Film & Television Studies/History

Film and television studies alongside history is a pairing that opens up two of the most important ways human beings have recorded, interpreted, and communicated their past. Film and television studies examines how the moving image functions as a medium, how stories are told, how genres evolve, how the industry is organised, and how screens have shaped culture and politics. History provides the longer perspective, asking how we know what happened, how sources are read critically, and how the past continues to shape the present.

Together, they develop a sophisticated understanding of how images, narratives, and institutions produce meaning across time.

The four-year full-time Film and Television Studies and History programme at the University of Glasgow draws on leading researchers in both fields, who bring their expertise directly into teaching. The film and television studies element has strong connections with Glasgow's creative and cultural organisations, with practitioners and policymakers contributing to core courses including media and cultural policy. You will study film theory, television history, documentary, genre, spectatorship, and the industrial and regulatory frameworks within which screen media are produced, distributed, and consumed.

Your historical studies will develop your skills in reading primary sources, evaluating evidence, and constructing sustained arguments about the past. A year abroad gives you the opportunity to experience academic and cultural life in another country, widening both your intellectual frame of reference and your professional network.

With a typical entry tariff of 216 points, the programme attracts students who bring genuine intellectual ambition to both disciplines. Graduates pursue careers in broadcasting, journalism, documentary production, arts administration, heritage, public history, archiving, and the cultural sector more broadly. Postgraduate study in film studies, media studies, history, or cultural policy is also a well-travelled path.