Communication and Media PhD

University of Liverpool

From political communication to discourse and culture, heritage industries to media and entertainment, and film and television to social media, the Department of Communication and Media produces cutting-edge research that links strongly with most key areas of inquiry in this major field of study. A PhD/MPhil in Communication and Media allows you to embrace the study of communication and media in an inclusive and comprehensive manner.Research topicsWe particularly welcome research proposals that match those of our researchers. This includes:Media in humanitarian crises; media and human rights; media coverage of migration and free movement across EuropeLatin American culture and the relationship between politics and aesthetics; contemporary photographyRhetoric, policy frameworks and methodologies that capture the impact and legacy of large-scale urban interventions and eventsBroadcasting history, institutions and their programming; film and television documentary, television current affairs programmingScience fiction, fantasy and ‘cult’ TV and film; PR and promotional cultures with a particular interest in social mediaGender, political communication and news media and the ways in which they intersectThe moral function of communication; conceptions of home, identity and belonging in communicative capitalismCritical discourse studies of populist political communication; the intersection of politics and the media as key carriers of public imaginaries of social realityExperimental, oppositional, marginal and other alternative filmmaking histories and practices; the work of Andy Warhol and other artist-filmmakersArgumentation Theory, Rhetoric and Discourse Analysis, with emphasis on in the study of argumentation in strategic communication contextsMedia discourse (especially approaches from a (socio) linguistic perspective) and the uses of dialogue in TV dramaMedia and the city; urban cultural studies; visual culture, space and place; cultural mapping and spatial humanities; popular culture, heritage and cultural memoryInternational and global journalism; young people as media audiences; the Internet’s role in relation to online risks and to enabling democratic deliberationsPolitical communication during election campaigns, particularly online; social media and their use by voters to communicate politically