Master of Arts in Conservation of Archaeological and Museum Objects (Diss)

at Durham University United Kingdom

This degree will equip you with the skills to understand religion and its power to shape the human condition This degree is designed to develop an understanding of the centrality of religion to the functioning of societies past, present and future. You will engage with the comparative study of religion, especially with the significance of myth-, ritual- and meaning-making. This is complemented by more specialised modules that explore religious practice in relation to either particular religions (such as Islam, Judaism and Christianity), particular regions (such as Asia, Africa, and Europe), or particular transnational media (the internet, film and literature).

You will engage with the role of religion in a wide range of contexts: including politics, literature, bioethics, and war. Students on this degree will benefit from the considerable strength that the Department has in the comparative study of religion, the social sciences and the study of religious texts/artefacts.

Graduates of the degree will be highly employable in a range of professions including the civil service, education, research and social work.

The degree enables you to understand better the world we live in, and to explore the forces that shape your own attitudes, hopes and fears. In turn, it will empower you to go out into the world to make a difference for the good.

This interdisciplinary and custom designed MSc offers the unique opportunity to look at conflict prevention and peacebuilding through the lenses of human security, social justice, and people’s diplomacy. Integrated into the MSc structure are opportunities to develop operational and vocational skills in humanitarian intervention, conflict mediation, everyday negotiation, conflict sensitive programme design, the use of peace indicators, participatory approaches to peacebuilding, and gender-sensitive approaches to security.

The MSc is designed for graduates with a career in government, inter-governmental organisations, NGOs, humanitarian organisations, or academia in mind, and for practitioners looking to enhance their practical skills while placing these within a broader theoretical perspective.

The MSc will provide you with advanced knowledge of the complex and specialised areas of peacebuilding, among it conflict analysis, conflict prevention, conflict resolution and conflict transformation, community driven reconstruction, peace processes within the context of contemporary conflicts and in the context of broader international (humanitarian) interventions. Integrated into the MSc structure are opportunities to develop operational and vocational skills for example in negotiations, conflict mediation, conflict sensitive programme design and programme management, or urban peacebuilding. You are provided with theoretical and empirical knowledge and with practical skills that are helpful for current and future employment opportunities. The courses are thus attractive to both graduates and mid-career practitioners. Whilst the academic and applied focus of the MSc comes through a peace and conflict studies analytic lens, course material will also draw from traditional strategic/security and development studies, enabling cross fertilisation between different perspectives. It allows the exploration of unique and new paradigms and practices in the fields of conflict, peace, security, defence, diplomacy, development and humanitarian intervention.

This course is designed for students with an undergraduate degree in a subject other than anthropology who would like to prepare for research in socio-cultural anthropology or for a career requiring expertise in anthropology.

High profile social anthropologist researchers at Durham, with experience of conducting fieldwork all around the world, introduce you to both classical and contemporary writing and research in the discipline. There is equal emphasis on theoretical and methodological questions, and plenty of opportunities to apply this new knowledge to issues of pressing social concern.

The full-time course consists of two terms of teaching, during which you are introduced to the range of research questions and methods used in social or cultural anthropology, and a dissertation, involving the design, development, and implementation of an independent research project. You will work closely with academic staff from our highly respected Social Anthropology Research Group receiving enhanced levels of support as part of the ‘conversion’ to anthropology, including fortnightly small group meetings with the course tutor, and have the opportunity to become involved in active research projects.

This course gives you the widest choice of modules. Modules can be selected from those available for students studying in International Trade and Commercial Law, and European Trade and Commercial Law, Corporate Law and International Law and Governance.

Having completed your taught modules, you will undertake an extended dissertation of 10,000, 15,000 or 20,000 words in length, under the supervision of a member of staff who is an expert in your chosen field of research. Teaching is by a mixture of lectures and smaller, student-led, seminars or tutorial groups. The dissertation is pursued by independent research.

