analysis that you will apply to literature of the period. Working with other students in class you will develop your social and critical skills in whole and small group discussions. You will realise the broader cultural capital of the course as you engage with themes that transcend the literature of the period. Conflict can be found in all literature. However, in the Romantic period it seems to have been the essence of the spirit of the age. Percy Shelley called the French Revolution of 1789 ‘the master theme of the epoch in which we live’, and indeed many critics and historians date the beginning of the Romantic period from then. In fact Britain was at war with France for most of this period (from 1793 to 1815) trying to undo the revolution, restore a king, and with him, the old aristocratic ruling class. Class conflict was in the air well before 1789 as William Hazlitt notes: ‘the French revolution might be described as a remote but inevitable result of the invention of the art of printing.’ What he means is that an overwhelming public consensus had to be achieved before a revolution could occur, and the only way to achieve this is through the mass dissemination of ideas – through literature. Therefore, this module will help you consider your own individual identity, as well as your attitude and adaptability to ideas on a diverse range of subjects. Notions of class, race, debates over work, the individual in society, women’s rights, slavery, protest and land ownership all feature in this module and require engagement with you as a person who has to examine many still current ideas from the Romantic period. Therefore, the scope of this module is a large one. -
Principles of Dramatherapy
This module is an introduction to the theory and practice of dramatherapy, as practised by registered professionals in the UK. It will not train you to be a therapist, but will equip you with knowledge of the field and some introductory skills that will be useful if you are considering dramatherapy as a vocation. You'll be introduced to the clinical field and will learn about the principles of dramatherapy and other related professions, such as work in applied theatre, teaching and nursing. You'll be taught through experiential workshops linked to theoretical seminars, and also a possible field trip. Audio-visual presentations will enable you to view clinical work in process. Through these activities you'll be able to evaluate, develop and analyse your potential in this discipline and explore the application of arts media to therapeutic situations. Your assessment will comprise small group practical work in which you will actively demonstrate an understanding of the use of drama as a therapeutic tool. You'll be individually marked during this task, according to the specified learning outcomes. The knowledge you gain on this module can be applied to other modules. It may involve improvisation, role-play or performance, and can contribute to a basic understanding of groups and how they function. -
Physical Theatre
On this module you'll focus on physical theatre techniques as developed by key practitioners and companies. Figures and topics might include Jacques Lecoq at the International Theatre School in Paris; experiments in dance theatre by Pina Bausch; the plays and performances of Complicité or Steven Berkoff; and the techniques taught by Frantic Assembly. In weekly workshop sessions you'll engage practically with physical methodologies for creating original performative work. These methods may include improvisation exercises, development of mime and gestural languages, experiments with neutral and expressive masks, ‘non-human’ movements, multi-role playing, clowning, chair duets, ‘pedestrian’ dance and the analysis of play-texts for their potential transformation into physical theatre performances. The movement of the body through space, and what this might be made to mean, will be a central concern on this module. This is a deceptively simple proposition, but the development of physical precision, rhythm and disciplined ensemble performance is a labour-intensive task. You'll be expected to be self-critical and able to develop your own physical work towards increasing clarity and complexity. Weekly sessions are collaborative in nature and you must be prepared to play a full part in the exercises undertaken. It is essential to wear suitable clothing to these sessions to enable you to ‘play’, according to Lecoq’s meaning of that term, which includes maintaining discipline in your work. You will be asked to work independently in small groups to devise a physical theatre performance for your assessment. You'll be asked to explain the rationale for your piece in advance of performing it, as based on ideas drawn from key contemporary physical theatre practitioners. -
Victorian Literature and Culture
