Introduction
English and Art History at Aberdeen combine all the advantages of the UK’s second most highly-rated research hub for English literature, language and creative writing, with an Art History department recognised for its high levels of student satisfaction. You will study art, architecture, and curation, covering a wide range of media and techniques, and gain the skills to explore a range of exciting career options.
Study Information
At a Glance
- Learning Mode
- On Campus Learning
- Degree Qualification
- MA
- Duration
- 48 months
- Study Mode
- Full Time
- Start Month
- September
- UCAS Code
- QV33
- Pathway Programme Available
- Undergraduate Foundation Programme
Aberdeen is a leading centre for the study of literature, language and creative writing, rated second in the UK for its research output. You will study poetry and prose through the dynamic relationship between author, reader, and literary text, covering every period from Chaucer to contemporary English, Scottish, Irish, European, and American writing, as well as the cultural and critical impact of powerful and controversial modern works. You will be inspired by enthusiastic teachers and researchers, themselves acclaimed authors and poets and be encouraged to develop your creative writing skills.
The undergraduate programme in Art History at Aberdeen achieves regular plaudits for its student satisfaction rates. Join us for an outstanding student experience at our beautiful historic campus in Old Aberdeen, inspired by academics whose specialisms include environmental and political art, exhibition history and curation, theory and historiography, from the medieval period to the present day. Beyond the classroom, you can get involved with the student-led Art History society and undertake paid internships and volunteering opportunities within our nationally significant University Collections, and local arts organisations including Aberdeen Art Gallery, Grampian Hospitals Art Trust and Peacock Visual Arts. And as a graduate, you will be ideally placed to pursue a career in the art gallery and museum sectors, arts education, auction houses, publishing and journalism, fine art conservation, or postgraduate study.
What You'll Study
- Year 1
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Year 1: Compulsory Courses
- Academic Writing for Language & Literature (AW1008)
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This compulsory evaluation is designed to find out if your academic writing is of a sufficient standard to enable you to succeed at university and, if you need it, to provide support to improve. It is completed on-line via MyAberdeen with clear instructions to guide you through it. If you pass the evaluation at the first assessment it will not take much of your time. If you do not, you will be provided with resources to help you improve. This evaluation does not carry credits but if you do not complete it this will be recorded on your degree transcript.
- Getting Started at the University of Aberdeen (PD1002)
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This course, which is prescribed for level 1 undergraduate students and articulating students who are in their first year at the University, is studied entirely online, takes approximately 2-3 hours to complete and can be taken in one sitting, or spread across the first 4 weeks of term.
Topics include University orientation overview, equality & diversity, MySkills, health, safety and cyber security, and academic integrity.
Successful completion of this course will be recorded on your Transcript as ‘Achieved’.
- Acts of Reading (EL1009)
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15 Credit Points
This course introduces students to the study of English by exploring the dynamic relationship between author, reader and text in a series of classic works of fiction and poetry. It covers a broad historical range (from Folk Tales and ballads to 21st century postmodernity) and offers a basic grounding in key elements of literary theory, literary history and the varieties of literary form.
- Introduction to Art History (AH1005)
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15 Credit Points
This course explores art history in the Western world from antiquity to the nineteenth century. We examine the artistic production of distinct historical periods, with reference to their social, religious, political and cultural contexts, and consider art history’s use of specific labels and chronologies, from Classical and Medieval, to Renaissance, Baroque, and Romantic art.
- Encountering Art: Museums Through History (AH1002)
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15 Credit Points
Collecting, like art-making, is a universal human activity. This introductory course takes you on a journey through the history of collecting, from early modern cabinets of curiosities, over the origins of the modern art museum, to questions of curation in the digital age. We will explore how changing modes of display affect our perception and understanding of artworks. The course also addresses key debates on the practice and ethics of museums, on restitution and decolonisation.
- Introduction to Modern and Contemporary Art (AH1503)
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15 Credit Points
This course discusses key works and movements in the history of art from c. 1800 to today. It serves as an introduction to one of the most dynamic and multifaceted chapters in art history. Topics to be discussed may range from the Pre-Raphaelites and the rise of abstraction to contemporary performance art. The course will also consider the global intersections of Western art, aiming to de-centre our understanding of what counts as 'modern'.
