Environmental Humanities (MA) (2024 Entry)
Explore our Environmental Humanities taught Master's degree.
Warwick is a thriving hub of Environmental HumanitiesLink opens in a new window research and teaching. The Environmental Humanities MA at Warwick draws on renowned expertise across the English Department, the wider Arts Faculty and specialist centres across the University to enhance your knowledge of the ways in which culture engages with the crucial environmental and ecological issues of our age.
Course overview
The MA in Environmental Humanities at Warwick will introduce you to major debates around climate change, the Anthropocene, energy, sustainability, ecological futures and environmental justice. Drawing on a combination of seminars, research projects and fieldwork, you will deepen your critical understanding of key ecological concepts and methods, while developing your competence in analysing the implications and developments of the global environmental crisis and ongoing climate emergency. As important, you will be given the opportunity to think creatively about ways of connecting theory and practice.
Considering your position as a scholar and environmentally attuned global citizen, this MA will immerse you in the study of cultural responses to ecological questions from across the globe. You will take a core module in the history, theory and methodology of Environmental Humanities, choose from a range of modules that address various perspectives on climate change, environment, sustainability and ecology, and undertake fieldwork or write a dissertation on an (approved) topic of your choice with a specialised supervisor.
General entry requirements
Minimum requirements
65% in an undergraduate degree (or equivalent) in a related subject.
Applicants may be required to provide a writing sample and/or personal statement to demonstrate suitability for the course.*
*For example, those applicants from a non-Humanities background but with strong elements in Environmental Studies.
English language requirements
You can find out more about our English language requirementsLink opens in a new window. This course requires the following:
- Band C
- IELTS overall score of 7.5, minimum component scores of two at 6.5/7.0 and the rest at 7.5 or above.
International qualifications
We welcome applications from students with other internationally recognised qualifications.
For more information, please visit the international entry requirements pageLink opens in a new window.
Additional requirements
There are no additional entry requirements for this course.
Core modules
Critical Environments
Critical Environments introduces key topics, concepts, methodologies and theoretical debates in the emergent field of environmental humanities, with special attention to its interdisciplinary origins. It allows students to navigate their own subsequent pathways through the MA in Environmental Humanities, depending on individual research interest. You will develop an informed perspective on a variety of areas, from debates over nature to the cultural registration of natural ecologies, histories and trajectories of pollution and waste, ecopoetics, the emergence of the Anthropocene, the energy humanities, ecological imperialism and more, all analysed through a world-ecological lens unique to Warwick Environmental Humanities. The module will provide a focused understanding of the cultural challenges in responding to such topics as climate change, environmental despoliation, species extinction, media ecology and truly sustainable futures.
Dissertation
The Dissertation offers you the opportunity to pursue your own research interests. You can develop any idea you’ve discovered in your modules or write on a completely new topic that matters to you. Our students choose an array of topics within the broadly conceived boundaries of ‘environmental humanities’: we’ll discuss your plans with you to make sure an available member of our teaching staff can support your topic.
Students often use their MA dissertations as springboards for PhD projects and have sometimes gone on to publish their work in scholarly journals.
You are also able to fulfil the dissertation requirement by opting for an extended fieldwork project, which will allow you to carry out your research using a combination of qualitative data-gathering and written analysis.
Optional modules
Optional modules can vary from year to year. Example optional modules may include:
- Petrofiction: Studies in World Literature
- World Literature in the Anthropocene
- Ecopoetics
- Early Modern Ecologies
- The Caribbean: Reading the World Ecology
- Culture and Global Sustainable Development
- Ecological Futures: Transdisciplinary Approaches
- Ecologies: Science, Media and Culture
- Managing Creativity for Sustainable Development
- Urban Data
- Media, Policy and Markets
For more information, please visit the Environmental Humanities webpageLink opens in a new window on the English website.
Teaching
The MA in Environmental Humanities comprises the core module, Critical Environments, three further optional modules, and a Dissertation of 16,000 words or an equivalent fieldwork project. You can take one of your three optional modules from outside of the Faculty, including from the Centre for Global Sustainable Development (GSD), the Centre for Interdisciplinary Methodologies (CIM), or the Institute for Advanced Teaching and Learning (IATL).
For more information, please visit the Environmental Humanities webpageLink opens in a new window on the English website.
Class sizes
Seminars consist of 5 to 12 students.
