BA Journalism and Sociology

Program Overview

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How is the power of the media changing our society? How can we use it to share information? What can we tell about our audience? Why do people behave a certain way? Our BA Journalism and Sociology will enable you to learn about contemporary society, media and digital society, alongside developing your journalistic skills, helping you to analyse information and understand it within the wider social context. In the digital society, where demand for news is at an all-time high, this course will give you a strong understanding of the world we live in and how to engage with the audience, allowing you to develop your own unique journalistic style. You explore a wide spectrum of topics ranging from crime to digital society. This will be combined with the practical journalism component of the course; where you develop your skills in using multi-media channels such as radio, television and online media and deepen your knowledge of journalism on an international scale. This course gives you the flexibility to choose the areas of the subject that interest you. Topics which you can study include:

• Mass Media
• Production skills
• Digital Society
• International Journalism

During your final year, you will have the opportunity to bring all aspects of the course together in a final multimedia project on a subject linked to the sociology element of your studies. As a student at one of the UK’s leading social science institutions, you are uniquely placed to acquire a deep understanding of the world you report on. You will join our Department of Literature, Film, and Theatre Studies and our Department of Sociology which is rated top 10 in the UK for research quality ( REF 2014 ) and ranked among the top 50 departments in the QS World University Rankings by Subject (2020). Why we're great.

• Our journalism teaching staff have a broad range of up-to-date hands-on industry experience.
• You create and broadcast your own online content, radio and TV programmes.
• You can build your knowledge of multimedia journalism whilst also specialising in your favourite subject.

Study abroad

Your education extends beyond the university campus. We support you in expanding your education through offering the opportunity to spend a year or a term studying abroad at one of our partner universities. The four-year version of our degree allows you to spend the third year abroad or employed on a placement abroad, while otherwise remaining identical to the three-year course. Studying abroad allows you to experience other cultures and languages, to broaden your degree socially and academically, and to demonstrate to employers that you are mature, adaptable, and organised. If you spend a full year abroad you'll only pay 15% of your usual tuition fee to Essex for that year. You won't pay any tuition fees to your host university

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Our expert staff

At Essex you learn from the best. Our course director Tim Fenton , is a former managing editor of the BBC News Online website and a journalist with more than 35 years' industry experience ranging from sports reporting for local radio to presenting and producing national current affairs programmes on TV and radio. Other core journalism staff include:

• Penny Wrout, a former BBC correspondent and producer who is currently a freelance documentary film-maker and multimedia arts producer.
• Paul Anderson , former editor of Tribune and deputy editor of the New Statesman , who now works as a print/online subeditor on the Guardian .
• Dr Fatima el Issawi , an international correspondent with more than 15 years’ experience covering conflict zones for a wide range of broadcast and online outlets including Agence France Press and the BBC.
• Dr Alexandros Antoniou , lecturer in media law and a specialist in communications regulation, intellectual property and cybercrime.

Throughout the course you also have the opportunity to meet visiting lecturers and teachers who are leading figures in different branches of journalism, and who provide an important link to an extended network of industry practitioners. Our sociology team includes: Professor Mike Roper, Professor Joan Busfield, Dr Michael Halewood, Dr Roisin Ryan-Flood, Dr Linsey McGoey, Professor Pam Cox, Professor Ewa Morawska and Dr Neli Demireva. You may already be familiar with our academics before you meet them in lectures; core A-level texts are written by our team. Our world-leading academics have their fingers on the pulse of modern society; whether it’s the battle between Apple and Spotify or the exploitation of female bodybuilders, we embed our innovative and sometimes controversial research into your course.

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Specialist facilities

As a journalism student at Essex, your material is published on a dedicated website , and you also spend time gaining on-the-job experience with a range of professional news operations, creating and publishing stories and building up a portfolio of published and broadcast work. You work in a purpose-built newsroom with access to television, radio studios, and computer software that allows journalists to create and edit content across all media and platforms quickly and professionally. The University’s Media Centre is equipped with state-of-the-art studios, cameras, audio and lighting equipment, and an industry-standard editing suite. You can also gain experience with our Students’ Union media platform Rebel , and benefit from access to our sociology facilities:

• A unique Student Resource Centre where you can get help with your studies, access examples of previous students’ work, and attend workshops on research skills
• The Sociology Common Room is open all day Monday-Friday, is stocked with daily newspapers, magazines and journals, and has free drinks available
• Links with the Institute of Social and Economic Research, which conducts large-scale survey projects and has its own library, and the UK Data Archive, which stores national research data like the British Crime Survey
• Our students’ Sociology Society, a forum for the exchange of ideas, arranging talks by visiting speakers, introducing you to various career pathways, and organising debates
• At Essex, we give you the opportunity to learn a language at no additional cost alongside your degree