- Fashion: History and Theory (AH1504)
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15 Credit Points
This course provides an introduction to the history and theory of fashion, one of the most dynamic, intriguing and influential artforms. From premodern tailoring to contemporary pret-a-porter, costume design and creative subcultures: the course surveys a wide range of ever-changing fashion trends, and asks what they tell us about identities, aesthetics, and popular culture.
Year 1: Optional Courses
Select ONE OR BOTH of the following:
- EL1513 - Controversial Classics
- EL1536 - Rethinking Reading
Plus, select further courses of choice to make up 120 credit points.
- Controversial Classics (EL1513)
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15 Credit Points
Literature can provoke, offend and disturb as well as entertain. This course considers some of the most powerful and controversial works of modern literature. It examines the circumstances of publication, the nature of the controversy, and the cultural and critical impact of each work. The course shows how poems, plays and novels can raise searching questions about national, racial and personal identity, and looks at the methods used by writers to challenge their readers, as well the responses of readers to such challenges.
- Rethinking Reading (EL1536)
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15 Credit Points
'Rethinking Reading' complements the module ‘Acts of Reading’. Intended primarily for students with degree intentions in English, this course introduces key areas in critical theory that inform the current work of staff at Aberdeen. It asks students to consider the history of English studies and its relationship to colonialism, and how this impacts on conceptions of literature and authorship, alongside topics such as gender and sexuality, and genre. Through a series of modules, the course introduces each area of theory alongside a literary text used as a case study. The course supports students in learning to read and use critical theory in your work, incorporating reflective learning and a practical focus on the techniques involved in critical writing.
- Year 2
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Year 2: Compulsory Courses
- Encounters with Shakespeare (EL2011)
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30 Credit Points
So you think you know Shakespeare? This course invites you to think again. Studying a range of plays we get behind the mythology of Shakespeare, and rediscover the dynamic inventiveness of the Elizabethan theatre. Shakespeare and his contemporaries were the principal players in a period of literary experimentation that reinvented the possibilities of literature. Encounters with Shakespeare is your chance to find out more.
- What is Art? (AH2001)
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30 Credit Points
‘Art’ is a controversial category. In museums, you might see urinals and cardboard boxes exhibited – but what earns them this accolade? Is it about skill? Creativity? Beauty? Who decides what counts as ‘good’ art? And why are museums full of stuff made by white men? This course discusses these and related questions. It will introduce you to a wide range of historical definitions of art, and discuss key works, from antiquity to Instagram - many of which challenged the boundaries of ‘art’.
- Art Matters: Materials and Techniques (AH2503)
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30 Credit Points
This course focuses on how artworks are made. Students will be introduced to a wide range of materials, techniques and processes over the centuries relating to paintings, prints, drawings, sculpture, photography and more. Each method and material will be examined using case-study examples, with discussion opening out to issues of the agency of materials and media and their cultural logics. In doing so, students will learn how artistic intentions are shaped and determined by material qualities.
Year 2: Optional Courses
Select ONE of the following:
- EL2518
- EL2512
Also, select further courses of choice to make up 120 credit points.
- The Tragedy of Knowledge (EL2512)
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30 Credit Points
This course traces the use of key Western myths from antiquity to the present to examine the way knowledge is often presented as both dangerous and compelling. As well as introducing students to a range of historical, social, and formal variations on the theme of knowledge, the course also highlights the role of storytelling and adaptation in the formation of knowledge and understanding.
- Power, Empire and Equality (EL2518)
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30 Credit Points
This optional course in literature allows students at pre-Honours to learn about the impact of global colonialism through the writings of those who experienced it and its repercussions. It includes theorists of our time and texts like Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe and Buchi Emecheta’s Second Class Citizen. The texts on this course are necessarily concerned with enslavement and freedom, with how one encounters difference, and what it means to possess or claim territory. In examining these issues students will engage with issues of power and equality over centuries of writing about colonialism and empire.
