

SSC301
Discovering Your Inner Academic
30 credits
In this module, students will learn the core academic and organisational skills required to succeed at university. They will benefit from a range of skill development sessions and subject-specific seminars, allowing them to practice applying the delivered academic skills in the context of their field of study.
100% Coursework
SSC302
Individual Project
30 credits
Students will undertake, with supervision, an individual project related to their degree programme. Staff will guide students through the process of defining, planning, and setting up their project. As part of the module, students will gain research and time management skills that will support their successful progression through their degree programme.
100% Coursework
SSC306
Literature, History and Visual Cultures
30 credits
This module explores the key texts and voices that have changed the ways in which we think and write the Humanities. It will investigate how thinkers, poets and writers have shaped our contemporary world, and the ways in which we study it. Based on this, this module will also explore the ways in which literature, art, film, media, memory and heritage impact on history and writing today. Students will examine a range of classic and contemporary literary texts as well as visual and media sources and consider the role of technologies in the Humanities. The module will be constructed around the exploration of key themes, for example gender and sexuality, faith, war, and race and ethnicity, using interdisciplinary approaches to identify how they have shaped the Humanities of the 21st century.
100% Coursework
SSC309
Imagining the Past
30 credits
This module will introduce concepts central to historical and literary study in the Humanities including: Time; Space; and Experience. Students will work with a range of sources to understand how the Humanities engage with the past. Students will develop the tools needed for progression to Higher Education, with a particular focus on analysing textual materials and essay-writing.
100% Coursework
ENG4001
Gods, Monsters, and Heroes: Myths and Legends in Literature
20 credits
This immersive module provides an important grounding for new students studying English and Creative Writing. Based around some of the earliest written texts that underpin Western literature, the module engages with a number of issues to enable students to gain an understanding of the historical development of literature and the ways in which texts relate to each other over the centuries.
100% Coursework
ENG4003
The Craft of Writing I: Prose Fiction and Non-Fiction
20 credits
This module introduces students to the key concepts and issues in creative writing through the practise of workshops. We will read classic contemporary works of fiction and nonfiction including autobiography, travel writing, poetry sequences, essays and reportage. We will produce our own works, and critically evaluate and contextualise them.
100% Coursework
ENG4007
Rewritings: Contemporary Literature and its Histories
20 credits
This module will examine how and why modern and contemporary authors have rewritten or reworkedinfluential literary texts of the past. Students will engage with a range of different literary forms,including fiction, poetry, drama and, where appropriate, film. By investigating the impulses behind suchintertextual acts, students will explore the ways in which literature engages with the cultural politics ofits times, focusing particularly on issues of gender, ethnicity, sexuality, class and aesthetics. This module will include 2, 2 hour talks that introduce our School and programme level employability related opportunities and support, including details of the optional placement year.
100% Coursework
ENG4009
Make it New: Digital Writing
20 credits
This module introduces students to writing digitally for, most notably, the Web, and its various platforms (from blogs to websites to Twitter etc). Students are invited to explore and expand ideas around authorship and audience and the writing (or images) that connects them as ‘content’, in its myriad of possible forms and formats. It will also introduce speculative and theoretical ideas about the relation between the self, writing, and digital forms. The module is taught through lecture, seminars, and workshops where students are asked to submit and feedback to peers and tutors on a regular basis.
100% Coursework
ENG4010
Adventures in Criticism: Introduction to Critical Theory
20 credits
This module will introduce some key critical theories relevant to the study of English literature. It will familiarise students with a range of theoretical perspectives and enable them to develop an understanding of different ways of reading literature, and its wider contexts.
100% Coursework
ENG4008
The Craft of Writing II: Poetry and Drama
20 credits
This module continues the trajectory of the study of ‘the craft of writing’, emphasising poetry and dramatic writing. We’ll explore how creative writing constitutes a ‘practice-as-research’ discipline, whilst studying relevant writing theory, contextual literature, and literary criticism. Lectures will introduce topics, and subsequent workshops will promote the development of student work through feedback. Students will submit creative work alongside ‘research statements’ twice during the term, in the form of portfolios.
100% Coursework
ENG4005
Writing and the Modern World, 1700-1800
20 credits
This module considers the further development of modern ways of writing, thinking, trading, and seeing in the eighteenth century. This period is crucial to understanding literary history and ourselves. The module explores four key themes:- the beginnings of human rights and democracy in the eighteenth century - modern ideas of gender which originate in the eighteenth century - imperialism & the transatlantic world - eighteenth-century reading practices and the development of new genres.
