Film Studies and English Language

Film studies and English language is a pairing that explores two of the most powerful ways human beings make and share meaning: through moving images and through language itself. Film studies examines cinema as an art form, a cultural industry, and a social force, asking how films construct meaning through narrative, cinematography, editing, sound, and genre, and how different national cinemas reflect the societies that produce them. English language and linguistics takes a scientific approach to language, examining how it is structured, how it varies across communities and contexts, how it is used in social interaction, and how it shapes and is shaped by culture.

At the University of Manchester, this three-year, full-time programme allows you to develop genuine depth in both disciplines simultaneously. The film studies strand will take you across classical and contemporary cinema, covering a wide range of film cultures from around the world and developing your capacity to analyse moving image texts with historical and theoretical sophistication. The linguistics strand will build your understanding of how language works at every level, from the phonological to the discursive, and how its study illuminates the everyday phenomenon that we all depend on but rarely examine.

The programme includes a year abroad, broadening your academic and personal horizons and giving you the opportunity to study film and language in a different cultural context.

A typical entry tariff of 136 points reflects the academic expectations of a major research university. Graduates from film studies and English language programmes go on to careers in journalism, broadcasting, film criticism, education, publishing, media production, communications, and academic research. The combination of visual literacy and linguistic analysis is distinctive and valuable in any career that depends on understanding how meaning is made and communicated.

Many graduates continue to postgraduate study in film studies, linguistics, media studies, or education, building on the dual expertise developed in the undergraduate degree.