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Your future

Our BA Journalism and Sociology, will equip you with the skills needed to pursue a number of different careers. You gain the ability to understand the digital society that we live in today and link this to the journalism methods you have studied and how they should be used. You compile an impressive portfolio of published work and complete a detailed multimedia project linked to sociology in your final year, allowing you to offer real evidence of your range and capabilities to future employers. You become a multi-skilled story-teller, familiar with production techniques in television, radio, online and newspaper journalism, and with the option to gain advanced skills in specific areas in your final year.

Program Outline

Course structure

Our research-led teaching is continually evolving to address the latest challenges and breakthroughs in the field. The following modules are based on the current course structure and may change in response to new curriculum developments and innovation. We understand that deciding where and what to study is a very important decision for you. We’ll make all reasonable efforts to provide you with the courses, services and facilities as described on our website. However, if we need to make material changes, for example due to significant disruption, or in response to COVID-19, we’ll let our applicants and students know as soon as possible.

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Components

Components are the blocks of study that make up your course. A component may have a set module which you must study, or a number of modules from which you can choose. Each component has a status and carries a certain number of credits towards your qualification.

Status	What this means
Core	You must take the set module for this component and you must pass. No failure can be permitted.
Core with Options	You can choose which module to study from the available options for this component but you must pass. No failure can be permitted.
Compulsory	You must take the set module for this component. There may be limited opportunities to continue on the course/be eligible for the qualification if you fail.
Compulsory with Options	You can choose which module to study from the available options for this component. There may be limited opportunities to continue on the course/be eligible for the qualification if you fail.
Optional	You can choose which module to study from the available options for this component. There may be limited opportunities to continue on the course/be eligible for the qualification if you fail.

The modules that are available for you to choose for each component will depend on several factors, including which modules you have chosen for other components, which modules you have completed in previous years of your course, and which term the module is taught in.

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Modules

Modules are the individual units of study for your course. Each module has its own set of learning outcomes and assessment criteria and also carries a certain number of credits. In most cases you will study one module per component, but in some cases you may need to study more than one module. For example, a 30-credit component may comprise of either one 30-credit module, or two 15-credit modules, depending on the options available. Modules may be taught at different times of the year and by a different department or school to the one your course is primarily based in. You can find this information from the module code . For example, the module code HR100-4-FY means:

HR	100	4	FY
The department or school the module will be taught by. In this example, the module would be taught by the Department of History.	The module number.	The UK academic level of the module. A standard undergraduate course will comprise of level 4, 5 and 6 modules - increasing as you progress through the course. A standard postgraduate taught course will comprise of level 7 modules. A postgraduate research degree is a level 8 qualification.	The term the module will be taught in. AU : Autumn term SP : Spring term SU : Summer term FY : Full year AP : Autumn and Spring terms PS: Spring and Summer terms AS: Autumn and Summer terms

