Social Media and Critical Practice (P4113)

15 credits, Level 6

Autumn teaching

Social media has become the way of framing much of internet and mobile media. The impact of this change is important. Social media has become influential in journalism, promotional culture, education and across the media industries. In this module, you will take a step back from the everyday use of these forms to question and critically analyse them.

You will examine a range of social media platforms and practices. You will also look at:

• the promise and risks, and how they developed
• their institutional and structural shape and power
• the politics, economics, aesthetics and pleasures attached to them.

Contact hours and workload

This module is approximately 150 hours of work. This breaks down into about 12 hours of contact time and about 138 hours of independent study. The University may make minor variations to the contact hours for operational reasons, including timetabling requirements.

We regularly review our modules to incorporate student feedback, staff expertise, as well as the latest research and teaching methodology. We’re planning to run these modules in the academic year 2024/25. However, there may be changes to these modules in response to feedback, staff availability, student demand or updates to our curriculum.

We’ll make sure to let you know of any material changes to modules at the earliest opportunity.