Master of Arts in Media and Development

at University of Westminster - Harrow Campus United Kingdom

Live Music is at the centre of Music as an industry and cultural experience. There is a rich set of global opportunities arising from the significant economic and cultural global growth of Live Music. Central to this are music festivals as economic, social and cultural centres of importance, enhanced by the link between social media and experiential experiences.

This new course will help you to develop a comprehensive knowledge and critical understanding of business and practice in the live music and events industries and equip you to navigate this fast-changing and challenging environment. It also sets out to examine how the live music and events industries interact with wider social and technological transformations, critically important in a socially distancing environment necessitating new business models such as live streaming, Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality.

At Westminster, we already have a highly regarded background and established reputation for successful teaching and research in music and events from the very heart of the global centre for live music, London. Our Live Music Management MA has been developed alongside and is heavily integrated with industry and will be delivered by both leading academics as well as frequent guest speakers from the live music industry (including leading industry spokespeople and companies).

The Social Media and Digital Communication MA will give you the opportunity to develop an in-depth understanding of contemporary digital communication and its seismic impact on politics, culture and society.

Social media have challenged how we understand communication, democracy, news, relationships, privacy, advertising and entertainment. Social media have captured the attention and imagination of hundreds of millions of people. They enable their users to develop and display their creativity, to empathize with others, and to find connection, communication and communion. But social media have also captured those users’ personal information, and turned their daily lives into commercial data through business models built around surveillance.

The course examines social media as industries and as central sites for understanding the cultural politics of everyday life. It explores the meanings of sharing and privacy, of remix cultures and new forms of journalism, of new forms of communication and new forms of citizenship. It connects social media to other digital phenomena such as the internet of things, Big Data, and media convergence. In its core modules, learners engage with questions of media technologies and texts, of platforms and users, and of how networked digital media are adopted and adapted in an environment built around the convergence of personal and public communication.

The Documentary Photography and Photojournalism MA allows you to explore society through photographically-related practice and within critically-informed ways through a combination of practice-based teaching and discussion of critical contexts.

We consider documentary photography and photojournalism as exciting and expanding mediums, situated within their own histories, taking many forms in the 21st Century.

Applicants can include students of documentary photography or photographers in general who are interested in specialising in this area and developing their practice. Artists who wish to focus their activities on a more social practice, and individuals from other disciplines who wish to explore the subject area at postgraduate level are also welcome.

From the moment you arrive, we emphasise the development of your own practice, leading towards a consolidation of your learning into a high-profile exhibition in a central London exhibition space.

You will be taught by practising professional photographers, artists and writers, within a supportive course atmosphere.

Our facilities are equipped to the highest professional standards for both analogue and digital production of still and moving image.

This course offers a hands-on curriculum that allows you to develop your core journalistic skills in print, online and social media management.  

You will learn to master a broad variety of media formats from writing and reporting to social media and video. Besides writing, the course emphasises contemporary digital skills that will place you in high demand in an ever-changing world of content creation and distribution. 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.

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.

From Al Jazeera to Hollywood, News Corporation to China Central TV, the media increasingly operate in a global context. This course offers a comprehensive interdisciplinary approach to global media, and is designed for those who work in, or want to work in, the media industries.

You will examine key developments in the media and communications industries associated with the logic of globalisation, and explore the complex nature of the globalisation process in the media. You will gain a relevant, well-grounded, high-quality education and skill base, enabling you to develop a clear and comprehensive understanding of communication and the mass media.

Based on continuous assessment, the course is taught in lectures and seminars by the team from Westminster's top-rated Communication and Media Research Institute (CAMRI). You will be part of a bustling multicultural academic department which boasts a strong research culture, and you will be able to attend the regular talks by outside speakers (academics and practitioners) on a variety of communication and mass media issues.

Our innovative MA in Film and Television builds on its prestigious heritage as the longest running degree programme of its kind in the UK. We aim to equip you with wide-ranging skills, knowledge and critical awareness to meet your career aspirations in sectors in which moving images play a central role. Our curriculum incorporates an exciting variety of learning and teaching activities designed to foster your capacity for researching and rigorously analysing different aspects of film, television and moving images. You will have the opportunity to develop key skills for communicating about and with moving images across a range of contexts and platforms.

Digital and Interactive Storytelling LAB MA is a new and innovative course, designed for digital storytellers and shaped like a media LAB. This means that during the course you will be able to produce a wide range of digital-first work for multi-platform formats. Your work will be underpinned with academic research, theories and expertise on mobile platforms, and digital interactive communication.

The course delivers industry-level professional expertise in visual communication from photography to video content creation, interactive narratives and apps for change.

You’ll be involved in creating content that extends beyond current ideas in multimedia and online productions – as our aim is to advance storytelling as a format of communication and as a practice.

We recognise how competitive the job market currently is, therefore this Master's has been created to develop your skills and knowledge in a way that will enhance your career development.

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.

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