80% Coursework
20% Practicals
ENG5005
Professional Writing for Different Media
20 credits
In the context of this module, Professional Writing refers to commercial content for a variety of media outlets including advertising and marketing, as well as other ‘businesses’ which students have imagined and created themselves. Students will experiment with creative formats such as posters, reviews, reports, ‘copy’, interviews, the op-ed (opinion-editorial). The module is taught through lecture, seminars, and workshops where students are asked to submit and feedback to peers and tutors on a regular basis.
100% Coursework
ENG5011
Dramatic Writing for Stage, Screen and Beyond
20 credits
This course explores a wide range of dramatic writing and dramatic writing theory, integrating critical reading with creative writing projects. Class time will be spent discussing published authors/texts/productions, writing/reading theories, compositional processes, practical exercises, and student work.
100% Coursework
ENG5012
Burning Issues: Interdisciplinary Writing Project
20 credits
This module asks students to engage with the 'burning issues' of our times, by thinking outside of their own discipline and engaging with research taking place in other departments, schools and faculties around the university, or even the country and the world. Students select a topic from outside their discipline and then, through research and communication with experts in the chosen field, devise a writing project to communicate and explore their chosen issue. The module is taught through lecture, seminars, and workshops where students are asked to submit and feedback to peers and tutors on a regular basis.
100% Coursework
ENG5017
Writing Genre Fiction
This module takes students into in-depth engagement with prose fiction writing in various genres, with possibilities including fantasy, science-fiction, period/historical, young adult fiction, horror, comedy, romance, crime, and thriller. The module is taught through lecture, seminars, and workshops where students are asked to submit and feedback to peers and tutors on a regular basis.
HEP5000
Preparing for Dissertation Research
This module will prepare students in the History, Art History, ECW, and PIR cluster for Level 6 dissertation research. Lectures and workshops will explore key approaches to sources, and practical and theoretical aspects to research. Students will complete an independent research project. Lectures include some choice, and cover a range of topics including, but not limited to, research in archives / local studies/ digital resources, creative practice, and literary analysis.
SSC500
Stage 2 Professional Development, Placement Preparation and Identifying Opportunities
0 credits
This module is for students in the School of Society and Culture who are interested in undertaking an optional placement in the third year of their programme. It supports students in their search, application, and preparation for the placement, including developing interview techniques and effective application materials (e.g. CVs , portfolios, and cover letters).
SSC601
School of Law, Humanities and Social Sciences Placement Year
Students have the opportunity to gain work experience that will set them apart in the job market when they graduate by undertaking an optional flexible placement year. The placement must be a minimum of 24-weeks (which can be split between a maximum of two different placement providers) and up to a maximum of 48-weeks over the course of the academic year. The placement is flexible and can be undertaken virtually, part or full time and either paid or voluntary. Students will have the option to undertake their placement year abroad. This year allows them to apply and hone the knowledge and skills acquired from the previous years of their programme in the real world.
ENG6007
Advanced Poetry Workshop
20 credits
In this final year module we will examine a range of contemporary poetry and poetic theory as a way for students to advance their own composition of poems. Class time will be divided between seminar discussions of published poetry/theory, writing exercises, and workshops of student poetry.
100% Coursework
ENG6009
Script to Screen: Making Films, Podcasts, and More
20 credits
This final year module asks students to realise an original script of their own making with an on-screen production. In addition to writing their own scripts, students will be introduced to the production side of things, including storyboarding, working with actors, cameras, and using film-making software. We’ll also study some classic examples of page to screen adaptations (albeit most on bigger budgets than you’ll have!). The module is taught through lecture, seminars, and workshops where students are asked to submit and feedback to peers and tutors on a regular basis.
100% Coursework
ENG6003
Advanced Short Story Workshop
In this module we will examine a range of contemporary short story writing and relevant theory as a way for students to learn how to compose their own short fiction. Class time will be divided between discussion of short fiction and theory, writing exercises and peer workshops of student work. The workshops will be substantially informed by staff research practice.
ENG6001
Dissertation
40 credits
The student will complete, under tutorial supervision, a significant project in critical or creative writing. Maximum length 9,000-10,000 words or equivalent in creative form.
