University College London (UCL)

Politics, Violence and Crime MSc

Teaching and learning

You will learn through lectures, interactive seminars involving critical discussion, collaborative exercises including group presentations, practical exercises and independent directed and self-directed reading.

While planning and producing your dissertation, you will benefit from one-to-one academic supervision.

You will be assessed through a series of formative (exercises for which you will receive feedback but do not count toward the degree) and summative exercises (exercises for which you will receive feedback and do count toward the degree), including essays, practical tests, presentations, take-home exercises and your dissertation.

The compulsory modules typically amount to 72 contact hours (a mix of weekly 2 and 3-hour lectures, seminars, workshops and tutorials). The three optional 15-credit modules typically amount to 54 contact hours, but will vary according to module selection. Dissertation supervision typically amounts to 2 hours.

Modules

Full-time

Students take a two-term compulsory (core) module, a one-term compulsory ethnographic methods module and three optional modules. Together, these provide the rigorous training required to enable students to successfully pursue their independent ethnographic research projects that culminate in their dissertations.

The core module’s seminars critically examine major questions in political anthropology and social theory centred on politics, violence and crime. Students receive training in how to undertake ethnographic research as part of the methods module.

Students further develop their particular research interests through their selection of optional modules and in their final dissertation research project.

Part-time

Students take all their compulsory modules and at least one optional module in the first year. In the second year, they take their (usually two) remaining optional module(s) and complete their dissertation.

Compulsory modules

• Anthropology of Politics, Violence and Crime
• Method in Ethnography
• Politics, Violence and Crime: Dissertation

Optional modules

• Anthropology of Crime
• The Anthropology of Nationalism, Ethnicity and Race
• Anthropology of Religion
• The Anthropology of Violent Aftermaths
• Multispecies Ethnography in the Anthropocene
• Anthropology of Platform Economies
• Anthropology and Policy
• Queer Anthropology
• Psychological Anthropology and Cultural Psychology
• Biosocial Anthropology, Health and Environment
• Medical Anthropology
• Nutrition, Health and Culture
• Informatic Cultures: The Anthropology of Data, Algorithms and Computation
• The Anthropology of Social Media
• Anthropology of Technics and Technology
• Art in the Public Sphere
• The Anthropology of Fashion
• Extra-Terrestrial Anthropology
• Visualising Others: Colonial and Postcolonial Visual Culture
• Multimodal Anthropology

Please note that the list of modules given here is indicative. This information is published a long time in advance of enrolment, and module content and availability are subject to change.

Students undertake modules to the value of 180 credits. Upon successful completion of 180 credits, you will be awarded an MSc in Politics, Violence and Crime.

What this course will give you

You will receive advanced academic training in socio-political theories and ethnographic approaches to politics, violence and crime, including: independent research design and implementation, research ethics, generating research material, critically informed modes of analysis and evaluation, and different genres of academic and professional writing, including writing for grant and project proposals.

You will also develop practical competencies transferable to any profession, including: critical thinking skills and creative initiative, communication skills, including the ability to interpret and present complex ideas and research debates to diverse audiences, independent and team working, leadership, and time and project management.

The foundation of your career

This degree prepares students for a wide range of careers, including:

• Academic publishing
• Consultancy
• Policy and advocacy in governmental, non-governmental (NGOs) and intergovernmental (IGOs) organisations specialising in legal aid and development, human trafficking and migration, law and governance, (il)licit economies, money laundering, counterfeiting, electoral monitoring, gender-based violence prevention, peacebuilding and conflict mediation, anti-racist work and decolonial strategies, people intelligence consultancy, drugs and organized crime and political risk analysis for impact investing and social enterprises
• Project management and research facilitation in universities, research centres and funding bodies
• Social and market research

A number of our graduates choose to progress to PhD-level study (Graduate Outcomes survey 2017-2022).

Employability

There is growing demand in a wide range of professions that look for cross-cultural expertise, with advanced research skills increasingly relevant in non-academic contexts.

You will graduate with expertise in applying anthropological and wider social science approaches to pressing socio-political challenges, fully equipped to pursue a successful career related to society, politics or law, or any profession requiring strong project management, problem-solving and communication skills.

Through your independent research project and dissertation, you will develop skills highly sought after by employers, including critical thinking and analysis and effective communication of complex ideas. These will also prepare you for PhD-level study should you wish to pursue it.

Networking

You will become part of the department's Social Anthropology section, learning from and networking with leading internal and external researchers through a weekly research seminar series.

Students will also be encouraged to attend the following events:

• Departmental seminars given by active researchers and expert creative practitioners in environmental, evolutionary, medical and public anthropology and material, visual and digital culture.
• Reading and Research Groups (RRGs), open spaces to exchange ideas on themes of mutual interest and welcome staff and student participation from across UCL and our neighbouring institutions.
• Events hosted by the broader anthropology and society communities at UCL, our neighbouring institutions and across London more widely. These will help you establish industry connections and extend your professional networks.

The department's central London location presents a range of opportunities to work, volunteer and carry out fieldwork in major government, business and third sector organisations.

The department also houses London's global non-fiction film festival, Open City Documentary Festival, to which all students are invited to volunteer to support to network with non-fiction film industry leading professionals.