Students attending the course are drawn from a broad range of countries, and their previous academic or professional experiences enrich the course. The Law School hosts a number of research centres, including the Institute for Commercial and Corporate Law, the Durham European Law Institute, the Centre for Criminal Law and Criminal Justice, Law and Global Justice at Durham and the Human Rights Centre. You are encouraged to participate in all their activities.

This course provides you with the systematic knowledge and intellectual tools to critically review developments in the theory and practice of international relations. It will enable you to evaluate in a sophisticated and critical fashion concepts, theories and paradigms within the broad field of international relations, drawing lessons from empirical studies involving both quantitative and qualitative investigations.

You will develop the ability to deploy research strategies and methods in an appropriately advanced fashion to critically evaluate current research and advanced scholarship. Each study route aims to provide advanced knowledge and understanding of the dynamics, including cultural and local political and ideological factors, which shape the contemporary international relations of the relevant area.

The course also provides an opportunity for studying international relations in comparative and historical perspective taking account of regional specific political and economic factors.

In the first year of Physical Geography, we introduce the range of our research specialisms and research methods, including residential fieldwork overseas (e.g. Portugal). Elective modules in the second and third years progressively lead to material at the cutting edge of research and include optional overseas fieldwork.

The majority of modules in the second and third year focus on physical geography and environmental topics. In the second and third year, you may take integrated modules (with a mixture of human and physical geography) and one module from the Geography BA (Hons) list (subject to timetable compatibility).

The MA in Research Methods (Behavioural Science) is a Social Sciences faculty degree that involves other departments within the University.

Students intending to have a career as a research psychologist or behavioural scientist need to acquire a high level of research skills at postgraduate level. Research methods training therefore forms a central part of the MA course, including both quantitative and qualitative research methods. One third of the course is also devoted to the dissertation which may be carried out in any area of psychology related to behavioural science. The taught course modules include both generic and subject level components, providing an introduction to broad issues and methodological approaches in behavioural science and the social sciences.

This course focuses on the political, social and cultural history of the Greek and Roman world, and their interactions with neighbouring societies. In your first year, you study core topics in Greek and Roman history, as well as a module focusing on ancient historical writing.

These courses prepare you for a wide range of more focused modules about politics, culture and society in the ancient world available in your second and third years. The course includes the option of beginning to learn Greek or Latin language (or continuing, if you have studied the languages already).

The MA Social Research Methods is part of a suite of advanced postgraduate methods-based courses delivered across the University faculties. The MA aims to provide core accessible and inclusive cross-disciplinary advanced research methods training across the social sciences with specific subject-specific training in research practices related to a chosen field of social policy, criminology, sociology or social work.

The course will equip you with the research and employability skills required to transition successfully to enhanced careers in academia, commercial companies, public sector, non-governmental organisations or other sectors. This degree will provide academic rigour and coherence, whilst allowing a degree of flexibility and choice within the chosen course in terms of disciplinary focus and advance research approaches.

The course covers conceptual and practical underpinnings and implications of research, looking at various research techniques and the rationale behind them. It will enable you to develop essential skills in both quantitative and qualitative work and to apply those skills to social research in a particular subject area (criminology, social policy, sociology, social work).

The LLB degree is a highly flexible three-year, full-time course. There are approximately 300 students on each year of the LLB. While providing a solid grounding in the main areas of English and Welsh law, it also allows for individual specialisation through a variety of optional modules offered by the School and other departments in the University.

The degree course provides the opportunity to obtain a Qualifying Law Degree as recognised by the Solicitors Regulation Authority and the Bar Standards Board. (Please note: whether or not a degree exempts a student from the academic stage of training to be a solicitor or barrister depends on the modules that the student studies. In practice, virtually all of our students choose to study the modules that are required by the Law Society and Bar Council, and do gain a Qualifying Law Degree.)

Study abroad
The LLB with a Year Abroad (YA) comprises all of the content of the three-year regular LLB, plus an exciting additional year spent at one of our European or international partners during the third year of study. At present, Durham Law School has partnerships with universities in Belgium, Canada, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Switzerland, Italy and Singapore.