Degrees and Programs
The BA in Media Studies
Major Requirements
Minor Requirements
The undergraduate program offers a wide range of courses that
teach students how to read carefully, think critically, and write and
speak effectively about the media arts and media history, theory, and
criticism. Students may also choose to develop their expertise in video,
film, multimedia, and sound production.
Our core courses explore the development of “texts” and
“genres” across a variety of communicative technologies—oral, written,
cinematic, video, and computational networks—to develop comprehensive
understanding of the media’s influence in our society and culture. These
courses highlight the historical and contemporary intersections of
political and economic power that have affected social, informational,
and cultural conditions in the United States and around the world.
Beyond these core abilities, the Department offers elective courses for
students to deepen their knowledge of the media’s aesthetic and
technological possibilities, their history, global reach, and the vital
role they can play in a democratic society. We seek to offer our
students as wide a range of courses in the field, broadly conceived, as
our faculty and material resources will permit. With a faculty advisor’s
guidance, students choose courses that can combine into sets of
program-specific specializations in electronic media, film, media arts,
media policy, or the media business.
Majors with junior or senior standing and a 3.0 G.P.A. or higher may also elect to participate in the Media Studies Internship Program involving major media institutions in the greater New York area.
The MA in Media Studies
Our Masters Program is not currently accepting students. The
Department plans to reopen a revitalized graduate program soon.
Consistent with our emphasis at the undergraduate level on media texts,
communicative processes and the social, political and cultural contexts
in which they operate, the program will stress the functioning of media
institutions and the importance of media literacy.
The BA in Film Studies
The purpose of the B.A. program in Film Studies is to afford
students the opportunity to study in depth the aesthetic, cultural,
sociological, political, philosophical, and psychological elements of
the cinema. The Film Studies major and minor are composed of film
courses offered by a number of departments in the Divisions of the Arts
and Humanities and the Social Sciences. For more information go to the Film Studies web site
