Master of Arts in Research Architecture

at Goldsmiths, University of London United Kingdom

The MA Queer History is a pioneering programme in one of the most exciting areas of historical enquiry, giving a voice to those who throughout much of history have been denied one.

Why study MA Queer History at Goldsmiths?

• This is the world’s first MA in Queer History and it provides a comprehensive introduction to the themes and methods of Queer History as well as laying a solid foundation in general historical study.
• Our emphasis is in the Early Modern and Modern periods: both the Western invention of ‘homosexuality’ in the 1860s and the emancipatory movements, especially of the post-1969, post-Stonewall period, figure prominently.
• You’ll gain a first-rate overview of important thought and methods from the fields of queer theory as well as the histories of gender and the body and sexuality.
• We aim to historicise often binary categories, such as male/female, heterosexuality/homosexuality, active/passive, and uncover the processes through which these categories came to be seen as ‘natural’.
• You’ll also pay close attention to questions of power, including how sexual orientation and race throughout history have often become interlinked in asymmetrical, oppressive ways.
• You’ll be able to choose from a range of option modules so you can tailor your learning to your own interests and get the most out of your year at Goldsmiths.

The programme will introduce you to a range of psychological theories, methods and processes within the context of the legal, criminal and civil justice systems.

Based at a research-led London university with strong links to forensic services, you’ll be taught by world-class researchers, and experienced practitioners from the NHS, and the prison and probation service.

Led by chartered forensic clinical psychologist Dr Caoimhe McAnena, the MSc also includes contributions from world-class researchers and practitioners who will teach on the programme and supervise research projects.

We have been awarded full British Psychological Society (BPS) accreditation, which will give you the opportunity to gain Graduate and/or Chartered Membership of the Society.

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.

This unique programme introduces you to the variety of ways in which brands are developed and used, and helps you to understand how the growth of branding – in business, but also in politics, government, sport and culture – has changed the societies we live in.

Why study MA Brands, Communication and Culture at Goldsmiths?

• This MA is not a conventional branding or marketing degree – it offers a unique, theory-based approach to the study of brands, reflected in topics taught on our compulsory modules such as gender, colonial history and branding, social media and open source cultures, and geodemographics and new forms of social classification.
• You’ll gain a comprehensive understanding of the history and development of brands and branding, and their relationship to contemporary forms of communication and culture. You'll also ask what happens when the state uses branding techniques to communicate with its citizens.
• You’ll also gain in-depth knowledge of the social, political and economic backdrop against which branding has become so important, and an understanding of the key themes and debates surrounding its development and use, including the relationship between brands and intellectual property, and the extent to which branding promotes or inhibits openness and transparency within organisations.
• You’ll improve your ability to think critically and creatively about contemporary communications and cultural practices. When you have completed the programme you will be able to analyse contemporary communications, make judgments about their significance, and be able to thoughtfully contribute to contemporary communications.

The BA Anthropology & Media programme combines anthropological and communications theories to provide you with a better understanding of cultural diversity, and a critical knowledge of communication processes.

Why study BA Anthropology and Media at Goldsmiths?

• You'll be taught by some of the leading names in anthropology, media, communications and cultural studies. And you'll have access to industry-standard practice facilities.
• You'll receive a solid grounding in anthropological methodology and practice, and in key media debates including representation, and symbolism. Most importantly, you'll learn how to apply these insights to the contemporary world.
• You'll develop the practical and transferable skills to help you find a career in media or anthropology – our recent graduates are now working as news readers, editors, journalists, producers, and photographers.
• You’ll be able to specialise and design your own learning experience in third year, choosing four Anthropology modules, and two Media, Communications, and Cultural Studies (MCCS) modules.
• We regularly host industry debates and talks by international figures; recent guests have included Danny Boyle, Gurinder Chadha and Noel Clark.

The MSc Marketing & Technology aims to transform students into uniquely-trained individuals possessing the knowledge and skills required to be successful marketers in dynamic and technology-driven industries.

Companies such as Netflix, Airbnb, and Tesla have one thing in common: they break with the norms of existing markets and employ unconventional, technology-driven marketing approaches. Traditional marketing education all too often neglects the marketing abilities that these companies possess.

The MSc Marketing & Technology departs from the rather passive marketing logic that assumes markets and marketing channels are fixed features of reality. Instead, it shows how managers can proactively shape and create new markets and marketing landscapes.

The goal of this programme is to transform students into uniquely-trained individuals who understand how to leverage emerging technologies, such as 3D printing, Virtual Reality, and the Internet of Things, to design unique customer experiences, disrupt existing markets, and create entirely new ones.

The programme will direct students’ attention to significant and emerging technological trends, and show how they can address important social and environmental problems.

It seeks to enable students to discover new market opportunities that will have a positive impact on the economy, society, and the environment. Students will be equipped with the skills required to effectively navigate today’s technology-dominated marketing environments, and they will learn how to be successful marketers in the digital marketing era.

