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MA

Drama

This drama masters reflects the contemporary professional world which calls for flexible, innovative practitioners who are willing and able to work across the full range of theatre and media. These roles might range from mainstream professional organisations to applied and community contexts.

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Key Course Details

  • Start Date

    September

  • Location

    Cardiff

  • Campus Code

    B

Fees

  • Home students

    £10,800*

  • International students

    £16,900*

  • Full-time fees are per year. Part-time fees are per 20 credits.

  • Start Date

    September

  • Location

    Cardiff

  • Campus Code

    B

Fees

  • Home students

    £1,200*

  • Full-time fees are per year. Part-time fees are per 20 credits.

Whether you are an experienced artist wishing to have the time and space to develop your practice or starting out in your career as a theatre maker, drama practitioner, story-teller or educator, the MA Drama course will help you fulfil your potential.

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Module Overview

Module content is broad and flexible, which enables you to take full advantage of the spectrum of staff expertise within the faculty.

Reflective Practice 1: Theatre and Performance Practices
This consists of a range of masterclasses related to different aspects of theatre-making and performance, for example, scenography, approaches to directing, acting, physical performance and adaptation. However, each student works towards a piece of assessment that reflects their own interests in terms of what they want to explore and develop.
 
Reflective Practice 2: Themes, Contexts and Applications

This continues with a series of workshops that have a very broadly applied feel, so this includes drama and theatre in education, performance & human rights, story-telling, site-specific theatre etc. Again, each student can focus their assessed work according to a specific line of enquiry they wish to explore. Students can work individually or collaboratively.

Research and Practice in Theatre and Performance 

This considers issues of practice as research, reflective practice, creativity, and production processes.

Professional Practices in Drama and Performance

This is based on a number of seminars with visiting professionals (theatre-makers, arts organisations). You are also required to visit two organisations or companies of your choice as the basis for an assessed presentation, focusing on their working methods and structures. We guide you in making these choices, and most importantly, help you to think about who it would be useful to meet and develop contacts with.

Major Production Project in Drama / Dissertation
For the final part of your MA you choose one of the above modules, allowing you to specialise in the area of Drama practice or research that is most important to you. For these modules you are allocated a supervisor who guide you. For either of these modules, the choice of specific focus is up to each individual student, but you are working towards a major piece of work as the culmination of the degree.  

 

ENTRY REQUIREMENTS

Admission to this programme is by application and demonstration of appropriate practical experience. You will normally be expected to hold a good Honours degree (2:1 or above). This degree does not necessarily need to be in a drama-related subject, but all applicants will be expected to have a documented advanced interest in key aspects of the broad field of drama.

Professional practitioners without a degree may be in a position to apply via the Accreditation of Prior Experiential Learning (APEL) route. Such applications will be considered on a case-by-case basis.

International applications welcomed:

We welcome international applications with equivalent qualifications of our entry requirements. For more details related to your country of residence, please view our dedicated country pages.

English language requirements

International applicants will need to have achieved an overall of IELTS 6.0 with a minimum of 5.5 in each component/TOEFL 72 overall and a minimum of 18 in reading, 17 in listening, 20 in speaking and 17 in writing or equivalent.

Equivalents can be located on our English Language pages.

If you have previously studied through the medium of English, IELTS might not be required, please visit our country specific page for further details. If your country is not featured, please contact us.

If you do not meet the English entry criteria, please visit our Pre-Sessional course pages.

Contextual offers

We may make you a lower offer based on a range of factors, including your background (where you live and the school or college that you attended, for example), your experiences and individual circumstances (as a care leaver, for example). This is referred to as a contextual offer, and we receive data from UCAS to support us in making these decisions.

USW prides itself on its student experience and we support our students to achieve their goals and become a successful graduate. This approach helps us to support students who have the potential to succeed and who may have faced barriers that make it more difficult to access university.

 

We're here to help

Whether you a have a question about your course, fees and funding, the application process or anything else, there are plenty of ways you can get in touch, and we'd love to talk to you. You can contact our friendly admissions team by phone, email or chat to us online.

 

Fees and Funding

UK Full-time Fee

£10,800

per year*
International Full-time Fee

£16,900

per year*
UK Part-time Fee

£1,200

per 20 credits*

Further Information

Studying at university is one of the most significant investments you'll ever make. Whilst you’re studying, you’ll have two main financial obligations – tuition fees and living costs. There’s lots of financial help available from the University of South Wales and external funding sources, that may provide loans (which have to be paid back) and grants, scholarships and bursaries (that don't).

