Literature and Art History

Literature and art history together offer a remarkably rich way of studying culture. Both disciplines are concerned with how human beings make meaning through constructed objects, whether those objects are texts or images, and both ask questions about the relationship between form, content, context and interpretation. Studying them together allows you to move between the written word and the visual image, developing a comparative understanding of how different media work and how they have influenced and responded to each other throughout history.

At the University of Essex, this three-year full-time degree takes advantage of the institution's distinctive approach to literary and cultural study, and its commitment to the most current developments in both fields. You will explore literature across genres and periods, developing skills of close reading, critical argument and historical contextualisation, while also studying the history of visual art and engaging with the methodologies and debates that shape art historical scholarship. The programme encourages you to examine the interactions and differences between literary and visual culture: moments when writers and painters respond to the same events or ideas, when aesthetic movements develop across both media, and when the relationship between text and image is itself a subject of artistic and critical interest.

Research, critical writing and independent analytical thinking are central throughout. You will develop the ability to move fluently between different kinds of evidence and different modes of interpretation, which is both intellectually rewarding and genuinely valuable in careers that require you to work with complex cultural material.

Graduates from literature and art history degrees move into arts and cultural administration, curating, education, publishing, journalism, heritage, broadcasting, communications, and the creative industries. Postgraduate study in literature, art history, cultural studies, or museum and gallery practice is a well-supported pathway.