Digital Methods for Research and Practice (897P4)

30 credits, Level 7 (Masters)

Spring teaching

On this module, you’ll explore principal theories and digital methods. This will be within a digital studies approach to digital media. You’ll consider how these shape the ways we might think about and research particular media, data and issues. Some examples include:

• digital methods
• political economy of digital media
• topic modelling
• discourse analysis.

This module aims to develop a systematic and critical understanding of the practical, epistemological and ethical issues involved in conducting different kinds of digital media research. This is with particular reference to digital methods. It also aims to make you methodologically self-conscious in your own research and written work and prepare you for the dissertation, software project and placement. 

Contact hours and workload

This module is approximately 300 hours of work. This breaks down into about 30 hours of contact time and about 270 hours of independent study. The University may make minor variations to the contact hours for operational reasons, including timetabling requirements.

We regularly review our modules to incorporate student feedback, staff expertise, as well as the latest research and teaching methodology. We’re planning to run these modules in the academic year 2026/27. However, there may be changes to these modules in response to feedback, staff availability, student demand or updates to our curriculum.

We’ll make sure to let you know of any material changes to modules at the earliest opportunity.