Bachelor of Arts (Hons) in English Language and Literature (with Sandwich Year)

at University of Hertfordshire - De Havilland Campus United Kingdom

Studying Philosophy, Religion and Ethics at Hertfordshire will enable you to explore the connections and contradictions between thought and faith in the world today.

You may have taken Religious Studies at A-level or be fascinated by how religious belief is a driving force behind social and political events in today’s globalised world.

This degree course offers you the opportunity to explore the beliefs that guide people’s lives using the logical and critical skills gained through philosophical inquiry.

You’ll be taught by internationally regarded academics, who will help you understand how the practices of religion and philosophy have influenced – and been influenced by – the modern world. You’ll learn to address the arguments and beliefs of others and to engage with them, so that you can arrive at your own conclusions and create your own original work.

All our lecturers are active researchers, so you’ll share the excitement of doing original work in a supportive and highly-rated academic community. Our Philosophy team is in the top 15 in the Guardian League Table 2019 and rates as one of the 100 best Philosophy departments worldwide in the 2017 QS rankings.

In your first year you’ll take philosophy modules exploring ethics, mind, knowledge and reality alongside an introduction to four of the major world religions: Judaism, Christianity, Islam and Buddhism. This will be given a modern context through a module on religion and the contemporary world.

Seminars in your first year will explore how to investigate and discuss different beliefs and ideas and to develop your critical thinking, all within a respectful and empathetic environment.

In your second year you’ll study the philosophies of religion, and explore virtues, vices and ethics. Focusing on specific virtues such as forgiveness, hope or love from both a secular and religious point of view, you’ll examine what it means to live a good life.

Alongside options in your final year to explore religion and popular culture, as well as feminist and political philosophy, your dissertation will allow you to develop your particular interests, perhaps encompassing an exploration of some aspect of your own religious belief system.

• An exceptional academic team, conducting internationally renowned research
• A flexible programme of study, allowing you to concentrate on areas you find especially interesting
• The opportunity to write a dissertation on a topic about which you are passionate
• CV-building potential through extra-curricular activities

This course develops your understanding of the business of sport, exploring the sports industry in the UK, as well as from a broader global perspective. You’ll learn key business concepts and theories, using them to review modern sports businesses and best practice in sports management. Throughout the course, we put a strong emphasis on the leadership and management of sports events, as well as developing the strategic skills you’ll need to be successful in today’s sports industry. We’ll help you develop your entrepreneurial skills, so that when you graduate you’ll have a balanced portfolio of knowledge and practical skills which really boosts your employability.

Indicative course structure
A strong business degree is an incredible start to your career. By combining it with accounting you’ll have the chance to build a firm foundation in business with a strong focus on accounting practices.

You’ll study a whole range of key business areas, including accounting, marketing, operations, management, human resources and the role of business in society. We’ll also help you explore everything from strategic leadership, performance and business management to ethics, enterprise and creative problem-solving.

• Develop important skills and knowledge required to become an accountant.
• Enhance your employability skills by undertaking a 12-month work placement to gain the first-hand experience.
• Develop strong intellectual capabilities.

This degree enables you to explore the nature of current sound and music technologies, using the latest digital audio hardware, software and programming packages. You'll investigate topics such as sampling, sequencing, mixing, remixing, signal processing, sound editing and recording, alongside audio programming, internet audio and electronics, ensuring that you'll be well equipped with the knowledge and hands-on experience expected of today’s professionals.

• Our programme is Accredited by JAMES, who represent the Association of Professional Recording Services (APRS), the Music Producers Guild (MPG) and Associate Industry Bodies.
• Develop excellent technical skills over the course of your degree, and benefit from our high quality studio, listening room, venue and sound resources including those by SSL, Yamaha, Avid, Focusrite, Quested, Genelec, Neumann, TLA, Lexicon and Drawmer to name but a few.
• Excellent industry input is built into the design of the degree awards from a huge number of areas within the wider music industry.
• The degree awards within the programme are designed to expose you to areas of music, sound and audio technology that you might not even know exist yet.  "Coming to this course has really given my brain the kick-start it needed, and I'm beginning to see near endless possibilities with where I can go." - Glenn Osborn, second year student
• We have a strong record of students from the programme securing placement years between years 2 and 3 of their studies.  Placement destinations include Focusrite,  Sound Technology (a leading distributor of high profile brands for the Music Retail and Professional Audio industries), The Famous Company, and a number of recording studios.
• Every year, organisations and companies approach us to recommend our graduating students.
• Music business is woven into your degree study at every year giving you the skills to slot into the music industry (or create your own business).
• Organise and Participate ‘live’ projects, and our ‘JamJar’ showcase live events.
• Benefit from studying in creative arts school and collaborate with filmmakers and animators in realising fully featured, professional standard media projects.
• We have some of the best resources in the UK, including the 39 million pound entertainment venue – the Forum where our students perform, and engineer every month, and state-of-the art music studios and film and TV facilities in our 12 million pound building for Music, Film and media.