The MA Research Architecture is for graduates from a range of disciplines who want to examine how architecture can engage with questions of contemporary culture, politics, media, ecology and justice and question whether spatial practice can become a form of research.

Why study MA Research Architecture at Goldsmiths?

• You’ll combine studio work with theoretical research. Lectures, seminars and workshops will equip you with a grounding in critical spatial practices and related areas of inquiry.
• The theoretical module provides thorough coverage of the historical, philosophical and technological aspects of the intersection of space, power and conflict in light of changing geopolitical conditions.
• You’ll take part in an annual field trip during the winter break to a site of special interest to Research Architecture, for example, Athens, The Hague, Berlin or Istanbul.
• You’ll join a group of students and practitioners from a wide range of backgrounds, experiences and disciplines and have the opportunity to work collaboratively and benefit from peer-to-peer learning under the guidance of a tutor.
• There are several workshops on the programme as part of the Forensic Architecture or Research Architecture Studio Module. These day-long participatory events are led by invited guest speakers with specific expertise in the field.
• Graduates of the MA will be well-suited for doctoral research or to pursue or enhance their career in the areas of architecture, design, law, journalism, filmmaking, art and curating.

The BA in Drama and Theatre Arts is designed to foster creative, radical theatre-makers and thinkers. It is adventurous in form, international in scope and hands-on in practice.

The Complete Theatre Maker

• This degree supports you to become the complete theatre maker. At the heart of the programme is a balanced integration of theory and practice. Knowledge gained through making and doing adds to your conceptual understanding, while the insights gained in writing about theatre and society inform the choices you make in your practice-based work.
• Tutored by our diverse and talented team, you will develop technical skills in acting, directing, writing, sound, lighting, scenography, and costume. Bringing these skills together, you will learn how to collaborate and operate in companies, ready to take your own show on the road.
• You will be introduced to a wide range of theatre thinkers, and explore the history and cultural diversity of performance. You will develop a complex understanding of what it means to make theatre in an increasingly global 21st-century society. And with London’s rich theatre culture on your doorstep, you can draw on an exciting range of contemporary practice to inform your thinking and making.

The BA Drama and Theatre Arts is a radical and innovative degree. The curriculum is responsive to the global reach of our teaching staff, including expertise in African, American, Francophone, Japanese, and South Asian performance, as well as British, European, and Russian theatre traditions. We prepare theatre-makers who are socially, culturally, and politically engaged.

The degree explores what it means to perform in contemporary culture, mobilising a range of theatre and performance practices from the interpretation of play texts to devised ensemble work and the possibilities opened up by political protest, live art, and the avant-garde.

Computation consists of all the changes brought about by digital technology. Art is an open set of ways of acting inventively in culture. Mixing the two together in a systematic way gives us computational art. This is a very open field, and one that is set to expand enormously in the coming years. It is where the most exciting developments in technology and in culture can already be found. This degree will place you in the middle of this fast-evolving context.

This degree develops your arts practice through the expressive world of creative computation. Over a two years (full-time) or four years (part-time) you will develop your artistic work and thinking through the challenge of developing a series of projects for public exhibition which will explore the technological and cultural ramifications of computation.

You will learn the fundamentals of programming and how to apply this knowledge expressively. You will work with popular open source programming environments such as Processing, OpenFrameworks, P5.js and Arduino, and will learn how to program in languages such as Java, Javascript and C++.

Since computational artworks don’t necessarily involve computers and screens, we also encourage students to produce works across a diverse range of media. Supported by studio technicians in state-of-the-art facilities, our students are producing works using tools such as 3D printers, laser cutters, robotics, wearable technologies, paint, sculpture and textiles.

You will also study contextual modules on computational art and the socio-political effects of technology. Modules provide students with the historical foundations, frameworks, critical skills and confidence to express their ideas effectively. You will have the opportunity to learn the cultural histories of technology, to reflect on computation in terms of its wider cultural effects, and to understand the way in which art provides rigorous ways of thinking.

The MA Cultural Policy, Relations and Diplomacy is a trans-disciplinary programme that addresses the theory and practice of cultural policy, cultural relations, and cultural and public diplomacy.

This broad area of study and the terminology applied to it is fluid and expanding. Having culture as the underlying thread, the programme explores areas such as:

• Arts policy and management
• Globalisation
• Cultural relations
• Public diplomacy
• Cultural and arts diplomacy
• External communications
• Place branding

This will provide a unique perspective into this field of study, and will examine topics such as mobility of cultural practitioners, cultural identity, intercultural dialogue, mutuality, propaganda, soft power, hegemony, influence and perceptions.

Goldsmiths' location provides you with a unique experience of living in a multicultural world city, which is of great relevance to the study of cultural policy, relations and diplomacy.