This module is structured around three main themes: ‘The Impersonating I’, ‘Victorians and Globalization’ and ‘Sensation, Scandal and Serialization’. These themes are central to the current re-formulation of Victorian studies and, as we work through them, you will be asked to engage with new critical developments in the field. In considering ‘The Impersonating I’, you will be asked to examine uses of first-person narratives in ‘autobiographical’ bildungsroman, the incorporation of multiple first-person perspectives in fiction and the impersonation of an individual in the dramatic monologue. The second strand of the module, ‘Victorians and globalization’, will involve how different forms imagine ‘the globe’, how the practice of imperialism both shaped, and was shaped by, the works that described it. The final theme of the course will involve a careful engagement with print culture and the development of sensation fiction. Through the course of the semester, you will experience something of the practices and rhythms of serial reading as we discuss the weekly instalments of a selected novel. From the outset of the module, textual study will be embedded in an examination of key historical developments and the issues - political, social, cultural and intellectual - to which these developments gave rise and currency. Formative and summative assessments will give you the opportunity to investigate particular historical and contextual phenomenon and will stretch your abilities of close analysis. -
Dialogue and Debate: More to Milton
On this module you will study a range of key poetic and prose texts produced by canonical and non-canonical early modern authors. One of the characteristics of the literature of this period is its dialogic nature. The writers on this course lived in an age in which the religion of their immediate forebears was seen as heresy and, in many cases, they went through a school system in which students were trained to speak for and against the same proposition. It is not surprising that they were adept at seeing issues from more than one angle. Many texts offer the reader two or more perspectives on an issue, asking questions which often remain unanswered. In addition to these internal debates, texts (translations, adaptations, parodies, flytings, prequels and sequels) were also often in dialogue with each other. You will explore these issues in lectures and seminars, investigating the relationship between the set texts and their literary, cultural and historical contexts. These contexts include politics, religion, mythography, rhetoric, gender and sexuality. Upon successful completion of the module, you will have a greater understanding of Renaissance poetry and prose, as well as appropriate cultural, historical and theoretical contexts. You will be assessed through one 3000-word essay. -
Modernism and the City
In this module you will examine literary Modernism as an artistic response to the social conditions and technological advances of modernity. You will explore the ways in which the distinctive features of Modernist writing - subjectivity, the psychological, innovations in form, style and genre – are produced by urban experience. You will study a range of canonical and noncanonical texts that 'write' the city in order to explore the centrality of urban culture to modernity and to consider the connections between cultural geography, historical context and narrative form. You will study poems, novels and manifestos dating from 1900-1940 in the contexts of some of the following: the influence of the First World War; suffrage; changes in visual art (primitivism, postimpressionism); cinema and photography; the movements of Imagism, Futurism and Surrealism. Ideas of exile and expatriation will underlie discussion of the cultural exchanges occurring in London, Paris and New York. Working with other students in class you will develop your social capital and critical skills in whole and small group discussions. You will develop your sense of identity as a critical and adaptable thinker, problem solver, researcher and creative agent as you apply theoretical material to the primary literatures under discussion. You will also realise the broader social and cultural capital of the course as you engage with key ideas and concepts related to, but also transcending, the literatures under discussion, which provide: differing reactions to the early twentieth-century city, in relation to ethnicity, sexuality, gender, nationality and class. The 1000-word Critical Review that forms the first part of the assignment, provides valuable experience in summarizing and synthesizing complex ideas, whilst the 2000-word essay allows you to develop these ideas with reference to your chosen literary texts. -
Performing Shakespeare
This module will introduce you to the field of contemporary performance theory and practice in relation to Shakespeare. You'll study a range of 20th and 21st century critical and directorial interpretations of plays by Shakespeare, exploring issues like power, sexuality, gender, justice, morality, religion and war. You’ll look at how critics, directors and actors generate meanings from Shakespeare's plays, drawing on details from primary texts, secondary criticism and examples of contemporary creative responses to the plays. For your assessment, you'll select a sequence from one of Shakespeare's plays to stage as an ensemble performance, supported by practical workshops. This performance may include interdisciplinary work involving music, song and a variety of performing styles. You'll also attend seminars that will guide the development of your project proposal, and group tutorials to help you set up your group project. In preparation for the ensemble performance, you'll submit a 1,500-word analysis of how your chosen play has been interpreted in contemporary criticism, and examine a range of creative responses to it in the theatre and on film. -
Practice as Research