Typical contact hours
Contact hours comprise 4 hours of seminars a week, 2 office hours per member of staff, weekly reading groups, workshops and research seminars, and one-to-one Dissertation or fieldwork supervision in terms 2 and 3.
Assessment
All essays are marked by two members of staff. The standard length for essays in modules on this course is 6,000 words; the Dissertation is 16,000 words. Marks are given out of 100.
For more information, please visit the Environmental Humanities webpageLink opens in a new window on the English website.
Your timetable
Your personalised timetable will be complete when you are registered for all modules, compulsory and optional, and you have been allocated to your lectures, seminars and other small group classes. Your compulsory modules will be registered for you, and you will be able to choose your optional modules when you join us.
Your career
Graduates from these courses have gone on to work for a range of employers, including: Deloitte; International Institute for Environment and Development; TeachFirst; The Times; V&A Museum; Yale University Press. They have pursued roles such as: arts officers, producers and directors; higher education teaching professionals; journalists, newspaper and periodical editors; management consultants and business analysts and marketing associate professionals.
Our department has a dedicated professionally qualified Senior Careers Consultant offering impartial advice and guidance together with workshops and events throughout the year. Previous examples of workshops and events include:
- Understanding Assessment Centres
- Careers following your English and Comparative Literary Studies Degree
- Discovering Careers in the Creative Industries
- Careers in Publishing and Journalism
- Freelancing
- Careers in the Public Sector
- Warwick careers fairs throughout the year
English and Comparative Literary Studies at Warwick
Founded in 1965, English and Comparative Literary Studies is one of the few comparative departments in the UK. We are in the top 5 English departments in the UK (Guardian University Guide, 2023); and one of the top 30 English departments in the world (QS World Subject Rankings, 2022). We are also ranked in the top 10 UK universities for research environment (2021 Research Excellence Framework); and 91% of our research is rated 'world-leading' or 'internationally excellent' (Times Higher Education).
Our research is interdisciplinary, comparative, and dynamic; we also ensure that all our students study literature as a historical, global, aesthetic, and theoretical subject. Our strengths as a department include American studies, eighteenth and nineteenth-century studies, environmentalism and ecocriticism, theatre and performance, gender studies, the literary and cultural history of the medieval and early modern period, poetry and poetics, theology and literature, and World Literature. Our major research centres include Poetry at Warwick, and the Warwick Research Collective (WReC). We were also involved in establishing the Centre for the Study of the Renaissance in 1993, which brings together staff from five departments engaged in the study of Renaissance Europe, and which enjoys formal academic links with several institutions including the Warburg Institute, the Sorbonne, and with the University of Venice. We have close links with the Centre for Research into Philosophy, Literature, and the Arts, the Early Modern and Eighteenth-Century Centre, and the Yesu Persaud Centre for Caribbean Studies. We are actively involved in the EUTOPIA consortium and the Monash Warwick Alliance.
Find out more about us on our website.Link opens in a new window
Our Postgraduate courses
Tuition fees
Tuition fees are payable for each year of your course at the start of the academic year, or at the start of your course, if later. Academic fees cover the cost of tuition, examinations and registration and some student amenities.
Fee Status Guidance
The University carries out an initial fee status assessment based on information provided in the application and according to the guidance published by UKCISA. Students are classified as either Home or Overseas Fee status and this can determine the tuition fee and eligibility of certain scholarships and financial support.
If you receive an offer, your fee status will be stated with the tuition fee information. If you believe your fee status has been incorrectly classified you can complete a fee status assessment questionnaire (follow the instructions in your offer) and provide the required documentation for this to be reassessed.
The UK Council for International Student Affairs (UKCISA) provides guidance to UK universities on fees status criteria, you can find the latest guidance on the impact of Brexit on fees and student support on the UKCISA website.
Additional course costs
Please contact your academic department for information about department specific costs, which should be considered in conjunction with the more general costs below, such as:
- Core text books
- Printer credits
- Dissertation binding
- Robe hire for your degree ceremony
Scholarships and bursaries
Scholarships and financial support
Find out about the different funding routes available, including; postgraduate loans, scholarships, fee awards and academic department bursaries.
Living costs
Find out more about the cost of living as a postgraduate student at the University of Warwick.
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How to apply
The application process for courses that start in September and October 2024 will open on 2 October 2023.
Applications will close on 2 August 2024 for students who require a visa to study in the UK, to allow time to receive a CAS and complete the visa application process.
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