Bachelor of Arts in Linguistics

at Western Sydney University - Bankstown Campus Australia

The Peace and Development Studies major is concerned with methods for promoting peace, human rights and sustainability. It involves a critical analysis of inequalities of power and opportunity that lead to international and local conflict, social dislocation and environmental degradation. Students will examine the structural causes of racist and gendered violence, environmental crises, forced migration, poverty, resource conflict, and inter-generational inequity.

The inter-related network of solutions includes empowerment and self-determination, sustainable living, constructive development, peacemaking and peace building.

These require understanding of the theories and method for identifying, measuring and resolving conflict and environmental degradation. The assumptions and failings of traditional development practice are critically assessed. Students will engage social theory within an interdisciplinary and applied framework, at local, national and international levels.

The major is comprised of three fields: 1) structural inequality, social justice & human rights; 2) development and sustainability; 3) peace and humanitarian responses/actions.

Social Anthropology is the study of humans and the cultures they create..

Areas of focus include the development of anthropology as a discipline; globalisation and culture; power and politics; gender and sexuality; identity and belonging; ethnography and ethnographic methods; indigenous peoples and nation states. Specific attention is given to cultures of Australasia, Southeast Asia and the Pacific, and to cross cultural interactions, at both global and local levels.

The major seeks to equip students with multi-cultural knowledge as well as to provide a thorough grounding in research methods and ethics with utility in a variety of professional and academic contexts.

The Bachelor of Arts (Dean’s Scholars) degree is designed to develop your communication and personal skills, creativity, capacity for independent thought, adaptability to new situations, and problem-solving abilities.

Philosophy

Philosophy has always asked the ‘big questions’, for example, about the limits of our knowledge, the best way that humans can live together, how we understand the world around us, and what is ‘the good life’.

Our philosophy major enables you to develop particular skills and attributes – such as clear thinking, capacities to assess arguments and values, and sound understanding of important philosophical views – that have always been essential to university scholarship and which continue to be valuable for graduates in both public and private life.

Students must maintain a grade point average of 5 or above to remain in the program. Those who do not maintain this average will be transferred to the Bachelor of Arts.

The Bachelor of Arts (Dean’s Scholars) degree is designed to develop your communication and personal skills, creativity, capacity for independent thought, adaptability to new situations, and problem-solving abilities.

Criminology and Criminal Justice

If you are interested in the complexities of detection, prevention and correction, or the cultural and social factors of criminality, this could be the major for you.

This major will give you a comprehensive understanding of how all of these factors fit together. It offers the opportunity to study crime and criminal justice in a critical way that stresses the social and cultural definitions of criminality.

Students must maintain a grade point average of 5 or above to remain in the program. Those who do not maintain this average will be transferred to the Bachelor of Arts.

This combined degree is designed for students who want to combine their interest and expertise in International Relations and Asian Studies with a good understanding of basic business issues, complemented by a high level of knowledge relevant to a specific business discipline.

Graduates will have a solid grounding in the relationships of societies, cultures, languages and systems of government within the international system.

Students will develop their capacity to appreciate the historical development of relations among nation states, and analyse contemporary political, economic, social and cultural issues such as globalisation, transnationalism and migration.

Students complete a major in International Relations and Asian Studies, a minor in Arabic, Chinese, Spanish or Japanese languages, and a major in Marketing. When combined with a high level of knowledge from the specific business majors, you will be ready for the workplace of the future.

 International Relations

This major has been designed to meet the needs of Australian government, business and society to engage the states and peoples of Asia at all levels in pursuit of national interests and as part of the globalisation process. It provides students with the opportunity to study contemporary Asia, as well as the rich and diverse histories, politics, cultures and languages of Asian countries and the international issues affecting Australia’s interests and role in the region and in the world at large.

The major area also includes a range of subjects concerned with the United States and Europe as well as with Asia itself, and subjects in international relations covering other parts of the world. It seeks to produce graduates with a broad, liberal education with the skills to mediate between Australia and the world in general and Asia in particular through political, economic, commercial, cultural, diplomatic and strategic links. Students are encouraged to undertake a minor in an Asian language in conjunction with the major.

Language majors will enable you to develop an appropriate level of proficiency in a second language, which may be used for professional purposes such as teaching, interpreting and translation, business or international relations.

If you are undertaking a language major in Chinese, you will be able to use the language in question according to its grammatical and pragmatic principles, communicate with native speakers appropriately in the spoken as well as the written mode, and demonstrate an understanding of the cultures and societies associated with the language.

The Music Performance major provides students with the opportunity to develop their professional and creative potential in making and appreciating a range of different kinds of music.

Students will gain practical experience in performance as a soloist and in groups, and through improvising and collaborating.

The Bachelor of Arts (Dean’s Scholars) degree is designed to develop your communication and personal skills, creativity, capacity for independent thought, adaptability to new situations, and problem-solving abilities.

Islamic studies

In this major you will engage in interdisciplinary study essential to an understanding of Islam, past and present. The area of study balances historical and modern Islamic studies and research methods. One of the keys to Islamic Studies is ‘relevance’ to contemporary Australian society, but relevance can only come from a sound comprehension of past traditions in Islamic scholarship and their socio-historical contexts.

Preparation for graduate study is also a key objective of this program, with its focus on developing critical and interdisciplinary research skills through a combination of approaches.

The Economics major provides a broad pluralist perspective on fundamental aspects of relationships between individuals, firms, institutions and countries. Students will learn how economies function and how public policy and the way organisations behave affect diverse social, economic and environmental problems. Students are introduced to a wide array of competing economic theories, so that they are critically informed about the ways in which they can transform the world. A major in Economics prepares students to be active participants in addressing the wide range of problems faced by governments, social organisations and the business community in the domestic and international economies. Students who study economics can expect to develop their analytical and problem solving skills and to be intellectually challenged, whether they view the discipline as providing specific vocational skills or as an area of academic and intellectual interest to them. An Economics major is very highly regarded in the business world and opens up a very large range of career prospects in general business, finance and the public sector.

Since the revival of humanist thought in the Renaissance, universities have placed studies in history and political thought at the centre of exploring what it is to be human.

At the heart of the History and Political Thought major are four compulsory units which introduce the student to the modern (since 1500) history of humanity. Although Europe is very prominent in the Major, the student will be invited to compare its history to the histories of Asia, Africa and the Americas.

The Major culminates in a capstone unit in students’ final semester discussing historical theories and methods. A wide range of elective units covers European, American, Australian and Asian history and political thought and includes thematic units which range widely over time and place.