Course Details

The BSc (Hons) Music and Sound Design Technology course is designed for students who wish to interrogate music and media through music, sound design and immersive audio applications.  Focus is placed on sound and music as a component of multimedia, including the world of sound design as a creative process.   Students create and work on a range of media focused projects including moving image, game audio and voice over production as well as determining how sound can be delivered within both multi-speaker environments and ‘virtual’ spaces. 

Core modules studied alongside music and sound design technology practice modules develop students’ techniques and approaches using a range of sound technologies, as well as fostering professional and industrial contextual immersion and awareness, and experience with specialisms within connected music and sound related fields.

BSc (Hons) Music Production sits within the overarching Music & Sound Technology Programme.  There are four degree awards within this programme: BSc (Hons) Music Production, Bsc (Hons) Music and Sound Design Technology, BSc (Hons) Live Sound and Lighting Technology. 

All courses share the same ethos, and you’ll have opportunities to work alongside our music composition and music industry management students too, ensuring you benefit from teaching and experiences within a large community of musicians, composers, technologists and performers.

Within the wider school of creative arts at UH, there are opportunities to collaborate with students from other creative areas, including animation and film and TV, allowing you to network with a broad range of creative industries.

The program supports you in developing your knowledge and understanding of issues and practice through enquiry and research. The program provides a range of module choices, but you are encouraged to bring your own ideas and focus on your own particular professional interests.  This award is gained through taking a SEND and inclusion focus for 50% of the study, including the Dissertation.

Why choose this course?
The MA SEND and Inclusion award is designed for professionals who wish to explore issues relating to SEND and inclusion in education policy and practice, in order to achieve better outcomes for learners in a range of educational settings. This award enables students to examine research into aspects of SEND and inclusion, and to use this to critically analyse issues of policy, practice and provision.  

Through this program you will

• Develop and deepen your knowledge and understanding of issues relating to education practice through critical reflection, analysis and enquiry
• Develop your ability to critically analyse educational theory and how it links to practice
• Become a member of a supportive learning community and learn from professionals from a range of educational settings
• Become a successful practitioner researcher

This course is ideal for students who are both creative and analytical, who want to learn about the business of fashion and who still have a desire to design and make, but ultimately want a fashion business-centric career. The course considers the complexities surrounding the global fashion industry to provide an in-depth appreciation of how products are manufactured, supplied and sold. Ultimately, you’ll gain the experience, knowledge and entrepreneurial skills to start your own company or to enter an existing one with a sound understanding of the business of fashion.Our strong collaborations with the likes of Ted Baker, Ally Capellino and Maria Grachvogel open up opportunities for live projects, work placements, competitions and employment.

The BA (Hons) Fashion and Fashion Business award is intended to equip graduates with the knowledge and skills to work in fashion business. The learning will prepare students to take up careers in a variety of fashion business roles including Buying, Merchandising, Sales and Marketing and Communication.  Fashion and Fashion Business is for students that are both creative, and analytical, who want to learn about the business of fashion, who still have a desire to design and make, but ultimately wish to pursue a fashion business centric career.

• We support freedom of expression and individuality and help our students to be industry informed, socially responsible and creatively prepared
• A unique course embracing an industry led Concept to Customer philosophy
• Exciting speakers from across the fashion industry and opportunities to attend company insight days and events.
• Strong industry relationships with a number of leading brands and designers collaborating through live projects, work placements, competition sponsorship and graduate employment opportunities
• A great spacious contemporary environment including industry standard resources for you to thrive in
• A highly experienced and dedicated academic and technical team putting your learning at the centre of the programme

A degree in English Literature and Journalism will help you grow from passionate reader into a critical thinker and literary scholar; it will also develop your practical, professional writing skills, shed new light on how the media works, and get you some hands-on experience that employers are really looking for.

