Arts MRes
1 Year Full-Time | September Start

In this module you will identify a research question and produce a 20,000 word dissertation or portfolio of practical work with an accompanying 10,000-word dissertation, which represents the culmination of your postgraduate studies on the MRes programme. It will enable you to apply the skills you have acquired in other modules and yield a discrete body of primary sources related to an identifiable area of enquiry. As an exercise in advanced research, it is intended to develop further your research skills and your ability to work independently as autonomous learner. It is the capstone project for your Masters of Research. Your Dissertation topic will be informed by your work on previous modules and your aims/objectives for this project, your future career direction and macro considerations, such as social responsible design/arts, ethical research and the benefit of research to wider communities. A series of seminar/workshops through the module will provide you with information on gathering primary/secondary data, information analysis, research thinking and writing skills and practice-led /based research, all with the aim of feeding into high quality Dissertation outputs. Your individual supervisor(s) will encourage you to engage with cultural, economic, strategic and social themes, critical discussion and high quality debate related to your area of enquiry. You will operate as part of an early career researcher community of practice, in contact with other researchers and interdisciplinary groups.

In this module you will develop an aspect of your research project and present it in a professional manner to an audience of academics and students. You will work with classmates to organize, advertise, and present a one-day symposium of research papers that express your scholarly projects. The module aims to advance your professional skills and professional abilities by practice. You will learn how to effectively present a piece of research, develop event planning skills, gain practical project management experience, all of which are necessary to sustain this type of work.

In this module you will be equipped with a range of core skills essential to research in the arts, as well as specific methodologies appropriate to your specialist field of enquiry (as historian, critic or theoretician). There are four key elements to the module: identifying the key issues and methodologies appropriate to your subject; identifying and retrieving appropriate data and sources; understanding ways to evaluate and employ these sources, and the implications of doing so; and developing and a practicable appreciation of how theory, research methods and practice mutually inform the creation of knowledge in the arts.
On completing the module you will have an enhanced awareness of how the choice of methodologies can fundamentally influence the direction of your research, and be able to: Understand and employ a range of advanced research skills, methods and critical approaches necessary to conduct a major academic research project in the arts; exhibit enhanced skills in the identification and evaluation of research sources relevant to your specific project and articulate a strategy for retrieving and utilising those sources; understand the characteristics of research questions, and frame your specific research questions within a feasible and sustainable topic of enquiry, appropriate to available research materials; develop original responses to the historical and conceptual questions posed by the research topic and to be able to situate your research within the larger context of research in the arts; communicate complex arguments and methods in written, visual and verbal form in a clear and credible way.

This module will address the intellectual contexts for research in the visual arts, media and design. You will examine the wider conceptual and theoretical frameworks that inform and impact upon your specific research project. In doing so you will assess how these frameworks reflect and inform a variety of historical, visual, performative and literary texts and practices (in the fields of fine art, film and television, performance, cultural and media studies, and history of art and contemporary design and design history), and are interrelated with broader cultural, social and political developments.
You will analyse how writers, critics, historians and practitioners think about knowledge and how they pursue their disciplines from epistemological and theoretical perspectives. In this way you will develop a structured overview of the ways in which key critical writing has changed over time, and how theory and conceptual thinking has influenced those working within disciplinary and cross-disciplinary fields.
On completion of the module, you will have developed original and critical responses to key theoretical questions raised via the analysis of sources, ideas, and other bodies of work, and be able to:
Locate your research within wider relevant disciplinary debates; demonstrate an enhanced knowledge of selected theories, concepts and critical literatures, and how to employ them in regard to your own research; interrogate and problematise theories and concepts; demonstrate how curiosity and dynamic debate underpin academic enquiry; communicate complex ideas, and their relevance to your research project, in open discussion and formal written, visual and verbal forms in a clear and credible way.

Academic skills when studying away from your home country can differ due to cultural and language differences in teaching and assessment practices. This module is designed to support your transition in the use and practice of technical language and subject specific skills around assessments and teaching provision in your chosen subject. The overall aim of this module is to develop your abilities to read and study effectively for academic purposes; to develop your skills in analysing and using source material in seminars and academic writing and to develop your use and application of language and communications skills to a higher level.

The topics you will cover on the module include:

• Understanding assignment briefs and exam questions.
• Developing academic writing skills, including citation, paraphrasing, and summarising.
• Practising ‘critical reading’ and ‘critical writing’
• Planning and structuring academic assignments (e.g. essays, reports and presentations).
• Avoiding academic misconduct and gaining credit by using academic sources and referencing effectively.
• Listening skills for lectures.
• Speaking in seminar presentations.
• Presenting your ideas
• Giving discipline-related academic presentations, experiencing peer observation, and receiving formative feedback.
• Effective reading techniques.
• Developing self-reflection skills.
• Discussing ethical issues in research, and analysing results.
• Describing bias and limitations of research.