57110 Cultural Studies Seminar

Handbook description

This subject is designed to develop students' original ideas within the context of contemporary cultural studies. A range of theoretical approaches are revisited, including Marxist, feminist, structuralist and poststructuralist, phenomenological, and so on, and associated research methods are detailed. It is expected that students acquire a working vocabulary of technical terms and an understanding of how these approaches feed into the contemporary field of cultural studies. All of these theories are presented as having an applied value. Accordingly, case studies involving relevant cultural concerns are developed by the lecturer in the class, in conjunction with students' own projects, where possible. In terms of the outcome, it is expected that students are able to present clearly their ideas in class and write an essay which shows a degree of sophistication in the manipulation of concepts and writing techniques, including argumentation, description, narration and persuasion.