On a degree in English Literature and Journalism, we’ll introduce you to writers who will open doors to contemporary worlds and cultures remote from your own, and also help you explore more familiar literature in ways that challenge your preconceptions. This means you’ll study literature written in English by writers from all parts of the globe, whose voices are relevant and important in our modern world. You’ll also develop your journalistic skills in exciting ways: you’ll learn the different requirements of writing ‘news’ and ‘features’, while learning how to carry out research, conduct interviews, and structure your writing in order to get published.

You’ll be taught by academic staff who bring fresh thinking to our accessible, engaging courses. Some are active researchers of international standing who bring their own passion for their discipline into the classroom; others are dynamic teachers with extensive industry experience.

Whatever your taste in literature, there will be something to interest and provoke you. From The Tiger Who Came to Tea to Jane Eyre, from Paradise Lost to Zadie Smith’s Swing Time, we’ll broaden your literary horizons and hone your critical thinking.

A core Literature module in your first year will equip you to read and interpret both traditional and contemporary literary texts critically as a scholar of English literature. Alongside this you can choose to revisit Shakespeare and consider his cultural relevance today through fictional, cinematic and TV adaptations; or to deepen your understanding of Gothic writing by tracing its origins back to the Romantic era.

In your second year you’ll focus on period-based literature from the Renaissance onwards and gain an understanding of literary history, from Elizabethan verse and drama, via Augustan poetry and the emergence of the novel in the 18th century, to the radical transformations of the Victorian age, and the emergence of modernity in the twentieth century. You’ll also have the opportunity to consider ways of reading that go beyond textual analysis or historical context, such as understanding literature through the political or ideological lens of Marxism, feminism and post-colonial theory.

You’ll have the chance to specialise in your final year, tailoring your literary study to reflect your own interests. Themed options include children’s literature, young adult fiction, Renaissance tragedy, European crime fiction, literary adaptations and the culture of print in the 18th century.

Your study of English Literature will enhance your ability to analyse and synthesise complex ideas, and to express yourself clearly in both written and spoken English. These skills will be hugely beneficial to your study of Journalism, but this part of your course will extend your range far beyond just print media. As the course progresses, you’ll discover how journalism varies across video, radio and the internet, hear from inspiring industry guest speakers, and take placements in real newsrooms.

Now that scientists can read and change DNA sequences, a new era has arrived in which it’s possible to investigate organisms at their most fundamental level. That means we have the opportunity to find pioneering ways to prevent or find cures for genetic diseases, such as cystic fibrosis and cancer. It could even help us discover more about our origins and who we really are. This course will give you the specialist theoretical knowledge and practical experience of gene manipulation and the analysis of nucleic acids and proteins. It will also show you how this can be applied to the study of health, disease and the natural environment. This degree is accredited by the Royal Society of Biology.

• Molecular Biology involves the study of biology at the molecular level, providing an insight into the building blocks of life itself.
• DNA carries the hereditary information that determines the structures of proteins. It contains through which cells are instructed to grow and divide, to differentiate into specialized cells thereby generating the millions of different life forms that exist.
• The university has excellent research facilities for molecular biology enabling students to experience key techniques for example, PCR and bioinformatics.

This course will give you a deep, considered appreciation for the role physical activity and sports play in today’s global society. You’ll explore the importance of both community and high-performance sport, while looking at the challenges involved in engaging an inactive population. You’ll also examine the significance of large-scale sports events, using key concepts and theories to appraise sports policy and individuals’ behaviour. At every stage, and in every context, we’ll encourage you to use your new-found insights to evaluate sports development practice.

This course is ideal if you want a degree that can lead to a wide range of business careers. It offers a creative mix of academic study, skills development and practical training, giving you the best possible platform for your career. You’ll learn principles of accounting, economics and marketing, and choose from a variety of other subject options. Strong partnerships with industry ensure our curriculum is up to date and meets business needs. Add a language and take the opportunity to study abroad. This course is aligned to several professional bodies for students to work towards achieving professional recognition.

You can also study a language with this course. You can be awarded the degree ‘with language’ in the title if you choose to study a foreign language in all years of study.

• Gain a broad base of business knowledge and explore a variety of career paths.
• Study key areas like accounting, finance, economics, HR, marketing and operations.
• Explore global perspectives, ethics, strategy, employment law, problem solving and much more.
• Create a stand-out CV by spending a year studying abroad.
• Add one of five languages to your business studies, gaining a sought-after new skill.