- Year 3
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Year 3: Optional Courses
Select one of the following from each:
Term 1:
AH3012: Surrealism and Its Legacies in Contemporary Art
AH3014: Architecture and Power
Term 2:
AH3501: Curation: Theory and Practice
AH3515: Women Writing Art History, C. 1850-1970
AH3517: Painting in Tudor and Early Stuart England
Plus two courses chosen from two of the groups below:
Medieval/Renaissance Literature
- EL30CP: Page and Stage: Renaissance Writings 1500-1640
- EL35DQ: Knights, Virgins and Viragos: Chaucer and Medieval Writing
Romantic/Victorian Literature
- EL30XR: Romanticism
- EL30SB: Britain and the 19th Century World
- EL35QA: Sympathy for the Devil: Scottish Short Stories
- EL35VC: Fallen Women and Self-made Men
Contemporary/Modern Literature
- EL35KN: Haunted Texts
- EL30FF: Modernism: Make it New
- EL30RD: American Voices: Self and Society,1850-1930
- EL35UT: Art and Atrocity: Representations of Violence and Trauma
- Year 4
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Year 4: Optional Courses
Select ONE of the following dissertation options:
- EL4502 - English Dissertation
- AH4518- History of Art Dissertation
Plus, select ONE of the following:
- AH4011: Art and the City
- AH4012: Surrealism and Its Legacies in Contemporary Art
- AH4014: Architecture and Power
Select further credit points from level 4 courses in English to gain 60 credits in the discipline.
Plus, select 30 credit points in level 4 Art History if required.
- English Dissertation (EL4502)
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30 Credit Points
Students will have the opportunity to write a dissertation on a topic of their choosing within English literature.
- Art History Dissertation (AH4520)
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30 Credit Points
Your dissertation is intended to give you the opportunity to carry out a piece of sustained research on a topic of your own choice and to demonstrate to the examiners your ability to present the results of such research in a proper, scholarly manner. Your research may be of various kinds. It may address works of art (or a single work of art) directly, through first-hand study in galleries, museums, or private collections, or it may be of a more literary kind, addressing critical or theoretical problems. Or it might involve both.
- Art and the City (AH4011)
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30 Credit Points
This course focuses on the physical and social contexts for the production and consumption of works of art and architecture. At the core of this course is a subsidised fieldtrip to a European city, allowing for an in-depth study of the urban contexts of art across time. Seminars and the fieldtrip will discuss themes such as urbanism, the specificities of public and private, sacred and profane spaces, and histories of collecting.
We will endeavour to make all course options available. However, these may be subject to change - see our Student Terms and Conditions page. In exceptional circumstances there may be additional fees associated with specialist courses, for example field trips.
How You'll Study
Learning Methods
- Field Trips
- Group Projects
- Individual Projects
- Lectures
- Tutorials
Assessment Methods
Students are assessed by a combination of assessment methods, including:
- Essays
- Source analyses
- Visual-based assessments
- Reflective reports
- Presentations
The exact mix of these methods differs between subject areas, year of study and individual
courses. In addition, all Honours students submit a dissertation.
Why Study Art History and English?
Why Art History
- Aberdeen’s impressive on-campus collections of art and cultural artefacts acquired over the past five hundred years
- First-hand engagement with artworks and architecture, with field trips to galleries, museums and heritage collections taking place at every level of study
- A learning experience at our beautiful historic campus in Old Aberdeen
- Teaching partnerships with museum professionals, developing and enhancing vocational skills through work-related learning
- Aberdeen and the north-east of Scotland’s distinguished architectural heritage from the Middle Ages onwards, including King’s College Chapel, St Machar’s Cathedral and Dunnottar Castle
- The award-winning Aberdeen Art Gallery, with its impressive collections of French and British art, and one of the best collections of Impressionist painting outside London
- A vibrant urban arts scene featuring cultural events across the year, including Nuart, the internationally renowned street art festival, and Spectra, Scotland’s Festival of Light
- A packed campus programme of student and public events, departmental research seminars and exhibitions
Interested in this programme?
Entry Requirements
Qualifications
The information below is provided as a guide only and does not guarantee entry to the University of Aberdeen.
General Entry Requirements
- 2026 Entry
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SQA Highers
Standard: BBBB
Applicants that present with BBBB will usually receive an unconditional offer.
Where we have more applicants than places we may need to ask for more than the minimum so continued engagement in school is recommended.
Widening Access: BBC
Applicants who meet one or more of our widening access metrics and present with BBC, are guaranteed an unconditional offer.
Foundation Apprenticeship: One FA is equivalent to a Higher at A. It cannot replace any required subjects.
Note: We do not double count a Higher and Advanced Higher in the same subject, but we do consider that a B grade at Advanced Higher is equivalent to an A grade at Higher.
National 5 English (or equivalent) is required at Grade C or above.
A LEVELS
Standard: BBC
Widening Access: CCC
GCSE English (or equivalent) is required at Grade C/4 or above.
BTEC LEVEL 3 EXTENDED DIPLOMA
DMM in related subjects.
