Programme

City University

Year 2 Specialism

  • Module 4: Dissertation
  • Location: City University London
  • Professor: Neil Thurman
  • Duration: 10 weeks
  • Credits: 30 ECTS

Overview

  1. To identify and research thoroughly a subject of the student’s own choice, on an original theme and which is worthy of sustained journalistic inquiry.
  2. To communicate the findings in a journalistic way, appropriate to the medium and the target audience, to a brief and to deadline.
  3. To identify from this exercise an aspect of journalistic practice or the profession of journalism worthy of sustained research.
  4. To investigate, collect evidence, evaluate and critically analyse the journalistic/professional issues identified.
  5. To communicate findings in a properly referenced in-depth academic essay.

A selection of dissertations undertaken by Erasmus Mundus Students at City:

  • “Kyoto’s Big Bang: The Emergence of the Global Carbon Markets”
  • “Food Supply Chains, Globalisation and Journalism”
  • “English-language Media in Spain: Cultural Integration, Media Economics
    and Journalistic Output”
  • “The Global Warming Business, Peru in the Carbon Market”
  • “Covering China: A Mission Impossible?”
  • “Europe in the Caspian: A Great Game to be Lost?”
  • “The Business of Life-saving Drugs”
  • “The Rise and Fall of Cable News”
  • “The Olympic Legacy on Host Cities: Jobs and tourism, or Bills and Empty Buildings?”
  • “The Battle over the Blue: Canada’s Freshwater Dilemma”
  • “Travelling Trash: A Global Story”
  • “Understanding Indian Entrepreneurship”
  • “In Turbulent Skies: The Financial Crisis Hits Commercial Aviation”
  • “The Invisible Hand Behind Cross-Taiwan Strait Relations”

Learning Outcomes

Subject Knowledge & Understanding

  • Demonstrate detailed knowledge of specific fields under investigation.
  • Demonstrated detailed knowledge of academic and journalistic research methodologies and sources of information (interviews, texts, internet, journal articles, cuttings, broadcasts, libraries).
  • Display a critical understanding of the practice of journalism in the UK / Europe or the students’ country of origin.
  • Display a critical awareness of the responsibilities and roles of journalists and the social, ethical and legal contexts in which they work.

Subject Specific Skills

  • Determine an original topic, journalistic angle/genre and target audience.
  • Apply research techniques.
  • Apply effective and appropriate interviewing for the medium and the target audience.
  • Demonstrate editorial balance and fairness.
  • Write accurately, appropriately and creatively.
  • Use the medium chosen creatively.
  • Present and produce to the highest professional standard.
  • Produced to brief and to deadline.
  • Construct well-structured, coherent arguments.

Indicative Syllabus

This module will be taught via: introductory lectures, individual tutorials, research training, independent research, and the production of an extended piece of journalism and dissertation.

Typical Methods of Assessment

  1. Production of an extended piece of journalism (either a feature or series of features totaling 6000 words or a radio documentary of 15 minutes in length or a web site of comparable length).
  2. 6000-word reflective and analytical academic dissertation, with complete references, end-notes and bibliography.

Indicative Reading List

  1. Phillip Seib, The Global Journalist, New York, 2002
  2. Kevin Williams, Fundamentals of Media Research, UK, 2003
  3. David Held and Anthony McGrew, Globalization/Anti-Globalization, Cambridge: Polity Press, 2002
  4. Tom Fenton, Bad News: How the Failing News Industry Is Endangering Americans, Regan Books, 2005
  5. Peter Golding, Pradip N. Thomas, Zaharom Nain (Editors), Who Owns the Media?: Global Trends and Local Resistance Zed Books, 2005
  6. Robert Ritter, The Oxford Style Guide, OUP Oxford, 2005
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