*Full-time fees are per year. Part-time fees are per 20 credits. Once enrolled, the fee is anticipated to remain at the same rate throughout the duration of your study on this course except as described below.

Please be aware that we may increase the maximum fee for home students on full-time undergraduate courses only where the Welsh Government increases the permitted level of inflation of fees. Fees for all students (including part-time, postgraduate and international students) may be amended in accordance with our applicable Fees and Debt Management Policy.  We will ensure that students are given clear, intelligible, unambiguous and timely information about our courses and costs in good time, ahead of the next academic year.

 

Fees and Funding Scholarships and Busaries Alumni Discount

Additional Costs

As a student of USW, you’ll have access to lots of free resources to support your study and learning, such as textbooks, publications, online journals, laptops, and plenty of remote-access resources. Whilst in most cases these resources are more than sufficient in supporting you with completing your course, additional costs, both obligatory and optional, may be required or requested for the likes of travel, memberships, experience days, stationery, printing, or equipment.

Media Loans

You can hire a range of equipment, for your assignments and practical work, for free from our Media Loans facility.

Media Loans

University Quality Assurance

At USW, we regularly review our courses in response to changing patterns of employment and skills demand to ensure we offer learning designed to reflect today’s student needs and tomorrow’s employer demands.

If during a review process course content is significantly changed, we’ll write to inform you and talk you through the changes for the coming year. But whatever the outcome, we aim to equip our students with the skillset and the mindset to succeed whatever tomorrow may bring. Your future, future-proofed.

Studying at USW

Our courses are designed with industry leaders and provide the practical skills and experiences industry demands. Our flexible courses reflect the need for life-long learning. If you value education in practice, not just in theory, then USW is for you.

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Postgraduate fees and funding
Exterior view of the University's Cardiff Campus.
Cardiff Campus
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Postgraduate Open Events

Course Highlights

How you’ll learn

You will study through practical workshops lectures, seminars and individual supervision by an appointed tutor.

You will undertake a series of visits to companies and professional productions of all kinds in order to extend your critical understanding of a variety of professional contexts.

You will also have the opportunity to contribute to a variety of projects, seminar programmes, public productions, conferences and symposia that are part of the life of ATRiuM. 

During your course you will be assessed through a range of methods such practical performance work, written and audio-visual portfolio, workshop facilitation, presentation, and essay.

Teaching staff

  • Dr Jodie Allinson, (drama course leader)
  • Michael Carklin
  • Sean Tuan John
  • Dr Márta Minier
  • Dr Sarah Crews
  • Dr Emily Underwood-Lee
  • Matthew Gough
  • Steve Fisher
  • Dr Thania Acaron
  • Dr Jesse Schwenk
  • Dr Sera Moore Williams

Facilities

The University has impressive facilities thanks to our £14.7m extension of the ATRiuM building. This building now has a 160-seat auditorium theatre with a sprung stage floor, full lighting rig, two brand-new dance studios and multimedia facilities. There are also four black box studio theatres, and professional film studios with ‘green screen’ and motion capture facilities, among other new facilities.

Equipment

At our Cardiff Campus we have a vast range of equipment that you will be trained to use as part of your course. To help support your studies we have a Media Loans facility that allows you to hire the equipment, at no cost, for you to then use for your assignments and practical work.  We have both basic and high-end film and photography cameras, portable lighting and sound equipment as well as a range of professional studio recording microphones, instruments and associated equipment to use in our music studios or on location. The team of technical officers and instructors are also available to help you with any queries and technical issues.

Careers and Employability

Possible career paths

USW’s MA Drama course provides an advanced professional development opportunity for those working in or wishing to work in contexts where drama is used. These include individual professional practitioners, teachers and educators, and applied drama specialists in a variety of contexts, as well as those who want to use drama skills in the film and television industries.

Graduates can also progress to a PhD or research degree.

How to apply

There is an online application process for this course. Please choose the application form for your preferred start date and mode of study (i.e. full-time or part-time).

International admissions

Please see our international admissions advice for further information about how to apply as a prospective international student.

Next Steps

How to Apply
Book an Open Evening
Chat to Us