American Studies MA

Entry requirements

Applicants should normally have a first degree in the subject or an equivalent area at 2:2 or above. Candidates who do not have a first degree in History will be required to have an interview.

Months of entry

September

Course content

If you enjoy approaching a subject from different angles and challenging yourself to see things in new ways, this could be the course for you. This course takes a broad approach to questions of identity, nationalism, race, sexuality and gender in the USA. We consider America as a cultural construct as well as a geographical and political entity.

This programme is one of the few one-year taught MA American Studies programmes in the country. We offer a range of modules designed to develop your understanding of the United States through a range of historical, literary and cultural perspectives.

This degree offers a tightly integrated programme with a selection of modules that will enrich your research methods and approaches in the American Studies subject-area. Whilst concentrating on the core aspects of American Studies you will be encouraged to pursue your research through avenues of related subjects (History, Literature and Film) forming a holistic, yet inter-disciplinary, approach. The modules offered emphasise a cross-fertilisation of subject areas, promoting an international perspective towards America, such as global concerns and transnational considerations, thus shifting from the original constructs of America, ‘American uniqueness’ and ‘exceptionalism’ (Brian Edwards, Globalising American Studies, 2010).

This programme is, therefore, well-suited to those students who prefer diversity to the narrower focus of a single-subject Master’s degree.

The suite of taught modules have been carefully constructed to take you on a series of journeys - from a discussion of American Studies itself as an approach, and then from the immediate localities, regions and borders of the United States, to the wider national and international settings. This will offer multi-perspective interpretations of the United States, internally, with its neighbours and with the rest of the world.

You will engage in an inter-connected sequence of debates which will lead you to a greater understanding of the complexity of the United States as a cultural construct as well as a geographical and political entity.

Fees and funding