Contemporary Culture Courses in London
Explore contemporary culture through our wide-ranging and diverse programme of courses in Literature , Film studies , Art history , and interdisciplinary Culture
Our short courses are available online and in-person daytime, evening and weekend. We invite you to join our community of learners exploring culture in our times.
- Shrinks on screen: psychologists on TV and FilmCourse start date: Sat 23 Mar 2024
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Mary WildIn this course, we will look at examples of ‘shrinks on screen’—portrayals of mental health professionals (psychiatrists, social workers, psychoanalysts, etc.) in cinema and TV. We will critically examine ‘head doctors’ tropes, and identify iconic psychotherapy sessions in movies and television that convincingly represent the challenges and effectiveness of the so-called ‘talking cure’.
Mary Wild is a film lecturer and podcaster with an academic background in psychoanalytic theory. Her research interests include cinematic representation of the unconscious, surrealism, mental illness, feminine subjectivity, the horror genre, and auteur studies. In addition to teaching at City Lit, she is a regular speaker at Freud Museum London.Full fee £59.00 Senior fee £47.00 Concession £38.00 - Literature taster: contemporary fictionCourse start date: Thu 28 Mar 2024
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Patricia SweeneyEver wondered what studying a Literature course at City Lit is like? Tempted to try, but not ready to commit to a whole course? Try this taster session on contemporary fiction to boost your confidence and whet your appetite for further study!
Includes information on the Literature programme offering for term three, which runs from April to July 2024.Full fee £10.00 Senior fee £10.00 Concession £10.00 - Friday lates: contemporary art in China - over the Great FirewallCourse start date: Fri 19 Apr 2024
Location on this date: Online
Tutors: Meitao QuFrom creation to distribution, the explosion of digital technologies has transformed artmaking in a myriad of ways. In this session, we will journey across the Great Firewall to explore contemporary, new media art China.
This course will be delivered online. See the ‘What is the course about?’ section in course details for more information.Full fee £19.00 Senior fee £19.00 Concession £12.00 - The alternative greatest films ever: The Sight & Sound and student pollCourse start date: Mon 22 Apr 2024 (and 1 other date)
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: John WischmeyerThis is a stand-alone companion course to the Autumn ’23 course on the Sight and Sound Poll of the Greatest Films of All Time. The first reactions to the Sight and Sound Poll 2022 were divisive, as completely expected, when certain 21st-century films made the list and other venerated classics were dropped (see topics below for the list). As interesting as the top 100 was to discuss, we wanted to look a bit deeper to see how the reception of certain films shifted over the last decade, with a rundown of the films that were added and those removed. Be assured, they are as enjoyable as the Top 100—perhaps even more so. In addition to viewing the films that were added or dropped, students will conduct their own poll of the Greatest Films of All Time. Enjoy either or both of these complementary courses.Full fee £179.00 - Image and identity: 20th century Chinese art and cinemaCourse start date: Tue 23 Apr 2024
Location on this date: Online
Tutors: Meitao QuExplore the art of Chinese artists and filmmakers from the turn of the 20th century to the turn of the 21st, as they try to make sense of a world on the cusp between the old and the new, marked by encounters with imperialism and iconoclasm. Learn what place art had in socio-political movements, and how it reflected the hopes and anxieties of its time.
This course will be delivered online. See the ‘What is the course about?’ section in course details for more information.Full fee £99.00 Senior fee £79.00 Concession £64.00 - Cyborg cultures: hybrid beings and monstrous identitiesCourse start date: Wed 24 Apr 2024
Location on this date: Online
Tutors: Katie GossIn this course students will be introduced to theories of posthumanism that suggest ways we can embrace ‘monstruous’ identities and ‘mutant’ forms of knowing. Through popular science fiction films and literary texts, we will contemplate the complex coming together and apart of bodies-minds-worlds in contemporary culture and explore experiences of hybridity and metamorphosis.
This course will be delivered online. See the ‘What is the course about?’ section in course details for more information.Full fee £99.00 Senior fee £99.00 Concession £64.00 - Contemporary art in LondonCourse start date: Fri 26 Apr 2024
Location on this date: Off Site
Tutors: Chantal CondronExplore and discuss contemporary art on show in London. Each week we’ll visit 1-2 commercial galleries or a public gallery and examine specific exhibitions of contemporary art across a range of media including painting, works on paper, photography, new media and sculpture. - Reading BrexLit: three novelsCourse start date: Tue 14 May 2024
Location on this date: Online
Tutors: Kate WilkinsonThe 2016 referendum result was one of the most significant events in recent British history. How can novels, written in that moment, shed light on the run-up to the vote and its immediate aftermath?
On this course we’ll study three fascinating and powerful novels, by Ali Smith, Anthony Cartwright and Adam Thorpe, exploring their stories and the backdrop they present of Britain’s divisions and connections.
This course will be delivered online. See the ‘What is the course about?’ section in course details for more information.Full fee £99.00 Senior fee £99.00 Concession £64.00 - Art in Britain since 2000: where are we now?Course start date: Thu 16 May 2024
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Chantal CondronDiscover how exciting, new UK-based artists use both experimental and traditional approaches to art to address issues of identity, history and personal experience.Full fee £119.00 - Art and critical theory: feminism and post-colonialismCourse start date: Tue 4 Jun 2024
Location on this date: Online
Tutors: Irina ChkhaidzeExplore the role of critical theory within the field of art history, and learn new ways of thinking about art by focusing on feminism, post-colonial theory and the notion of the death of the author.
This course will be delivered online. See the ‘What is the course about?’ section in course details for more information. - Cinema beyond the cinemaCourse start date: Sat 29 Jun 2024
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Paul SuttonNowadays there are so many ways to watch film - smart phones, tablets, TVs - just as there are so many different spaces in which we encounter the moving image - cinemas, galleries, our homes, to name but a few. This day-long course will broaden and deepen your critical awareness of the diverse formal and experiential possibilities of cinema, both as they have developed in the past and as they are transforming in the contemporary moment. It will do this by reflecting on two questions: ‘what is cinema?’ and ‘where is cinema?’.Full fee £59.00 Senior fee £47.00 Concession £38.00 - A history of modern art in 50 worksCourse start date: Mon 15 Apr 2024
Location on this date: Off Site
Tutors: Sarah JaffrayExplore the history of modern art through objects and artworks in London galleries. Build a greater understanding of modern art, its experiments and the cultural rebellions that mark the period.
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