Master of Science in Psychology of the Arts, Neuroaesthetics and Creativity

at Goldsmiths, University of London United Kingdom

Taught jointly by the Departments of Anthropology and Social, Therapeutic and Community Studies, this MA offers a stimulating synthesis of theory and practice. In short, it is at the heart of what Goldsmiths is all about.

This MA, launched in 2015, is the third of three related pathways. The first, the MA Applied Anthropology and Community and Youth Work, was started in 1992 and is aimed at students who wish to pursue a career in youth and community work and who need a professional qualification.

A second pathway, the MA Applied Anthropology and Community Development, was launched in 2012 as an option for international or home students who do not need an NYA qualification and for those who want to specialise in community development.

This third pathway has been created in response to a growing number of applicants with an arts background and arts interests, and is aimed at students who wish to work in community arts. The three pathways entail different placements but are taught together, providing many opportunities for exchange of ideas and collaboration amongst students.

Working from a materially diverse basis, this programme engages with a range of empirical, aesthetic, conceptual and material issues that traverse and exceed both 'art' and ‘politics’ to speak with our current contemporaneity.

Why study MA Art and Politics at Goldsmiths?

• Explore practices and issues related to our current contemporaneity in terms of public space, democracy, equality, participation, states of exception, collectivity, performance and justice.
• Examine a range of material practices and strategies which, in the encounter between art and politics, play out in numerous forms and very different kinds of social spaces.
• Develop frameworks and spaces that are mixed and mobile, and which can operate in trans-disciplinary settings. You'll join students from a range of backgrounds and disciplines, meaning that the political character of both theory and material practice take on renewed vigour and urgency.
• Investigate the potential of art, material practice and trans-disciplinarity in times of political and cultural crisis. You will have the opportunity to interrogate the relationship between material practices and theoretical work, to work within constraints but also within the interstices of artistic, cultural, social and political practices.
• Choose from a range of option modules that encourage you to work across areas of particular interest to you including practice-based Individual and Group project work, the politics of space, gender politics and human rights.

Do you want to advance your knowledge of contemporary art and pursue a professional career in the field of curatorial practice?

Curating refers to a wide range of activities including the care of collections and the development of exhibitions, festivals, screenings, digital platforms and more. Curators engage with historical knowledge and respond to urgent social issues, staging culture as a way of bringing together multiple publics.
Visual Cultures at Goldsmiths has been at the forefront of curatorial research for well over a decade, helping to redefine the profession. Drawing from this research, taught by leading curators and researchers, BA Curating combines a strong grounding in art history and contemporary cultural theory with the development of practical know-how and industry experience.

Why study BA Curating at Goldsmiths?

• Visual Cultures at Goldsmiths is internationally renowned for its research on Curatorial Practice and you will be learning from leading theorists and practitioners.
• You will study compulsory modules on curatorial history, theory and practice alongside option modules in art history and visual culture that allow you to focus on your particular interests.
• You will be mentored to develop the know-how and practical skills necessary to practice as a contemporary art curator through a number of practical assignments as well as an industry placement in your second year.
• You will develop your ability to work collaboratively and will work with your peers in your third year towards your degree show.
• You will be supported to develop student-led projects and will have access to our dedicated Curating Room to host your events.
• You will benefit from the rich programme of events at Goldsmiths as well from world-class exhibitions at the newly opened Goldsmiths Centre for Contemporary Art.
• Our London location means you’ll never run out of galleries, events, museums and visual culture to explore in the capital.

The MA Promotional Media explores the impact of digital platformisation and automation on promotional professions, skills and techniques

You will explore the convergence between public relations, advertising, and marketing roles, as well as hybridised fields such as digital marketing, social media management and UX/UI design. This MA isn’t about studying ads or press coverage, but about becoming a professional who can cross-examine and critique the power dynamics between promotional professions, their client-organisations and today’s platformised media landscape.

At its core, this masters looks at how you can better serve society by improving communications across the promotional disciplines, and how public relations (PR), advertising, and marketing professionals can best develop within a challenging digital world. You’ll learn how to reflect on contemporary intellectual theories – including digital media studies, sociology, feminist theory and algorithmic culture – and apply them to workplace realities so you plan the next decade of your career.

The MSc Psychology of the Arts, Neuroaesthetics and Creativity is the first postgraduate programme in the world for the scientific study of aesthetics and creativity.

At the intersection of the arts and the sciences, the programme introduces you to the psychology and the cognitive neuroscience of how humans generate new ideas, how we appreciate beauty, and how we form preferences.

Aesthetic and creative decisions are relevant in the visual and the performing arts, and in many applied and commercial contexts, ranging from clinical interventions to curating exhibitions, from dance choreography to marketing and advertising. Based in the Department of Psychology, in collaboration with Computing, Media and Communications and the Institute of Management Studies, the course builds critical knowledge, research and communication skills across the arts and the sciences, centred around two key topics: the psychological and brain mechanisms of making (Creativity) and appreciating (Neuroaesthetics) art. Conducting a research project with an interdisciplinary focus will prepare you for a research career in aesthetic or creative science, working in the creative industry, or to develop your artistic practice.