This module will introduce you to a research methodology that treats the live, spatial and embodied nature of performance as a means of generating knowledge and understanding. You'll explore how performance can be designed to test or demonstrate ideas that are not amenable to library research alone, but are practice-led. 'Practice as Research' is a methodology that expands the concept of ‘knowledge derived through doing’ into a research strategy; as such, this module is particularly valuable if you are planning any kind of practical work for your Major Project. Discussion of PAR and more traditional research strategies for the Major Project will be an important aspect of this module. Practice as research will also be useful for all additional performance-based explorations of ideas that you'll encounter at levels 5 and 6. The purpose of this module is to give you strategies that will underpin the research credentials of your future practical work. It will cover both practice-led research and research-led practice. You'll explore how an understanding of ideas can be derived from existing live performance work and how such work can also generate new knowledge. These examples may encompass live art, activist performance, installations and exhibitions, workshops and performance laboratories in acting training. You'll be assessed through your own design of a practical project informed by practice as research principles, which will be performed live, with an introductory (or concluding) rationale for its design, alongside an outline of the ideas with which the performance engages. -
Scenes and Shorts
This module will give you an opportunity to perform in short plays and scene studies that will combine into a substantial themed production. The short play demands intensive work in understanding its variety of forms and often experimental nature, and the technical aspects of such works can also be exacting. Therefore, there are many roles you can take up on this module, including performer, technician, or stage manager, with each team working to facilitate efficient turn-arounds between separate works. You will focus on works that are typically for small casts and of short duration, such as the short plays of Samuel Beckett, Bertolt Brecht, Caryl Churchill, Harold Pinter or Martin Crimp. Alternatively, you might focus on scene extracts from companies such as Forced Entertainment, Complicité, DV8 or Vincent Dance Theatre. You might also use a a performance style such as naturalism, Dadaism, physical theatre, postmodernism, the post-dramatic or performance art to pull together sequences on the module. The nature of scenes and shorts will allow you to work intensively and independently in small groups in rehearsals before coming together to produce a single show featuring all of your work. Your small-group rehearsals will be self-managed, requiring professional discipline and full participation to drive work forward. If you choose a production role, management of the whole show will be a substantial responsibility. You may choose to be assessed in the capacity of performer, producer, technical staff or a combination of these roles. In each weekly rehearsal session you will receive feedback on your developing work, culminating in assessment based on your process work week-by-week as reflected in the final performance.
Year three, core modules
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Major Project
The individual Major Project will allow you to undertake a substantial piece of individual research, focused on a topic relevant to your specific course. Your topic will be assessed for suitability to ensure sufficient academic challenge and satisfactory supervision by an academic member of staff. The project will require you to identify/formulate problems and issues, conduct research, evaluate information, process data, and critically appraise and present your findings/creative work. You should arrange and attend regular meetings with your project supervisor, to ensure that your project is closely monitored and steered in the right direction. -
Festival of Performance
This module aims to consolidate your skills as theatre makers through the curation, programming, marketing and delivery of a festival of performance. You will synthesise and apply the processes of production explored throughout your degree, collaborating with your peers and staff and taking a high level of responsibility and independence in preparing the work created and shown. At the start of the module, you will reflect on your individual learning journey and career aspirations through the creation of professional portfolio materials to support your input to the festival. This will involve advancing your skills in creating professional CVs, show reels, online profiles and critical reflection of their suitability for your chosen career pathway. You will then identify an appropriate role for yourself as part of the festival team and will take responsibility for associated tasks, including the curation or polishing of existing work and working as an ensemble member in the creation new work for presentation at the festival. This will involve a production process, supervised by a member of staff. In the second period of the module, you will develop, rehearse, design, market and realise a piece of performance, which might be based on a published play text or musical theatre book, an adaptation from other source materials or an original devised piece. These works will form the core of the festival and inform the curation of other events, such as workshops, community performance and/or work presented by other students. The festival will be public facing and designed for an external audience. At this stage, you must show self-discipline, professionalism and full commitment to additional rehearsal and production sessions as the festival approaches.