100% Coursework
ANT5008MX
Brave New Worlds: Ethnography of/on Online and Digital Worlds
20 credits
This module teaches students how to use ethnographic methods to make sense of the internet, which we now increasingly inhabit. Students learn how to navigate and analyse platforms such as Facebook or TikTok. They study how these technologies transform our relationships, identities, and ideas of truth. The module also examines the socio-cultural and ethical aspects of digital worlds (e.g. Second life).
100% Coursework
ANT6008MX
Coastal Cultures: Marine Anthropology in the age of climate change and mass extinction.
20 credits
Using ethnography, we analyse how coastal communities use the sea – not only as a source of livelihood, but as a key ingredient in the construction of their identity and place in world. Drawing on a range of cases from across the world – from Polynesian sorcerers, to Japanese whale mourners, to Cornish surfers – we study how coastal communities are responding to climate change, sea level rise, pollution, and extinction.
100% Coursework
ARH5002MX
Imagery in Online and Offline Worlds: Film, Television and Video Games
20 credits
This module provides students with a comprehensive understanding of current approaches towards mass media and visual culture. Particular emphasis will be put on medium-specificity, content analysis and audience studies.
100% Coursework
ARH6002MX
Questions in Contemporary Art
20 credits
The module introduces and examines selected questions raised in the last three decades in contemporary art. Case studies drawn from art history, critical and cultural theory, and where appropriate related disciplines, will be examined.
100% Coursework
HIS5009MX
Middle Kingdoms: Themes in Early Modern Asia
20 credits
This module introduces the history of early modern Japan (c.16th-19th centuries). At one level, it explores key questions shaping the histories of the late Sengoku (‘Warring States’) and Tokugawa Japan. Building on these questions, it then situates the Japanese experience in a trans-regional perspective with reference to early modern China, Korea, Ryukyu, as well as Europe.
Explore this module100% Coursework
HIS5014MX
Dunkirk to D Day: The Second World War in Europe
20 credits
The module examines the Second World War in Europe and the Atlantic Ocean from 1940 to late 1944.
Explore this module100% Coursework
HIS6002MX
Piracy and Privateering, c.1560-1816
20 credits
This module explores piracy and privateering activity in the seas around the British Isles and further afield from the reign of Queen Elizabeth to the end of the second Barbary War in 1816. This course focuses on the social history of piracy and privateering, the organisation of pirate society, and the economic impact of piracy and privateering.
Explore this module100% Coursework
HIS6006MX
America, the United Nations and International Relations 1945 to the present
20 credits
This module provides a detailed examination of the relationship between the United States of America and the United Nations in the management of international relations from 1945 to the present.
Explore this module100% Coursework
CRM5009MX
Crime, Harm and Culture
20 credits
The module aims to provide students with a critical appreciation of harm and crime by exploring relevant issues from film, television, music, fiction literature and art. By applying a criminological lens to different forms of popular culture, students will be able to examine a variety of media forms in terms of its content and its contemporary political, social and economic context using different theories and concepts.
100% Coursework
CRM6016MX
Green Criminology: Climate Justice and the Planetary Crisis
This module will address theoretical perspectives, methodological issues, and empirical research related to the field of green criminology, including applied concerns, such as policy and social/political praxis, through a range of concepts, topics, and themes that are central to green criminology.
PIR6009MX
Mao to Now: the Politics of Modern China
This module introduces students to politics in China. It provides them with the analytical skills and historical understanding to examine the structure of the contemporary Chinese state, looking in particular at Maoist legacies, nationalism and ideology, the relationships between party, law, state and market, and China’s involvement in international affairs.
PIR6007MX
Global Environmental Politics
20 credits
This module examines the problem of environmental degradation and its implications for our global political economy. It discusses the major debates in political thought around the primary causes of environmental degradation. The module outlines the major attempts to build international regimes for global environmental governance, and the difficulties and obstacles that such attempts have encountered. A range of ideas, critiques, policy proposals, innovations in governance, and templates for political activism within the environmental movement are critically evaluated.
100% Coursework
PIR5009MX
Refugee Studies
20 credits
This module focuses on the political, economic and social context of forced migration and considers the complex and varied nature of global refugee populations. It analyses responses at international, national and regional level and engages with a range of challenging questions around international co-operation, the framework of international protection, humanitarianism and the causes of displacement.
