Course Catalogue

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This course takes a critical starting point to work and working practices in the cultural industries and aims to examine and explore alternatives to exploitation and exclusion in cultural work. It will do this by looking at how workers are organising via unionisation, co-operatives, campaigning organisations and their links to wider social movements.

7 x 2 hr seminar over 7 weeks as scheduled on Mycampus

1 x 2 hr practical skills workshop

2 x 2 hr workshops (site visits to co-ops)

Available to all students fulfilling requirements for Honours entry into MA Creative Arts and Industries, and by arrangement to visiting students or students of other Honours programmes who qualify under the University's 25% regulation

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The standard assessments for this course are:

■ Short promotional campaign (This can be a video, a website, a podcast or a more traditional flyer or brochure. It may, but does not have to, contain multiple types of content) - 40%

■ Individual presentation of campaign - 10%

■ Essay (2500 words) - 50%

If required, for instance where a disability prevents a student from undertaking a specific method of assessment, the following alternatives are available:

■ There is no alternative to the short promotional campaign, but a flexible deadline and extra time can be offered as reasonable adjustments (students should follow the usual process for extensions).

■ A recorded presentation OR written script of equivalent length OR PowerPoint with substantial notes as an alternative to the individual presentation.

■ There is no alternative to the essay, but a flexible deadline and extra time can be offered as reasonable adjustments (students should follow the usual process for extensions).

Further reasonable adjustments may be provided where necessary. Students are encouraged to consult with the course convenor.

This course aims to:

■ Build on existing knowledge of cultural labour issues · Develop skills pertaining to working in a professional context

■ Promote critical reflection on alternatives to precarity in cultural labour markets

■ Develop an understanding of co-operative ways of working

By the end of this course students will be able to:

■ Produce sustained arguments in both written and oral form on a variety of forms of worker organisation in the cultural sectors

■ Critically reflect on the conflicts and tensions in cultural labour markets

■ Produce an argument on the strength and weaknesses of worker-led alternatives