Year three, optional modules
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Spectacle and Representation in Renaissance Drama
You will consider a range of plays from the period 1580 to 1642 in the light of issues of stage spectacle and representation in a variety of forms, including identity, sexuality, violence, and death. You will experience one of the greatest periods of dramatic writing that English literature has known, which has subsequently continued on the English stage under the UK’s great acting companies, including the Royal Shakespeare Company and National Theatre. Primary texts will be taken from Shakespeare and his chief contemporaries, including a changing range of authors chosen from Thomas Kyd, George Chapman, Ben Jonson, Christopher Marlowe, John Marston, Thomas Middleton, Francis Beaumont, John Fletcher, John Webster, John Ford, Richard Brome, and James Shirley. You should check the reading list each year to determine specific plays. You will become familiar with relevant theory and criticism of Shakespeare and his contemporaries. In seminars you will be attentive to issues of performance, which can include active learning through play-reading and walking through a scene, or in independent learning through attending relevant performances or viewing film adaptations. -
Elizabeth Gaskell and the Brontës
This module will introduce you to the work of Elizabeth Gaskell and the Brontë sisters and to literary and cinematic adaptations of their fiction. You will begin by reading Gaskell’s The Life of Charlotte Brontë alongside Lucasta Miller’s The Brontë Myth and by assessing the way in which the ‘Brontë myth’ has been sustained by different generations of readers. The second part of the module will include a detailed survey of the diverse literary outputs of Gaskell and the Brontës. Through this, there will be a focus on the ways in which the four writers engage with their cultural contexts. In addition to thinking about the issues involved in debates about religion, education, social change, gender and familial and romantic relationships, you will be asked to consider the novels through the lens of disability theory and to assess their treatment of Imperialism and Empire. The final part of the module will involve an introduction to theories of adaptation and to rewritings and cinematic adaptations of Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre, Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights and Elizabeth Gaskell’s North and South. -
Renaissance Magic
This module will give you the opportunity to specialise in an exciting period of literary history – the English Renaissance – and to pursue a thematic interest: the early modern literary fascination with magic. ‘Renaissance Magic’ explores the intersections between imaginative literature, science, religion and the occult, through the close study of various literary forms (from journal entries and essays, to epic poetry and drama) both canonical (including the works of Shakespeare, Jonson and Spenser) and more marginal (including seventeenth-century women’s writing, and anonymous alchemical poetry.) You will be introduced to various aspects of magic/occult culture of the early modern period: attitudes toward angelology and demonology; the learned figure of the ‘Renaissance magus’; alchemy; the fascination with and persecution of witches; and early science fiction. The variety of different texts is designed to challenge perceptions of the ‘canon’, and to broaden views of what constituted ‘literature’ in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. You will find all texts either in the Norton Anthology of English Literature, widely available for inexpensive purchase, or shared as documents on the VLE. You will be assessed through: an in-class (written) close reading exercise, worth 20% of the final mark; involving responding critically and applying some contextual knowledge to a short, unseen text; a 2000-word essay worth 80% of the mark at the end of the semester, showing your ability to read two or three texts from the course within their historical and cultural context. The choice of questions for this assessment will be available to you from the beginning of the module. -
Site Specific and Immersive Theatre
On this module you'll focus on significant developments in contemporary theatre through detailed analysis and exploration of site-specific and immersive practices. You'll be asked to consider place and space as theoretical concepts and explore the influence of performance space on audience reception and on your own creative practices. You'll engage with a range of theoretical perspectives from theatre historians, performance scholars, philosophers and cultural geographers, and with a range of performance practices such as site-specific, promenade, immersive, digital and applied theatre. You'll take part in seminar discussions and reading group sessions, and a number of practice based workshops, off-site visits and theatre trips. These activities will allow you to develop a sophisticated understanding of the contemporary theatre context that you'll be entering after graduation, and working towards the assessment will allow you to imagine your own creative input to that context. You'll be asked to develop and thoroughly research your own idea for a new site-specific or immersive theatre performance. This will be assessed through an oral presentation in which you'll ‘pitch’ your creative idea, demonstrating its originality, thoughtful relationship to place, creative use of space and practical viability. This will allow you to be ambitious and work on a larger budget/scale production than you would usually be able to at this stage in your career. It will also develop a range of highly important transferable skills, such as presenting, budgeting, researching, exploring creative partnerships and fitting your work into the contemporary scene. -
TV Drama Production
