Master of Arts in Data, Culture and Society

at University of Westminster - Harrow Campus United Kingdom

The Media and Development MA is an interdisciplinary course that teaches main theories, concepts, case studies and practical media skills around the theme of media and development and its implications for less developed countries. The course will provide you with a unique blend of theory and practice teaching, aimed at deepening your knowledge of the history of communications within the development process of emerging economies. It will critically evaluate the impact of international and regional institutions from a critical political economic perspective. Teaching by academic staff, guest lecturers and other carefully selected staff from development organisations will provide you with an overview of the policies, actions and impact of state and non-state institutions within the area of communication media and development.

A distinctive feature is its emphasis on the practical role of communication media in development. You will participate in media production workshops and take part in our internship programme, offered in partnership with media and development organisations in London. As part of the work experience module, students participate in an extensive NGOs and media seminar series featuring experts and panel discussions. The work placement programme is in line with the University of Westminster’s strategy of nurturing of the critical practitioner.

This exciting new multidisciplinary Master's programme is fully designed to reflect the needs of contemporary interactive media industries, bringing together creative technologies, interactivity and design practices within digital cultures with the user in mind.

Interactive Media Practice combines a wide range of digital creative technologies primarily combining digital literacies design, technology and interaction, through user-centred design for commercial outputs to an industry standard.

Interactive Media Practice places the user at the centre of the experience and focuses on design and content creation in areas such as mobile app development, wearables, games, rich media websites, interactive guides and installations, immersive VR, next generation advertising and virtual and augmented reality systems, through to social media powerful eMarketing and entrepreneurship through innovation protocol.

Our innovative Fine Art Mixed Media BA will give you the opportunity to explore and develop work across boundaries, within the ever-expanding contemporary fine art disciplines.

Our course enables you to work across disciplines or within the more traditionally defined areas of practice, while referencing relevant critical and theoretical debates.

You'll be encouraged to bring highly individual approaches to studio practice, coupled with an emphasis on experiential learning – these are the defining factors that have established the course at the cutting edge of contemporary practice.

We encourage creativity, individuality and personal growth, and once you've acquired the basic skills you can negotiate your own individual programme of study with tutors.

We select only the most dedicated and creative students who have the energy, enthusiasm and commitment that our course requires.

Based at our Harrow Campus, you'll work alongside students from film, photography, music, fashion and journalism, in a unique hothouse of creative opportunity. 

Our studio-based course provides you with a permanent space, depending on the type of work you engage with as you progress through the programme.

You'll be taught by practising artists with national and international profiles working in and across the mediums of sculpture, painting, moving image, performance, photography and sound. Our exceptional team are supported by state-of-the-art facilities and workshops that are at the forefront of current technical innovation.

Our teaching and learning methods will encourage you to create a body of work characterised by personal commitment and an increasing sense of autonomy.

Our teaching methods include lectures, tutorials (individual and group), presentations, crits, workshops, and gallery visits and talks. 

Fine art disciplines include:

• Digital
• Drawing
• Installation
• Intervention
• Interdisciplinary
• Moving image
• Painting
• Performance
• Photography
• Printmaking
• Sculpture
• Sound

Our Television Production BA is a practice-based course taught by broadcast industry professionals and media theorists, combining critical analysis with hands-on practical skills.

Our course focuses on how television programmes are conceived, produced, commissioned and distributed in a digital broadcast and multi-platform environment. 

You’ll work across a digital workflow supporting single-camera and multi-camera studio production modes and produce programmes across all genres, from documentary and drama series to TV commercials and studio entertainment shows.

As well as learning practical skills in editing, camera operations, sound recording, lighting and graphics, you’ll study critical analysis of the ever-changing global broadcast and digital media industries. 

You’ll work with industry-standard facilities and equipment, and you’ll be taught by experienced industry professionals and practitioners, including documentary filmmakers, directors, producers and screenwriters. We also host a range of visiting lecturers and guest speakers, from sound designers to investigative journalists and social media strategists.

Our course is designed to prepare you for the challenge of a multi-skilled, mixed-portfolio career, and our graduates leave equipped with the knowledge, skills and mindset necessary to thrive in the creative industries.

Our course capitalises on the benefits that London has to offer, particularly through our connections with the many production companies based in the city, with links that include ITV studios, Disney and London Live. Our students have undertaken work experience with a range of employers, including the BBC, Endemol and ITV. 

Based at our vibrant Harrow Campus, just a 20-minute train ride from central London, you’re ideally placed to take up a range of exciting opportunities as you begin your professional career.

The course is designed for recent graduates seeking a career in traditional and new media organisations. It provides a combination of business and media skills designed to equip you to take up an entry-level position in today’s media organisations.

You will learn how media organisations are engaging with the challenges resulting from the emergence of digital media technologies and platforms. The course introduces you to the processes by which media organisations develop their corporate strategies, business plans, marketing and production operations as they respond to radical change in the commercial environment.

The course is designed to enable you to find and take up work placements and internships at media organisations in London during the course of your studies. Our students have successfully completed internships at TV production companies like the BBC, technology companies like Google, as well as many other multimedia, advertising and news organisations in London. Some have successfully started their own businesses in the UK.

Whether you are planning a career in a media organisation or seeking to create your own new business start up, the MA International Media Business aims to provide the analytical insight, operational knowledge and planning skills you will need to prosper. The course is taught alongside a suite of Masters courses in Westminster’s highly successful Centre for Creative Industries Management.

Our Photography BA course is a long-established course with an excellent international reputation for its academic and practical teaching. This reputation is reflected in high application rates, a distinguished record of graduate employment in the industries it serves, and in the publication, production and teaching profile of its staff and graduates.

