Bachelor of Arts (BA)

BA Film Studies and Music

Combine study in Film Studies and Music through our joint honours course.
  • Duration: 3 years
  • Year of entry: 2025
  • UCAS course code: PW30 / Institution code: M20

Full entry requirementsHow to apply

Fees and funding

Fees

Tuition fees for home students commencing their studies in September 2025 will be £9,535 per annum (subject to Parliamentary approval). Tuition fees for international students will be £26,500 per annum. For general information please see the undergraduate finance pages.

Policy on additional costs

All students should normally be able to complete their programme of study without incurring additional study costs over and above the tuition fee for that programme. Any unavoidable additional compulsory costs totalling more than 1% of the annual home undergraduate fee per annum, regardless of whether the programme in question is undergraduate or postgraduate taught, will be made clear to you at the point of application. Further information can be found in the University's Policy on additional costs incurred by students on undergraduate and postgraduate taught programmes (PDF document, 91KB).

Scholarships/sponsorships

Course unit details:
Music and Its Contexts

Course unit fact file
Unit code MUSC10512
Credit rating 20
Unit level Level 1
Teaching period(s) Semester 2
Available as a free choice unit? Yes

Overview

This course explores three different musical cultures/repertories and their contexts, focusing on such overall themes as ‘Making History: Progress and Tradition’; or ‘Musical Identities and Awakenings’. Each block of lectures examines a discrete aspect of music history within specific historical,  geographical, social and cultural boundaries. The precise content of the three blocks changes from year to year, but previous topics have included ‘The New German School (Liszt and Wagner)’,‘Nordic Music and National Awakenings’, and ‘Bob Dylan, the American Folk Revival and Protest Song’. 

Pre/co-requisites

Available as free choice, but note prerequisite of A Level Music or Grade VIII Theory or equivalent.

Aims

  • To promote active and critical engagement with different musics and cultures
  • To introduce a range of skills relating to researching, thinking and writing about music and its artistic, cultural and social contexts
  • To provide a foundation for further study in the fields of musicology and/or ethnomusicology

Knowledge and understanding

By the end of this course students will be able to:

  • Engage intellectually with a wide range of music and its stylistic, aesthetic, cultural, social and political contexts
  • Demonstrate an understanding of a range of different ways of approaching musicological study, and of the inherent problems in constructing a historical narrative
  • Define and apply the appropriate skills required for University-level study, including research gathering, note-taking, critical reading and writing

 

Intellectual skills

By the end of this course students will be able to:

•    Research and write about a range of music and cultures and relevant critical issues
•    Analyse and evaluate historical methods as used in musicological discourse
•    Reflect critically on music’s interaction with aesthetic, cultural and political context
 

 

Practical skills

By the end of this course students will be able to:

  • Show that they can access scholarly writings and resources in a range of media, including electronic resources
  • Draw together ideas from a range of sources, with developing skills in the organization, interpretation and synthesis of information
  • Develop and sustain a coherent argument in both written and verbal forms

Transferable skills and personal qualities

By the end of this course students will be able to:

  • Show a burgeoning ability to produce good-quality work independently with developing critical self-awareness
  • Demonstrate a growing ability to communicate ideas and information clearly in written and verbal form
  • Demonstrate increasing levels of intellectual curiosity and the potential to approach tasks in a systematic and creative way
     

Employability skills

Analytical skills
Analytical skills (analysing texts, musical scores and other materials)
Group/team working
Working in a team (seminar discussions)
Oral communication
Communication skills (oral and written)
Problem solving
Creative problem-solving (fulfilling a set task with the resources available)
Research
Digital skills (information searches in databases, catalogues and other online environments
Written communication
Communication skills (oral and written)
Other
Time management skills (submitting material to fixed deadlines)

Assessment methods

Assessment TaskFormative or SummativeWeighting
Informal Preparatory tasksFormative0%
Coursework project (essay)Summative50%
Open-book examSummative50%

 

 

 

Feedback methods

Feedback methodFormative or Summative
Oral feedback on seminar contributions, and general advice given in seminarFormative
Group feedback on seminar tasksFormative
Written feedback on essay and examinationSummative
Additional one-to-one feedback (during consultation hours or by making an appointment)Formative

 

Recommended reading

Each block of the course unit has its own reading and listening lists.  The following titles provide general support for all three blocks:

  • Beard, David and Kenneth Gloag, Musicology: The Key Concepts, 2nd edition (London: Routledge, 2016).  
  • Clayton, Martin, Trevor Herbert and Richard Middleton (eds.), The Cultural Study of Music: A Critical Introduction, 2nd edition (New York and Abingdon: Routledge, 2012).
  • Garratt, James, Music and Politics: A Critical Introduction (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2018).
  • Spitzer, Michael, The Musical Human: A History of Life on Earth (London: Bloomsbury, 2021).  
  • Taruskin, Richard, The Oxford History of Western Music, 5 vols. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009). 

 

Study hours

Scheduled activity hours
Lectures 21
Seminars 6
Independent study hours
Independent study 173

Teaching staff

Staff member Role
Caroline Bithell Unit coordinator

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