Postcolonial Studies

This programme explores colonial and postcolonial writing, film and theory. The historical and contemporary movements and migrations of peoples challenge how we understand ‘culture’, and this programme encourages you to think about the location of culture within and beyond the nation-state. One of the first institutions to teach colonial and postcolonial writing in the UK, Stirling has a strong national and international reputation in this area.

Programme Objectives

Coming to study at Stirling for the MLitt Postcolonial Studies you will find yourself in a thriving postgraduate culture that brings together students and academic staff from many fields of expertise and where research students play a crucial role in helping Postcolonial Studies to remain at the cutting edge of its multiple disciplines.

Entrance Requirements

English Language Requirements

If English is not your first language, you must provide evidence of your proficiency such as a minimum IELTS score of 6 (minimum 5.5 in each skill), or TOEFL: Listening 21, Reading 22, Speaking 23, Writing 21.

Funding

information on possible sources of funding

Modes of Study

Full-time: one year
Part-time: 27 months

September

Structure and Content

Both full-time and part-time students will take a postcolonial studies core module over two semesters. In Semester One you will also study:

• Travelling Theories: Key works in postcolonial theory.
  

In Semester Two you will also study:

• Borderlands: Reading borders in writing, film and theory.
  

Further optional modules allow you to develop a more specialised knowledge. You will take one of these modules each semester. If you are on the part-time programme you will take the two optional modules in year two.

These modules vary depending on teaching staff, but they have included the following:

• Migrant Metropolis
• Contemporary Black British Writing
• Routes: Fictions of Travel
• Slavery and Caribbean Poetry
• Transition: West African Writing
• South Asian Diasporas
• Film and Diaspora
• Aboriginal Writing and Painting
• Postcolonial Gothic

Arts Research Training
Our innovative training for graduates enables students to build up a portfolio of skills that prepare them for academic and professional life. All graduate students will work with their supervisors to select what’s right for them from a menu of activities. Each student will build up a portfolio of skills every year. On a taught postgraduate degree, you may be given specific guidance on what activities you need to undertake for those qualifications.

Delivery and Assessment

Teaching will take the form of regular tutorials in small groups. Though all the modules will offer close and careful supervision, you are expected to take proper responsibility for your own studies. The aim in all cases is to foster student-led learning in expert, stimulating and congenial company. Assessment in each semester will be based on coursework and essays; there are no formal examinations. Methods of assessment for each of the non-core modules may vary, but will often consist of a single essay.

Dissertation
The most significant piece of work on the programme will be a dissertation of 15,000 words on a subject of your choosing in consultation with a member of English Studies. You may choose to develop work initiated on one of the modules you have studied. Those who do not embark on the dissertation may be awarded a Diploma. The work of the best students completing the programme may be deemed worthy of MLitt with Distinction.

Timetable

Contact the School for information on your timetable and reading lists.

RAE Rating

Over half of our submissions in the most recent Research Assessment Exercise (RAE), were found to be ‘Internationally Excellent’ or ‘World- leading’.

Career Opportunities

Completing a Master’s degree as a prelude to further academic research is an increasingly common pattern of study for young scholars and is a route encouraged by the Arts and Humanities Research Council.

Advanced education in the Arts, the practical experience of research and the production of a dissertation are significant transferable skills for many careers in business and the professions.