Our course will enable you to develop your creative production skills across a range of photographic and lens-based media, to establish a critically engaged and self-reflective creative practice. It will equip you with the skills to adapt to creative opportunities, participate in contemporary cultural debates, and increase your awareness of the political, ethical and aesthetic implications of your work. You’ll learn to form independent, informed opinions of your own work and that of others.

Our course is renowned for its distinctive philosophy, which aims to provide a holistic photographic education. It combines high levels of technical and visual photographic skills with excellent visual literacy and a critical awareness of visual culture alongside solid professional practice.

You’ll also explore a wide range of relevant contemporary theories and debates designed both to stimulate a critically engaged practice and to better prepare you for a range of related careers.

The course is part of the University's College of Design, Creative and Digital Industries, based at our state-of-the-art Harrow Campus – a cutting-edge creative hub.

Top reasons to study with us

• Fantastic location -  you'll enjoy all the benefits of studying at our Harrow Campus – just a 20-minute tube ride from London, a global hub for the media and cultural industries
• Develop your creative production skills – work across a range of photographic and lens-based media to establish a critically engaged and self-reflective creative practice
• Learn from high-profile experts in photography theory and practice, dedicated to photographic education
• Photographic pioneers – photographic education at the University of Westminster has a unique depth of tradition. Classes in photography were taught at the Polytechnic Institution, the forerunner of our University, from 1852, and the School of Photography was established in 1883

This is an exciting and highly innovative course (developed in collaboration with the Media Diversity Institute) that seamlessly combines theory and modules providing or containing hands-on practical training in journalism or campaigning and public relations related to social and cultural diversity.

The course will give you the opportunity to study and research the main ways in which social scientists analyse the role of the mass media in the social construction, representation and understanding of difference and social diversity and get a critical understanding of the social and media structures and journalistic practices that impact upon these processes. It will also equip you with practical skills that will enable you to produce your own media product on a topic related to social and cultural diversity.

The course combines a portfolio of theory modules aimed to develop your knowledge and critical understanding of the processes of managing and making sense of cultural diversity, key issues in intercultural communication and of various aspects of the sociology of news with a number of practice-oriented modules intended to give you first hand experience in the practice of inclusive journalism.

Drawing upon this unique combination of rigorous theoretical engagement and specialist practical training, this course is designed to equip you with a comprehensive conceptual/theoretical grounding and the practical skills to engage in responsible media coverage of diversity, to practice culturally informed and inclusive journalism and to develop a career (whether practical, strategic, or research-based) involving understanding and responding to the challenges of social diversity.

Our Contemporary Media Practice BA is built on our long tradition of teaching interdisciplinary media practice, working across moving image, photography and interactive media.

Our unique approach combines the creative exploration of art school traditions with academic and professional excellence. We have extensive industry-level facilities and equipment, and to develop your skills and knowledge we use a variety of assessment methods, including practical projects, presentations, written work, research tasks and portfolios.

Our course sets high standards for professional achievement in specific media industry roles, and prepares you for the challenge of a multi-skilled portfolio career. You'll also gain the transferable and cognitive skills necessary for lifelong personal and professional development.

Our graduates have a high employment rate across the media industries, including broadcast television; commercial photography and photojournalism; curating and film programming; film direction, production, editing and visual effects; fine art practice; and new media.

Studying this course will enable you to develop your creative media production skills across a range of disciplines, and give you the ability to adapt to the creative opportunities of new media forms and hybrids. It will enhance your ability to participate in contemporary cultural debates, and develop your awareness of the political, ethical and aesthetic implications of your work.

This course offers a hands-on curriculum that allows you to develop core journalistic skills in broadcast and digital media. You will learn the technical skills to master TV, audio and digital reporting. The course has a very practical focus, so you will develop your own story ideas and gather your own material through research and reporting for journalistic course work.

You will be given full training in using our up-to-date video, audio, social media management and mobile journalism resources, ensuring that you graduate from the course as a multi-skilled journalist. These practical skills are underpinned with training in media law, ethics and regulation.

Whether your passion is current affairs, arts and culture, investigative features, travel, fashion, sport – or you are still deciding, our aim is to help you to find your first job in journalism.

Our Music: Production, Performance and Enterprise degree will equip you for a successful career in all areas of the commercial and popular music industries.

Our course will inspire you to develop expertise and experience in the key fields of commercial music: music production, music performance and music business/enterprise. In today's industry, only by having knowledge and understanding of all three specific areas will you be sufficiently prepared for employment and a career in music.

Whether you aspire to be a music artist, producer, performer, songwriter, composer, musicologist, journalist, DJ, technologist, entrepreneur, business specialist or educator, our course will nurture your aspirations and ensure you develop a broad range of transferable, music-related skills.

We incorporate a strong focus on reflective practice and contextual studies, meaning that our graduates are positioned to become innovators and thought leaders for the future of the constantly evolving music industries.

You'll have two enrolment options: you may choose the standard BA award if you intend to specialise in either music production or music business, or you can choose the BMus award if you want to study specialist modules associated with music performance and instrumental musicianship. Whichever award you pick, you'll also study Music Business and Enterprise.

Our music industry links in the thriving London community allow us to provide guest lectures from leading professionals and maximise opportunities for you to network and begin your career while on the course.

Based at Harrow Campus, the course also offers unique opportunities to collaborate with students from other academic disciplines including film, TV, radio, fashion and media, and provides networking opportunities with relevant professional societies and organisations. As a result, our graduates have excellent employment opportunities and the ability to build successful careers in many diverse areas of the creative industries.