This module will develop your skills in acting for the camera by producing short dramatic works adapted for video shooting. The videos produced may form part of a showreel for your use after completing your degree. You will explore the preparation of video material for a variety of new media and accordingly develop basic video production skills. Regular video playback will allow for critical reflection on the work produced and highlight where improvements may be made in performances or choice of shots. You will be expected to participate fully and professionally in all the practical work for this module. -
Working with English
You should take this Employability module if you have had employment, want employment, need a CV, or have ever wondered how to connect what you do at university with what you have done in the workplace. If you have been on an international exchange, you can use that experience for this module too. English literature connects with every aspect of human activity, including the workplace. In addition to being a subject that provides you with a great range of transferable skills, it also engages in deepening a person’s social and cultural capital. Literature is about every part of the human experience and this makes it one of the most valuable degrees to possess - it help shapes your identity, as a broad range of ideas are examined through a thousand years of English Literature. Literature necessary engages with the world of paid work and this module helps you examine those links as well as gain credit for any work that you do. The CV and covering letter you will create can be used, and reused, after your degree, adapting to the needs of the jobs you apply for. This module requires you to complete 35 hours of work in any field, full or part time, by the end of your degree. The 35 hours worked do not have to be consecutive and might be excerpts from periods with various employers. Students with more limited CVs are encouraged to aim for work experience in areas that will aid disenfranchised people or are at prominent companies. Doing well in this module will be achieved through ambition; evidence of analysis in your work journal and having a tight and interesting covering letter and CV. This is potentially the most useful module that you will take as it will help you earn money and to apply for employment after university. -
Literature and Exile: Displacement, Identity, Self
This module will introduce you to a range of C20th and C21st literary representations of exile. To be in exile is to be banished from one’s home, to be displaced and/or estranged from one’s country, family, community, and even one’s self. Exile takes many forms: it can be literal or metaphorical; it can be enforced or self-imposed. Through close readings of novels, graphic novels, poetry, autobiography and short stories, many of which were written by authors in exile, you will explore various forms of exile writing and consider various conditions and contexts of exile, including politics, race, sexuality, gender and disability. At the start of the module, you will be introduced to a range of theories of exile; you will explore these theories each week in relation to the selected literary texts and related themes of memory, home, identity, community, nostalgia, self, and language. You will be assessed by means of a final 3,000-word essay, giving you the opportunity to demonstrate your understanding of what has been covered on the module including your knowledge of the set texts and grasp of the key theories and ideas that have informed the course. -
Romantic Idealism
The Romantic period heralded not only the beginnings of the Modern world, but it also looked towards futures and ideals that humans have not yet obtained: slavery still exists, and yet it was banned in this period; Britain passed the first animal rights legislation in Law, but species are still disappearing and the human relationship with other animals remains uneasy. This was a period in which old ways were sometimes driven out and everything seemed up for grabs. Even time was altered. In revolutionary France the old 24-hour clock disappeared, making way for a new decimal clock with 100 minutes in the hour, 10 hours in the day, 10 days in the week and three weeks in the month. This module will help you to engage in fresh critical thinking about ideas that you might never have imagined as well as your position within society. The module will deepens your social and cultural capital with ideals examined including: Human perfectibility; Veganism; Animal Rights; Women’s rights; Children’s rights; Slavery; Human stratification; Disenfranchisement; the Natural Environment; the purpose of life; jealousy; the Imagination. -
Contemporary Fiction
In this module you will look at a range of fiction written in the last 10 years, examining formal and thematic issues and the relationships between them. You will consider narrative experimentation and the recycling of old stories and forms; the representation of and return to history; posthumanism and the limits of the human; globalization and technology. The module will invite you to consider the power and role of literature in contemporary society and the impact of literary prize culture on publishing and publicity. Taking place in the final trimester, it will also encourage you to reflect upon literary developments that have led to 21st-century writing and thus the texts’ relationship to those studied on other modules on the degree, such as Modernism and the City. Since there is inevitably an absence of established critical texts on the contemporary works studied, you will consider alternative sources of critical opinion (academic journals, the internet, broadsheet and broadcast journalism); and the ways in which new novels demand and shape new criticism. The reading list will be updated annually to ensure that all texts are those written during the last decade. Each two-hour seminar will have a (mini) lecture with a thematic focus. The (mini) lecture will be followed by close reading and discussion of related texts in the seminar group. These activities will allow you to develop your analytical skills as well as your abilities in communicating the research and analysis that you will apply to the literatures under discussion. Working with other students in class you will develop your social capital and critical skills in whole and small group discussions. You will develop your sense of identity as a critical and adaptable thinker, problem-solver, researcher and creative agent as you apply theoretical material to the primary literatures under discussion. You will also realise the broader social and cultural capital of the course as you engage with key ideas and concepts related to, but also transcending, the literatures under discussion, which provide: differing reactions to the early twentieth-century city, in relation to ethnicity, sexuality, gender, nationality and class. The 1000-word Critical Review that forms the first part of the assignment, provides valuable experience in summarizing and synthesizing complex ideas, whilst the 2000-word essay allows you to develop these ideas with reference to your chosen literary texts. -
