Film Studies and Africa & Black Diaspora

Film studies and Africa and black diaspora studies is a combination that brings together two fields with deep and productive connections. Film studies examines cinema as a cultural form, developing the critical, theoretical, and historical tools to analyse how moving images are made, distributed, and received, and how they construct and contest representations of race, identity, and belonging. Africa and black diaspora studies addresses the histories, cultures, and experiences of African peoples and their diasporas around the world, engaging with questions of colonialism, slavery, resistance, creativity, and the ongoing shaping of global culture by African and diasporic voices.

Together, the two subjects offer an unusually powerful framework for understanding cinema's role in representing and reshaping the world.

At the School of Oriental and African Studies this three-year full-time programme is taught within an institution with exceptional depth in the study of Africa and the Global South, giving your film studies a distinctive grounding in the cultures and histories it engages with. You will study film across its global dimensions, with particular attention to African cinema, black diaspora cinema, and the representation of race and identity on screen, alongside theoretical and historical approaches that situate these questions in their social and political contexts. A foundation year route is available for students who would benefit from additional academic preparation.

Graduates from this combination pursue careers in film programming and curation, arts journalism, broadcasting, cultural organisations, education, publishing, research, and advocacy. The combination of film literacy and deep knowledge of African and diasporic cultures is genuinely distinctive and valuable in organisations concerned with representation, diversity, and global cinema. Many graduates continue to postgraduate study in film studies, African studies, or cultural theory, often with a view to research, curatorial, or educational careers.