Goldsmiths is uniquely placed to offer this programme, with an internationally renowned reputation in the arts and the sciences. Existing courses combining art and psychology often have a largely therapeutic focus and rarely cover the psychology of aesthetic appreciation or creative cognition, in a broader profile. In contrast, business-oriented courses in marketing, advertising and consumer psychology often lack adequate scientific training in experimental psychology or cognitive neuroscience methods, which is required for a scientific approach to aesthetics and creativity. Optional modules based in the Departments of Media & Communications, Computing, and the Institute of Management Studies will complement and challenge the scientific perspective, acknowledging the richly diverse, unique and culturally-specific nature of human aesthetic and creative practice.

Develop your digital production skills, and combine them with key anthropological concepts. The BA Anthropology & Visual Practice programme helps develop your understanding of contemporary cultural issues, as well as your practical skills in both research methods and visual practice.

Why study BA Anthropology & Visual Practice at Goldsmiths?

• This programme approaches anthropology from a fresh angle that differs from the 'traditional anthropology' taught at other institutions.
• You’ll receive hands-on training in a range of digital production skills, such as editing, videography, and photography. These new skills will complement your theoretical study, and prepare you for vocational opportunities when you graduate.
• You’ll have the opportunity to investigate anthropology in relation to politics, religion, knowledge, philosophy and psychology – and you’ll learn to apply an interdisciplinary perspective to your work.
• Examine anthropology from a contemporary perspective – what you learn in the classroom will be relevant in a variety of public domains, in Britain, and around the world.
• You'll explore links between theoretical issues and ethnographic studies, enabling you to think critically about your own culture and society, and to apply knowledge learned in lectures to your everyday life.
• Our graduates have gone on to work for the UN, World Bank, NGOs, law companies, media companies and corporate social responsibility (CSR) consultancies, while others have gone on to pursue academic careers.

Journalism is about the world outside. It’s about the story and the people who make it. It’s about being on top of the zeitgeist. And being on top of the deadlines.

What you will learn

• This MA gives you the practical skills to work as a journalist at the highest level in print and online. We will learn what news means, and where it comes from. We will give you the ability to write compelling features and interviews. We’ll also be focusing on the kinds of questions you need to ask – of the individual, the state or the organs of power. And we address how the new digital world has transformed the way we go about journalism, adding new platforms and new technical skills.

This unique Masters will enhance your critical understanding of musical theatre as a popular entertainment genre. It will help you to sharpen your practical skills as a creative artist. On a practical level, it will assist you in working as a freelance writer, composer or producer of musical theatre.

The MA focuses on the dramaturgy of the musical as a key factor in the future development of the genre. Expert professionals are regularly employed as visiting tutors, to maintain direct links with the industry.

You follow one of the two pathways as either:

• Producer
• Writer or composer

Combine the study of literature with the practice of creative writing. You’ll graduate with the ability to be informed and curious about literature, and with the imagination to turn that curiosity into creativity.

This flexible programme allows you to choose topics related to American literature and culture, comparisons of literature across different cultures and art forms (also known as Comparative Literature), and study diverse aspects of language use in linguistics modules. Your literary and creative studies will be supported by lectures and seminars which will give you practical advice to help you improve your essay writing and refine your research strategies.

Why study BA English with Creative Writing at Goldsmiths?

• You’ll read key literary texts, and experiment with writing prose and poetry. By the end of the creative writing degree you’ll have uncovered your written style and developed an extensive portfolio of creative work.
• We’re based in London, a city that’s full of literary inspiration. Take a look at English student Samantha’s favourite places to write.
• Our alumni have gone on to win prestigious awards including the Rooney Prize for Irish Literature, the Sunday Times Young Writer of the Year, the European Union Prize for Literature, and the Dylan Thomas Prize. One of our alumni, Sophie Collins, was awarded a Fellowship by the Royal Society of Literature as part of its inaugural 40 Under 40 scheme in 2018.
• We’re regularly visited by literary guest speakers. Recent visitors have included Ali Smith, Nikesh Shukla, Michael Rosen, Eimear McBride and Howard Jacobson.
• We host an annual literary award – the Goldsmiths Prize – that celebrates work that pushes the boundaries of the novel.

It’s really important for us that you graduate with a set of core digital journalism skills so half of the degree focuses on the computing side of the discipline and half on media and communications. This means you get a holistic MA, where you study the foundations of digital journalism and practise it in its most current forms.

You’ll have the chance to study multimedia and interactive journalism, look at interactive documentaries, digital reporting, and video journalism. You’ll also learn coding, so you can get to grips with using algorithms and data sets, and do social network analysis to monitor what’s going on behind the screens.

Through our partnerships with BBC news labs and The Times’ development team, we make sure we’re keeping up with industry but also working with it.

We want you to reimagine the medium while you’re here, so you get the chance to specialise in your own area of interest for your final project. This could be anything from an interactive website to a video production using interactive story telling and text.  We offer a lot of support when it comes to the coding side of the course. A boot camp before the start of the programme gives you an introduction to some of the techniques and languages.

What you go away with are the core skills for news writing, video, and computational techniques and some amazing industry contacts.