Art History & Visual Culture and English

Art history and visual culture studied alongside English literature is a combination that develops two closely related ways of reading, one focused on the image and one on the text, and trains you to move fluently between them. Art history examines how visual objects, paintings, sculptures, photographs, films and architectural forms are made, what meanings they carry and how those meanings are shaped by their social, historical and cultural contexts. English literature brings a parallel set of skills to written texts, asking how literary works create meaning, how they engage with and respond to their historical moment and how the formal choices writers make shape the experience of reading.

Together they develop a rich and comparative approach to cultural analysis.

At the University of Exeter this three-year programme draws on departments with strong research reputations in both fields. You will develop your visual analysis and art historical knowledge alongside your skills in literary criticism and close reading, working across a wide range of periods and genres in both disciplines. A sandwich year and work placements provide professional experience, and a year abroad gives you the opportunity to engage with art and literature in a different national context, which is particularly valuable for developing comparative perspectives and for encountering collections and literary traditions that may not be readily accessible from the UK.

Graduates of this combination work in galleries, museums, heritage organisations, publishing, journalism, arts administration, education, cultural policy and curatorial roles. The depth of critical and interpretive skill the degree develops, alongside the ability to write clearly and engagingly about complex cultural material, is valued across the wider cultural sector and beyond. Many graduates go on to postgraduate study in art history, English literature, museum and gallery studies, cultural theory or publishing, using the undergraduate programme as a foundation for specialist study or research.