English and Film

An introduction to aspects of film language such as camerawork, editing, and mise-en-scène.

An introduction to the key aesthetic, historical, cultural and social contexts of American and European cinema.

An introduction to the analysis of narrative forms and genres, focussing primarily on pre-20th Century, 20th and 21st Century texts.

This module introduces key skills for university study, progressing to research, writing and project development. You will learn skills of close reading and textual analysis, practice on a range of cultural forms and focussed on representations of Manchester as a diverse, international city. You will then develop your own independent project and put into practice the analytical skills developed. 

Topic-based module introduces a range of cinematic modes, movements and genres, whose formal, historical and cultural properties will be analysed. Topics may, for example, include: genres (eg Horror, Melodrama, Musical, Noir); theories of genre (structuralist and historical); other cinematic modes of expression (eg the gothic, queer cinema, art-house narrative) and other theoretical approaches to cinema (eg National/transnational cinemas, star studies, women's cinema).

The module introduces and debates a variety of theoretical perspectives on film.

This module will explore the organisations and activities that make up Manchester’s UNESCO City of Literature network, and assess ways in which literary activity can help cities address contemporary global challenges.

The module will take students through the various stages of recruitment from identifying strengths and skills, to job searching and CVs, using platforms such as LinkedIn, and interview practice. Students will build up a portfolio of tasks related to employability, for instance, CV, video interview, assessment centre and reflect on their learning across the module.

This module will analyse the current climate crisis applying the methodologies of creative writing, English literature, or film and media studies.

A module that is about reading in context, focussing on the relationship between aesthetic form, thematic content and historical context in a diverse range of texts and genres from the 19th to early 20th centuries. 

You will practise reading in context, focussing on the relationships between aesthetic form, thematic content and historical context in a diverse range of texts and genres from the late 20th and early 21st centuries.

A module that is about reading in context, focussing on the relationships between aesthetic form, thematic content and the historical context in a diverse range of texts and genres from the 1940's-1970's.

This module investigates cultures of resistance and their historical conditions. To do so, it places a range of resistant cultural texts in dialogue with relevant theoretical and critical material. 

Students focus on two literary forms chosen from a list (for example prose, poetry, scriptwriting) and follow an intensive workshop for one semester. 

An innovative module which applies interdisciplinary methods and perspectives in a professional and/or public setting. Students work in interdisciplinary teams on one of a range of projects to showcase interdisciplinary skills in practice.

An innovative module that applies interdisciplinary methods, approaches and perspectives of humanities and social science disciplines to contemporary socio-economic challenges, complementing Engaging the Humanities 1. Each year the module will address a different contemporary issue or theme.

This module examines the films, industries, festivals and issues that make up the vibrant cinemas associated with the continent of Europe.

This module explores the legacies of British colonialism as engaged in the literature and culture of postcolonial nations.

A module that is about reading in context. You will initially focus on a diverse range of texts and genres from the 1940s to the 1970s, considering the relationships between aesthetic form, thematic content and historical context.  Focus will then move onto the relationships between aesthetic form, thematic content and historical context in a diverse range of texts and genres from the late 20th and early 21st centuries.

This module examines British literature and culture during one of its most significant periods, from the Revolutionary Controversy of the 1790s to the end of the Romantic movement around 1830.

This module explores the production, reception and dissemination of non-Anglo-American cinema and provides students with the necessary tools to explore global screen cultures. In this module students will interrogate the issues and experiences of transnational interaction and cross-cultural appropriation, the problems with the concept of authentic `national cinema', and consider the depiction of 'third world' and 'diaspora' populations.

How can literary and cultural texts write back to the former colonial centre, enact the decolonisation of the mind, and unpick the stereotypes and ideologies central to the establishment of the British empire? How do literary and cultural works represent the lingering effects of imperialism in the present day? What does contemporary inequality, nationalism, Islamophobia and racism have to do with Britain’s colonial past? This module supports students to address the formal, ideological and ethical questions negotiated in postcolonial literature and cinema. The module offers an introduction to postcolonial theory as it relates to the texts and contexts we discuss. Areas of investigation might include climate change, migration, war, gender and sexuality, race and religion.