New Media Discourse
This module explores the importance and significance of computer mediated communication, digital media and more modern ways of communication in a rapidly changing world. It also explores how new technologies have changed the way we communicate with others. You will be introduced to a wide range of theories and theoretical as well as analytical frameworks. These include not just critical sociolinguistics and critical discourse analysis but also more pragmatic approaches to the study of digital communication. You will also learn how these approaches could be meaningfully used to analyse real and authentic digital texts. The module consists of a weekly lecture followed by a one-hour seminar, in which you will work in pairs and small groups, providing feedback to each other and reflecting on your performance. The topic of the week will be introduced in the lecture and explored in seminar discussions. You will be assessed by a portfolio of coursework comprising two tasks. In the first, you will design and maintain a weblog on Wordpress for 7 weeks on a topic discussed in class, and each week you will post original content, receiving feedback on your blogs. In the second, you will write a critical essay on one of the topics provided. -
Theorising Children's Literature
You will take as a starting point the need to be critical about literature written for young audiences, including early years and YA fiction. You will read children’s literature primarily as literature, instead of as a contributing factor towards childhood development. This process will demand that you engage with the primary texts through literary theory, including wider theory that is not typically applied to children’s texts, such as the work of Lacan, Bakhtin, Said, Foucault, Derrida, and others. You will consider eco-criticism, animal studies, disability, race, sexuality, and gender. You will also engage with changing historical constructs of childhood and the generic fluidity of children’s and fantasy literature. Reading will be set each for you to discuss in two-hour seminars. -
Workshop Facilitation
This module will encourage you to examine and explore teaching and leading participatory workshops in drama and the performing arts. You'll gain practical experience and skills that can be applied as a practicing professional in educational, professional and community contexts. The module will also equip you with theoretical and methodological knowledge relevant to a workshop leader and enable you to practice and develop confidence in delivering effective and well-prepared sessions. Topic areas may include philosophies of education, the sociological and psychological elements of arts pedagogy and the variety of contexts for drama and performing arts workshop education. You'll be expected to reflect on the responsibilities of leadership in creative contexts and develop enhanced skills for future employability. You'll develop skills in independent learning, research and communication of process and product throughout the module. Your assessment will comprise live workshop facilitation, in which you'll lead aspects of a prepared workshop (approximately 15 minutes) and a 1,000-word critical refection that evaluates and contextualises your workshop facilitation. As part of the module, you might be invited to identify a work placement as a workshop facilitator. This can be undertaken either in ‘sandwich’ mode during the semester or in a ‘block’ during the Easter vacation. The nature of your involvement in the placement should contribute to your ongoing reflection as well as your final, assessed workshop facilitation. -
Provocations
On this module you'll explore a range of contemporary performance and live art practices that are challenging, often controversial and sometimes disturbing. You'll examine how the body can be explicitly staged in performance art and the ways in which it can be a vehicle for expressing identity positions that are marginalised within dominant western culture. As such, you'll encounter contemporary performance practices that articulate racial, gender, transgender, queer, disabled and refugee identity positions. You'll consider the ethical implications of this practice, its relationship to its audience and its effectiveness as a strategy of resistance to mainstream stereotypes. Content may include the extremism of live art by Franko B, Ron Athey, Kira O’Reilly and Marina Abramovic; activist interventions by Richard Dedemonici and Reverend Billy and the Church of Stop Shopping; representations of race in Brett Bailey’s Exhibit B; queer identities in Split Britches’ Belle Reprieve; transgender performance by Heather Cassils and the representation of disability in dance works by Bill Shannon. In seminars, you'll explore the relationships between performance, the body and identity through a combination of videos, web material, reviews, interviews and critical essays from major theorists in the field. Your assessment will comprise a 3,000-word essay, with advance formative assessment by tutorial appointments to discuss your plans, arguments and case-studies. The practitioners that you'll study may deploy shock-tactics in the delivery of their work - you'll be expected to be intellectually curious, ask questions about this work and be open to new ideas, practices and processes.