100% Coursework
PIR6009MX
Mao to Now: the Politics of Modern China
This module introduces students to politics in China. It provides them with the analytical skills and historical understanding to examine the structure of the contemporary Chinese state, looking in particular at Maoist legacies, nationalism and ideology, the relationships between party, law, state and market, and China’s involvement in international affairs.
PIR5013MX
Politics Beyond Parliaments
20 credits
This module analyses the role of civil society and the public sphere in democratic governance and in democratization from a variety of theoretical perspectives.
100% Coursework
LAW5009MX
Environmental Law
20 credits
The module provides an examination of key themes in environmental law, with a focus on the generation, application and enforcement of this law within a critical and applied context.
100% Coursework
LAW5011MX
Intellectual Property Law
This module focuses on the law and concepts of intellectual property, examining in addition related legal themes of information access, dissemination and control.
LAW6012MX
Public International Law
20 credits
A module that focuses on the primary legal principles of the public international legal order, before exploring a range of substantive areas, such as, for example, the use of force, the law regulating the conduct of war, International Human Rights, International Criminal Law and International Environmental Law.
100% Coursework
SOC5005MX
Globalisation and Social Justice
20 credits
This module investigates the key debates of globalisation and critically evaluates, in terms of its economic, political, socio-cultural and legal dimensions, the causes and consequences of a globalising world. It furthermore explores a range of international social justice issues to examine the relationships (causative and ameliorative) between policies and (in)justice
60% Coursework
40% Practicals
SOC6004MX
Health, Medical Power and Social Justice
20 credits
This module considers a range of issues concerning health, illness and medical power in contemporary society. The module seeks to develop an understanding of the impact of ‘medicalisation’ on everyday life, as well as the importance of social divisions, such as age, gender, ethnicity and socio-economic status. There will be a focus on a range of sociological perspectives on health with an opportunity to focus upon areas of particular interest.
100% Coursework
CRM6011MX
Security Management
20 credits
This module provides students with a critical insight into the professional domain of security management. It provides an overview of the theories, policies, procedures and practices that underpin the work of the security manager, and focuses upon a career-relevant knowledge and understanding of this significant area of expertise.
70% Coursework
30% Tests
CRM5003MX
Harm in the 21st Century
20 credits
This module explores the global challenges of harmful behaviours and activities in contemporary society by considering specific areas of concern for criminologists. By drawing on real-world examples in everyday life, the module examines how social problems and issues have arisen due to processes of globalisation that have changed the social, political and economic landscape of the 21st century.
100% Coursework
CRM5009MX
Crime, Harm and Culture
20 credits
The module aims to provide students with a critical appreciation of harm and crime by exploring relevant issues from film, television, music, fiction literature and art. By applying a criminological lens to different forms of popular culture, students will be able to examine a variety of media forms in terms of its content and its contemporary political, social and economic context using different theories and concepts.
100% Coursework
“The creative arts are a brilliant way for people to express feelings they might not be ready to talk about.
Creative writing and painting are positive mediums to express my emotions. Poetry in particular helps process my experiences with masculinity and mental health.â€
Take advantage of the many opportunities on offer to develop the knowledge and practical experience to succeed.
Options without limit
The broad variety of skills you will hone are highly valued in almost every field, giving you access to numerous career pathways.
Expand your horizons overseas
Experience other cultures and grow your network by studying or working abroad in either Europe or the US.
Gain invaluable experience with INK, our in-house magazine, building skills in everything from desktop publishing to editing and magazine journalism.
Dr Mandy Bloomfield
Associate Professor in Modern and Contemporary Literature
Professor Anthony Caleshu
Professor
Dr Russell Evans
Lecturer in Creative Writing
The overall vibe of the city is perfect. You are by the sea so it is still laid back, but you have all the conveniences of living in a city.
My degree and my lecturers taught me to take responsibility for my creative output, and my work ethic since graduating has become rock solid… Studying at Plymouth was like someone opening a door and saying ‘go explore; go see what you can do.’
Creative writing has enabled me to write about anything and everything. The possibilities are endless, which I believe is exactly how writing should be.
I found Plymouth a particularly supportive and nurturing university with lecturing staff who care about the progress of their students.
4 years
(+ optional placement)
Full-time
4 years
(+ optional placement)
Full-time