This module provides you with the opportunity to undertake a guided independent research-based project to produce an extended piece of work that presents a thesis. This will result in a piece of writing on an American topic of your choice, representing an individual project that builds upon the skills you will have developed on this course. Opportunities are also available for students to work with external partners on their research project.

The module will take students through the various stages of recruitment from identifying strengths and skills, to job searching and CVs, using platforms such as LinkedIn, and interview practice. Students will build up a portfolio of tasks related to employability, for instance, CV, video interview, assessment centre and reflect on their learning across the module.

American Sounds and the City combines the study of American literature, film and music to explore the soundscapes of the American city. 

The Study Abroad module will involve study for one semester at an approved partner University overseas.

The module will aim to introduce English as a core curriculum subject in secondary schools and as an A-level subject. It will provide students with insight into the application of their subject specialism to teaching in school and colleges in England, covering aspects of both curriculum content and subject pedagogy.

This module will focus on representations of the United States’ history, culture and selfhood promulgated by the nation’s movie industry from the early twentieth century to the present day; exploring how Hollywood has articulated, interrogated and dominated available ideas of American national identity.

Touching upon a broad range of genres, this module is concerned with critical and creative conceptions of 'space' and travel (both geographic and metaphorical) in American literature from colonial times to the present.

This module investigates the question of the human in contemporary cultural debate. To do so, it draws upon theoretical and critical work in the field and sets these conceptual frameworks in dialogue with a wide range of literary and cinematic texts. 

This module provides an analytical study of the gothic mode on screen.

This module will introduce students to all parts of the book publishing process and industry. Through practical exercises and interactive lectures, students will learn how the industry developed, specialist genres such as children's publishing and how publishers commission, edit, design and produce books in all formats. 

This module draws on LGBT Studies and Queer Studies to analyse cultural constructions (and manifestations) of non-normative sex, sexes and sexualities.

This module explores the relationship between postcolonialism and popular culture, examining the ways in which colonial histories and legacies are interrogated, mythologised or sublimated within popular cultural forms.

This module explores the relationship between race, postcolonialism and popular culture, examining the ways in which colonial histories and legacies are interrogated, mythologised or sublimated within popular cultural forms.

This module provides an analytical study of a range of classic and modern texts written for children. It also uses these texts as models for the production of new texts. The module also covers appropriate techniques for writing for children. It provides you with the skills to analyse a range of children's literature, and to use the resulting knowledge to produce original texts suitable for teenagers and children. 

This module may also be taken as a 15+15-credit combination with EdLab.

This module introduces students to the range and diversity of contemporary poetry, and develops students' own critical skills in relation to the study of contemporary poetry.

This module provides an analytical study of a range of twenty and twenty-first century games, both analogue and digital. Students will be introduced to the critical and historical field of game studies, and given guidance on the appropriate critical approaches and terminology to enable them to read games and gaming.

Students will study a range of popular fiction texts and study the ways in which such texts conform to and subvert a set of generic conventions.

This module is concerned with critical and creative conceptions, constructions and depictions of forms of violence and trauma, and introduces students to representations and theories of trauma drawn from multiple locations (temporal and geographic).

This module looks at Shakespeare's plays and poems in regard to both his contemporary intellectual, political and social meanings and effect, and the influence of his work on subsequent culture, in terms reception, adaptation and reinvention. 

This module explores ideas and attitudes towards human bodies, medicine and technology in contemporary world literature, film and theory.

This module will critically analyse the representation of place in key contemporary texts. These texts, drawn from a range of genres, will be evaluated within the frameworks (including literary geography and ecocriticism) provided by contemporary theoretical debates. The module will also situate creative and conceptual writing about place within the context of 'real world debates': topics to be covered will include environmental crisis, regeneration and the post-industrial city, and digital technologies and spatial literacy.