Optional modules available in years two and three
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Anglia Language Programme
The Anglia Language Programme module will allow you to study a foreign language as part of your course. You may choose to take two language modules in place of options on your course from the second semester of your first year, or in the second or third year. You can choose from the following: Chinese (Mandarin), French, German, Italian, Japanese, or Spanish. In order to experience the learning of a new language, you must select one that you have not learned before.
Assessment
Modules are subject to change and availability.
You’ll show your progress on the course through a combination of essays, reports, oral presentations, and studio/public performance, as well as a major project involving practice-based research techniques.
Where you'll study
Your department and faculty
Using our creative expertise and industry connections in Cambridge and beyond, we create experiences that entertain, educate, inspire and improve lives.
At Cambridge School of Creative Industries, we believe in the importance of experimentation and risk-taking to create experiences that entertain, educate, inspire and improve lives.
Whether writing bestselling fiction, creating challenging documentaries or sharing a piano with people on the autism spectrum, the expertise of our staff goes far beyond teaching. Their research produces significant funding success, leading to important publications and international conferences.
Where can I study?
Cambridge
Our campus is close to the centre of Cambridge, often described as the perfect student city.
Study abroad
You can apply to study abroad for one semester, and get funding to help you cover the cost.
Field trips
You'll have the chance to broaden your experience on one of our field trips. Past trips have included Venice, Italy
Facilities
You’ll have access to all our creative industries facilities, including two dedicated drama studios, a highly flexible black-box performance space as well as an additional rehearsal space. In Years 1 and 2, you'll also have the chance to put on a production in our Mumford Theatre, which presents a range of touring professional touring companies, local community and student theatre, as well as music concerts.
Activities and events
You can take part in our many extra-curricular activities, our poetry and writing evenings, research symposia and conferences, as well as many student societies including the Creative Writing Society, the Stand-up Comedy Society, the Poetry Society and the Harry Potter Society.
Fees & funding
Course fees
UK & EU students starting 2020/21 (per year)
£9,250
International students starting 2020/21 (per year)
£13,500
Fee information
For more information about tuition fees, including the UK Government's commitment to EU students, please see our UK/EU funding pages
How do I pay my fees?
Tuition fee loan
UK and EU students can take out a tuition fee loan, which you won’t need to start repaying until after your graduate. Or alternatively, there's the option to pay your fees upfront.
International students
You can pay your tuition fees upfront, in full or in two instalments. We will also ask you for a deposit of £4,000 or a sponsorship letter. Details will be in your offer letter.
Paying your feesFunding for UK & EU students
Most new undergraduate students can apply for government funding to support their studies and university life. This includes Tuition Fee Loans and Maintenance Loans. There are additional grants available for specific groups of students, such as those with disabilities or dependants.
We also offer a fantastic range of ARU scholarships, which provide extra financial support while you’re at university. Find out more about eligibility and how to apply.
Funding for international students
We offer a number of scholarships, as well as an early payment discount. Explore your options:
Entry requirements
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Audition
You will be invited to perform an audition as part of the application process.
For more guidance on how to prepare for this, please visit our creative industries auditions page.
Important additional notes
Our published entry requirements are a guide only and our decision will be based on your overall suitability for the course as well as whether you meet the minimum entry requirements. Other equivalent qualifications may be accepted for entry to this course, please email answers@anglia.ac.uk for further information.
We don't accept AS level qualifications on their own for entry to our undergraduate degree courses. However for some degree courses a small number of tariff points from AS levels are accepted as long as they're combined with tariff points from A levels or other equivalent level 3 qualifications in other subjects.
International students
We welcome applications from international and EU students, and accept a range of international qualifications.
English language requirements
If English is not your first language, you'll need to make sure you meet our English language requirements for postgraduate courses.
Improving your English language skills
If you don't meet our English language requirements, we offer a range of courses which could help you achieve the level required for entry onto a degree course.
We also provide our own English Language Proficiency Test (ELPT) in the UK and overseas. To find out if we are planning to hold an ELPT in your country, contact our country managers.
