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Interdisciplinary Taught Postgraduate Courses

As well as our wide-ranging postgraduate courses in Literary Studies we contribute to interdisciplinary postgraduate qualifications. These give English students the opportunity to apply their skills in relation to other subjects, and in ways that may have transferrable benefits to future careers.

Current interdisciplinary courses supported by or with relevance to English Studies are:

MA, Diploma, or Certificate in the Medical Humanities

Taught by a team of specialists from across the humanities and social sciences - including individuals working in healthcare and policy settings, activists, and experts by experience - this suite of taught postgraduate programmes in the Medical Humanities provides outstanding interdisciplinary training to equip you with the skills that you need for your future career.

In the video below, Professor Angela Woods, Medical Humanities Programme Director, talks about the impact of Medical Humanities and the scope of the four postgraduate taught Medical Humanities programmes at Durham University.

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Master of Data Science (MDS) Digital Humanities

Durham’s Master of Data Science (MDS) in Digital Humanities is an innovative programme expressly designed for students with an undergraduate degree in Arts and Humanities subjects such as English Studies. It will enable you to develop the quantitative and computational skills that are increasingly demanded by employers and ever more necessary to be an informed and engaged citizen and researcher in the world today.  

The course does not presuppose any mathematical background or prior familiarity with computer programming.  As part of the MDS core, you will learn programming (in Python) from scratch via modules in the Computer Science department.  You will also take modules on statistical modelling in the Maths department, where advanced topics include machine learning, AI and neural networks.   You will then learn to apply these skills to a broad range of cultural data, including literature, in the core module for the Digital Humanities stream of MDS.  

Available elective modules may include Qualitative Approaches to Digital Humanities, which is taught in our Department of English Studies. 

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MA in Medieval and Early Modern Studies

The taught MA Medieval and Early Modern Studies is a highly diverse, interdisciplinary programme associated with the Institute of Medieval and Early Modern Studies (IMEMS). It covers a wide and exciting range of topics from Late Antiquity to the late eighteenth century, with a global range from the Silk Road to the Viking North.

Students can participate in a multifaceted approach to the period 300AD-1800 and its legacy, with workshops, seminars, and other activities ranging from fieldwork to research-led performance practice. 

Students can join the Medieval and Early Modern Student Association, in which English Studies postgraduates have traditionally been very involved.

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MA in Environmental Humanities

The MA in Environmental Humanities is an exciting new, interdisciplinary programme that aims to explore how the methods and insights of humanities disciplines can contribute to developing a response to the environmental crisis. It enables you to cross disciplinary boundaries, engaging both the humanities and social sciences and the natural sciences, and provides you with a foundation for further research at PhD level as well as for environmentally-oriented careers or activist forms of engagement. Undergraduates in English Studies seeking to develop their interests in ecocriticism, environmental justice, animal studies or posthumanism, and looking to expand these into interdisciplinary directions are warmly encouraged to apply.

For any questions, or for more information on studying at the intersections of English Studies and the Environmental Humanities, please contact Philippe Lynes at philippe.g.lynes@durham.ac.uk.

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