Centre for Media and Film Studies
The Centre for Media and Film Studies at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) is one of the very few centres in the world which specializes in the vital and increasingly important developments taking place in the cultural industries - media, communications and film – globally, but especially when and how they involve the non-Western world. Our focus in teaching and research extends from the traditional media to the multiple alternative spaces of cultural production and from big cinema screens to small mobile phone screens. We are interested in how convergence and digitalization are bringing these industries closer together and how and why diverse actors engage in these industries in different ways.
We recognize that we live in a multi-platform and multi-centred media world in which the global balance is changing rapidly and therefore are committed to addressing theoretically and empirically the Eurocentrism which still pervades so much discussion of the non-Western world. We focus on the dynamism and complexity of communications in regions like Asia, the Middle East and Africa. Our staff have specialist knowledge of these cultures, societies, political economies, politics and their inter-relations.
Taught Masters degrees
The Centre has been running four quite distinct MA degrees, each of which addresses different sets of issues in non-western media and film. In September 2012, it is introducing an MA Media and Development.
- MA Critical Media and Cultural Studies
- MA Global Media and Post-National Communication
- MA Film and History
- MA Global Cinemas and the transcultural
Phil/PhD/Research
The Centre has an exceptionally vibrant and varied research atmosphere, and draws students and post-doctoral researchers worldwide. We have strong and specialist expertise in the media, communications and film environments of different regions of Asia, the Middle East and Africa and their diasporas. We draw upon an eclectic range of disciplinary approaches – media and cultural studies, political communication, anthropology, sociology, film and performance studies and development studies – and accommodate perspectives and research methods from both the humanities and the social sciences. We have started a new route of PhD with practical component in 2007. Our cohort of PhD students work on different aspects of media and development, media and political change, film cultures, performance, ethnography of media production and digitalized cultures in the Middle East.
Media Practice
The Centre stresses the close link between theory, practice and participation. Courses have film and media showings, and students are encouraged to undertake their own media projects as part of their degrees, whether MA or PhD. We have a PhD with practical component which enables research students to bring together written and audio-visual analyses.
Collaboration
The Centre has developed close collaboration with other colleges in the University of London, which enables us to provide unparalleled depth and breadth of expertise in media and film. We are also a member of the University of London Screen Studies group, which hosts regular international symposia and has its own postgraduate training programme.
Get on the Carousel
Project Carousel is a student-led online community based at the Centre for Media and Film Studies. It is rapidly becoming an important resource for contemporary media and film issues in the Global South. We aim to encourage discussion and connections between academia, media practitioners and the general public around the world. We welcome guest editorials. If you are interested in participating, please click here
Contact:
- E-mail:
- mediaandfilm@soas.ac.uk