Note: BTEC Level 3 Extended Certificate (Subsidiary Diploma) achieved at Distinction level, is normally acceptable in lieu of one A Level at grade B.)
GCSE English (or equivalent) is required at Grade C/4 or above. GCSE Mathematics at Grade C/4 is also required for Accountancy, Economics and Finance programmes.
IRISH LEAVING CERTIFICATE
Five subjects at Higher at H3.
INTERNATIONAL BACCALAUREATE
32 points including 5, 5, 5 at HL.
SL in English is also required.
- 2027 Entry
-
SQA Highers
Standard: BBBB
Applicants that present with BBBB will usually receive an unconditional offer.
Where we have more applicants than places we may need to ask for more than the minimum so continued engagement in school is recommended.
Widening Access: BBC
Applicants who meet one or more of our widening access metrics and present with BBC, are guaranteed an unconditional offer.
Foundation Apprenticeship: One FA is equivalent to a Higher at A. It cannot replace any required subjects.
Note: We do not double count a Higher and Advanced Higher in the same subject, but we do consider that a B grade at Advanced Higher is equivalent to an A grade at Higher.
National 5 English (or equivalent) is required at Grade C or above.
A LEVELS
Standard: BBC
Widening Access: CCC
GCSE English (or equivalent) is required at Grade C/4 or above.
BTEC LEVEL 3 EXTENDED DIPLOMA
DMM in related subjects.
Note: BTEC Level 3 Extended Certificate (Subsidiary Diploma) achieved at Distinction level, is normally acceptable in lieu of one A Level at grade B.)
GCSE English (or equivalent) is required at Grade C/4 or above. GCSE Mathematics at Grade C/4 is also required for Accountancy, Economics and Finance programmes.
IRISH LEAVING CERTIFICATE
Five subjects at Higher at H3.
INTERNATIONAL BACCALAUREATE
32 points including 5, 5, 5 at HL.
SL in English is also required.
The information displayed in this section shows a shortened summary of our entry requirements. For more information, or for full entry requirements for Arts and Social Sciences degrees, see our detailed entry requirements section.
Fees and Funding
You will be classified as one of the fee categories below.
- EU / International students
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- Tuition Fees for 2026/27 Academic Year
- £20,800
- Tuition Fees for 2026/27 Academic Year (Self-funded Students *)
- £14,800
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The above fee includes the £6,000 Aberdeen Global Scholarship provided to self-funded international students. Full terms and conditions apply.
- Home Students
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- Tuition Fees for 2026/27 Academic Year
- £1,820
- England, Wales, Northern Ireland, and Republic of Ireland
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- Tuition Fees for 2026/27 Academic Year
- £9,790
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The UK Government has confirmed that the RUK fee cap will continue to increase each year to reflect inflation. Tuition fees will increase in line with the Government fee cap each year, and this should be taken into account when budgeting.
Scholarships and Funding
UK Scholarship
Students from England, Wales and Northern Ireland, who pay tuition fees may be eligible for specific scholarships allowing them to receive additional funding. These are designed to provide assistance to help students support themselves during their time at Aberdeen.
Aberdeen Global Scholarship
The University of Aberdeen is delighted to offer eligible self-funded international on-campus undergraduate students a £6,000 scholarship for every year of their programme. More about this funding opportunity.
Funding Database
View all funding options in our Funding Database.
Careers
Our graduates gain essential skills, including critical thinking, oral and written communication, task management and organised and disciplined working practices, which are crucial in a wide range of professional careers.
By working in partnership with local collections and cultural institutions, Art History students at Aberdeen develop desirable vocational awareness, preparing them for future careers. Our Art History alumni have gone on to work in museums and galleries, the art trade and auction houses, fine art and building conservation, publishing, journalism, libraries and universities.
There are many opportunities at the University of Aberdeen to develop your knowledge, gain experience and build a competitive set of both degree-specific and transferable skills to enhance your employability. This is essential for your future career success. The Careers and Employability Service can help you to plan your career and support your choices throughout your time with us, from first to final year, and beyond.
Our Experts
Information About Staff Changes
You will be taught by a range of experts including professors, lecturers, teaching fellows and postgraduate tutors. However, these may be subject to change - see our Student Terms and Conditions page.
Discover Uni
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Get in Touch
Contact Details
- Address
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Student Recruitment & Admissions
University of Aberdeen
University Office
Regent Walk
Aberdeen
AB24 3FX