Year 1 Year 2 Final Year This module introduces you to the basics of news and of storytelling, core skills for all jobs in journalism. You discuss the nature of news and how to identify a story, learn how to look for and uncover the information that will make a story, and study the different ways in which that information can be presented. You develop your skills in absorbing and condensing information and producing an accurate and engaging narrative. Understanding the need to check and verify everything that you write, you begin to learn the basics of multimedia production, and start producing content for print, online, radio and television outlets. You work on practical reporting assignments from an early stage. View Practical Reporting, Interviewing and Production (Joint Honours) on our Module Directory How can sociology help you understand the world in which you live? What are some of the major features and trends in present-day societies? Using sociological tools, you analyse key features of different societies, such as stratification, poverty, racism, consumption, multinational corporations, religion, and the gender division of labour in low-income countries. View The Sociological Imagination on our Module Directory This module is all about how the internet has transformed the media in the 21st century. Building on the History of Journalism module, this module is taking in several related topics, including the way the internet has changed the working practices and business models of existing news media organisations – local, national and international; the increasing dominance of social networking corporations in advertising; the rise of ‘citizen journalism’ online; how journalists can use social media; the challenge of big data for journalists, from Wikileaks to ‘fake news’; the difficulties of regulation in the online age. The scope is broad: you will be encouraged to explore the economic, political and ethical issues of the still-emerging new media landscape in all its aspects and to engage with debates worldwide. The majority of reading is extremely contemporary – and liable to week-by-week change – and the format of classes will be a mix of lectures, seminars and audio-visual material. View Journalism Now on our Module Directory What research methods do sociologists use? And what are the methodologies underpinning them? Wish to learn how to critically evaluate social research? And receive training in collecting quantitative and qualitative data? We study the principles of social science investigation and how to carry out original research. View Researching Social Life I on our Module Directory This module covers the history of journalism in Britain from its beginnings in the 17th century to the start of the internet age. Topics include: the impact of printing; the first news serials; government attempts to control the press from the 17th to the 19th centuries; the emergence of mass circulation papers; the role of press barons in the 20th century; radio and the rise of the BBC; the press from 1945 to 2000; the arrival and development of television; ownership and control of the media; and the impact of the internet. The module critically considers the evolving political, economic and social contexts of journalism and the media more generally, underpinning and informing the content of all other elements of the degree course. View History of Journalism on our Module Directory This module focuses on helping you to operate effectively in a number of different news and features platforms, and with a clear understanding of the distinctive nature of each and its implications for the way you work. Supported by your tutor, you find news and features stories, pitch them in editorial meetings, research, write, edit, proof-read and determine how best to present and publish them. You develop your use of social media, and understand more about how social networks are used as a part of mainstream journalism. As you begin to produce radio and television programming for streaming across the campus, classes will examine interviewing techniques, voice training and presentational techniques. View Audio and Video for Broadcast and Online (Joint Honours) on our Module Directory Alongside and complementary to the Multimedia Journalism module, this module develops the technical and production skills you learned in Year 1. You examine in more detail the individual characteristics and technical requirements of different media, and to start producing radio, television and more advanced print and online content, both on your own and as part of a team. You learn how to use appropriate editing software, and to produce engaging and dynamic content in each medium. View Feature Writing and Magazine Project for Print and Online (Joint Honours) on our Module Directory Want to study sociological classics? Wish to read and interpret original texts by Marx, Durkheim and Weber? Then study a selection of the contemporary writers who followed? We look at classic and modern thinkers, carrying their ideas into new contexts and inverting approaches to social understanding. View Power and Agency in a Global World on our Module Directory Does technology determine history? Can games teach us about power? Does software shape society? Develop a critical understanding of the role played by human-machine relationships in contemporary cultural change. Evaluate recent developments in media technologies from a sociological perspective. Develop your own blog as part of your final assessment. View Digital Society on our Module Directory This module provides an insight into the major legal questions facing the media, and an appreciation of the complexity of journalism and publication generally in a global context. You consider a broad outline of the principal areas of UK law that apply to the media, and which are set in turn against broader principles as enshrined in the European Convention on Human Rights. A range of themes around Article 6 (Fair Trial), Article 8 (Privacy) and Article 10 (Free Speech) will be explored against practice and issues in a selection of other jurisdictions, including the UK’s equivalent focus on Contempt, Confidentiality and Libel . View Comparative Media Law and Regulation on our Module Directory This module builds on everything you have learned so far about writing, reporting and production, with a particular emphasis on the broadcast media of radio and television. You will already have had the opportunity to gain extensive experience of newspaper and online reporting, and this module will bring your broadcast skills up to the same high standard of knowledge and expertise. This module will also prepare you for the Specialist Option element of your NCTJ Diploma. View Advanced Practical Journalism on our Module Directory How do you understand contemporary society? What role do key topics like modernity, post-modernity, feminism and capitalism play? And what do contemporary theorists like Foucault and Bourdieu say? Learn why philosophical knowledge is vital for sociological understanding, while deepening your own awareness of the subject. View Rethinking Modernity on our Module Directory What impact has the printed press had on our social and cultural life? What about radio, cinema, TV and recorded music? And how important is all this in the light of new technological advancements? Examine the development of our mass media culture, from the nineteenth century to the present day. View Mass Media and Modern Life on our Module Directory COMPONENT 05: COMPULSORY WITH OPTIONS LT396-6-AU or LT969-6-AU (15 CREDITS)

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Teaching

• Teaching will mainly take the form of lectures and classes of about 20 students
• Opportunities for placements
• Mentoring from professionals in your specialist subject
• A typical timetable involves a one-hour lecture and a one-hour class for each of your modules every week

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Assessment

• Your final mark for each module is determined half by coursework and half by examination
• A mark for class participation is included in your coursework mark