Staff and students of the Department of Music pursue research on a wide range of subjects, mainly but not exclusively focused on the music of Asia and Africa. Staff have special interests in the music of China and Central Asia (Harris), Korea (Howard), Japan, Indonesia and Thailand (Gray), India and Nepal (Widdess), the Islamic Middle East (Wright), the Jewish world (Wood), West Africa and Cuba (Durán) and South and East Africa (Impey). But research is not limited to these areas: projects have been undertaken on American jazz, and on Caribbean, Mediterranean and Eastern European music, for example. [+]

Media and Film Studies at SOAS has an expanding programme of doctoral research with some thirty research students currently enrolled. Our research students work on an exceptionally wide range of topics, both theoretical and empirical, with about half coming from Africa, the Middle East and Asia, and half from Europe and North America. [+]

The Centre for Film and Screen Studies invites applications for disciplinary and interdisciplinary research in Film and Screen Studies with particular reference to Africa, Asia and the Near and Middle East. The Centre’s geographical focus on film/screen industries and movements beyond the dominant Western ‘global’ Hollywood and European economies of production, distribution and exhibition, makes the Centre unique in its approach. We are also keen to promote research on the transnational, transcultural and multi-media nature of the image in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. [+]

While a research degree should be very rewarding personally, it is also a serious and sometimes intense undertaking. Under the current system, a full-time doctoral student has three years to complete a full draft of her or his thesis and then a further one year for writing up (known as a 3+1 degree). There are always solitary moments when carrying out individual research, even if a department has a strong collegiate atmosphere, as ours does. Research degrees are generally undertaken by individuals who aim to become professionals in the field of art history and/or archaeology, whether as academics who carry out research and teach in universities or as curators or educators in museums, libraries or archives, or in any number of other related areas such as academic publishing or even the commercial art world. It is generally a good idea to have some experience of work outside university before applying to a doctoral programme, for example, in some role in a museum or gallery. Embarking on a research degree is not just about the qualification but also about developing as a person and a professional so as to be able to contribute to national and international discourses in, and perhaps also far beyond, the history of art and archaeology. [+]