Program Overview

At Bath Spa University many of our undergraduate programmes can be combined, so you don’t have to limit yourself to one subject. If you choose to study a combined award then in Year One you’ll start by studying both subjects in equal depth, then from Year Two you can choose whether to continue with an equally joint course, or a Major/Minor route.

Criminology

Criminology is the study of crime and victimisation and the responses to crime that come in the form of justice, law and punishment. Students of criminology explore the causes and motivations underlying criminal conduct and the social conditions and problems which are associated with criminality. The criminal justice system is also a key aspect of criminological studies and you will critically investigate and scrutinise the policies, processes and practices of law, criminal justice and punishment in this course.

As a field of study, criminology has developed with contributions from a range of disciplines including sociology, psychology, law, geography, media and literary studies, biology and history amongst others. This is reflected in the BSU Criminology programme which draws on expertise in a number of fields enabling you to look at the problem of crime from different angles. At the core of the programme is a suite of modules that will provide foundational knowledge of the main theories, methods and debates criminology, provides an applied education in criminal justice and includes opportunities to undertake your own research into crime and justice.Criminological research has had an impact on public policy, but criminologists also have a responsibility to analyse and question forms of governance and social control.You will interrogate the balancing act that criminology plays between contributing to government policies that control and punish crime and critical exploration of them.

Politics

The study of Politics in combination with your main subject enables you to enhance or supplement your insights and understanding of, for example, the ways in which politics and economics interact at national, regional and global levels; the application of modern political thought to a wide range of current issues and challenges; the varied visions of politics located both in the past and in the present; the ideas (or ideals) and history of radical politics, and the shaping of the modern world.

This programme will support you in becoming an imaginative, critical and independent thinker. We want you to be inventive, thoughtful, and fully aware of the changing narratives of the ‘new’ political world that surrounds us. How does this relate to the emergence of different forms of political activity, as older models of participation are challenged by community activism? How will the use and impact of social media, and the shifting connections between the local and the global, change the ways in which we engage politically? What do we really mean, when we say we are not ‘interested in politics’, when this takes so many forms and is expressed in so many ways?

The focus of the programme is on contemporary change, movements and action, but this informed and underpinned by an exploration of the historical and philosophical contexts in which political thought and response take place, and by the social, environmental and cultural impact of all these.

You will be able to develop new skills and expertise through your studies, and to apply these to your main subject. Our Politics modules have been carefully designed to work in combination with other areas of study, and to encourage you to look across and between the boundaries of otherwise distinct disciplines.