Find out more about studying MA Heritage and Museum Studies at University of Essex? We've gathered all the key details, entry requirements, modules, fees, and more. Take the next step by booking an open day to explore it for yourself.
Master of Arts - MA
University of Essex
Part Time
Oct 2027
2 Year
Heritage is the physical and intangible cultural materials we choose to preserve and value. But heritage is also a matter of heated debate. How do we manage, preserve, and communicate our heritage today In what ways is the past remembered or forgotten, exploited and renegotiated in the present What are the differences between tangible and intangible, cultural and natural, physical and digital heritageOur interdisciplinary MA Heritage and Museum Studies offers specialist, practically-grounded and academic training exploring these questions and more. Our intensive degree emphasises the real-world relevance of debates surrounding cultural patrimony, and the ways in which it is presented and consumed.The MA is made up of core and optional modules, where you will develop knowledge of the field and practical skills, all while pursing your own specialist interests in the field of heritage.
This module will explore how conflicts over 'heritage' rights are, today more than ever, influencing critical debates over the definition of world, national, and local heritage, as well as universal, community, and individual rights. It will also examine the impact that tensions between communities and universal versus local values have on the management of heritage, and how these tensions might be resolved to allow sustainable growth. Among other questions, we will ask: What is heritage? Who defines it? Who should control its management and preservation?
Who controls the raw materials of History? Historians depend on archives: for manuscripts, printed and digitised documents, photographs and images, textiles, oral histories, film and many other types of source. It's only relatively recently, however, that we've started to look 'behind the catalogues' to examine critically the systems and structures of actual archives as specific sites of practice and to question the power relationships they preserve and/or hide. This module asks questions about what's been collected and how it's been organised, what's got 'lost', destroyed or withheld, and how and why records have been used, neglected and 'discovered'. It's also about whose voices and stories get included and excluded and why. This module flips our perspective as historians. We'll start from the other side of the enquiry desk, working towards a critical understanding of what archivists do, how archives are made and operate and how power is built into their structures. Records are always political and their use and abuse can have serious, sometimes catastrophic, human consequences (as we've seen in the recent Windrush scandal) – but they can also empower people, aid the pursuit of justice and foster a sense of community. So we'll also look at case studies, including one chosen by the class, to give us new insights into archives as sites of power.
This co-curricular module comprises a series of fortnightly lectures by academics and some museum professionals to present current research. Lectures will cut across different geographies and chronological limits, encouraging students to think broadly about key formal, conceptual, and political issues that have informed the history of art and curation.
