• The first year offers a solid basis for the programme and provides you with a broad and multidimensional overview of Literary and Cultural Analysis. 
• You will be familiarised and critically work with the most important ideas, approaches, debates and topics such as discourse, power, intertextuality, intermediality, gender, colonialism, de- and postcoloniality, ecology, cultural memory and more.  
• You will practice different ways of analysing and interpreting specific cultural artefacts, including narrative, rhetorical, discourse and visual analysis. You will also explore a series of case studies to strengthen and expand your analytical and interpretive skills.  
• You will learn how to critically engage with concepts that are at the heart of contemporary debates about climate change, decolonisation, and posthumanism, and practice ways of relating literary and other cultural objects to pressing sociopolitical and philosophical questions. 
• You will develop specific academic skills, such as academic writing and conducting independent research. 

• The second and third years of the programme build on the foundations laid in the first-year courses. In the second year, you will engage more deeply with theories and philosophies that have historically shaped the hinking about the pressing questions of today’s world.  
• You will study 20th and 21st century literature and cultural theories that have enabled new ways of analysing, interpreting and reflecting on the meanings, functions, and value of literature, the other arts and popular culture. This will allow you to become more familiar with debates, approaches, and concepts that are central to the developing interdisciplinary field of Literary and Cultural Analysis and the Humanities at large. 
• You will be able to tailor the second-year programme to your own interests by selecting a minor or elective courses in a wide range of subjects. 

• In the third year of the programme, you participate in a research seminar where you will work on and exchange ideas about your thesis project with your fellow students.  
• In the second semester, you will be assigned an individual thesis supervisor who will help you shape your thesis into an academic text that sheds light on an urgent cultural, philosophical and/or sociopolitical question through the critical, qualitative analysis of one or more cultural objects. The objects our past students have worked with include novels, poems, films, television programmes, Tik Tok videos, comic books, installation art, performances, social movements and museums. 
• You also explore the historical and philosophical background of the Humanities through a critical and sociopolitical lens, with a particular emphasis on the literary, cultural, and artistic disciplines. 
• You will be able to further specialise in your field of interest through a range of electives, take the opportunity to study abroad for a semester, or do an internship.

Next to your regular courses and your specialisation, you will have 30 ECTS worth of space to fill by doing electives, a minor, an internship or studying abroad. 

Electives

In theory, any course can be taken as an elective, from courses offered by the Faculty of Humanities to those offered by other faculties or even other universities.  

Minor

A minor is a cohesive teaching programme that usually consists of 30 ECTS. Doing a minor is not mandatory. However, it can be a good way to prepare for a Master’s programme or for a certain profession. 

The programme allows for you to do an internship and/or to study abroad for a period of time. 

Internship 

You can enrich your study programme as well as your CV by doing an internship. This will allow you to gain experience at an organisation in the field of Literary & Cultural Analysis and gives you an impression of what working for such an organization entails. 

Studying abroad 

The UvA is involved in a number of exchange programmes that give you the opportunity to study abroad for a period. 

Highly-motivated students may qualify to take part in a selective Honours programme. This programme accounts for an additional 30 ECTS and will help develop your academic research skills and prepare you for a Research Master’s degree. 

Literary and Cultural Analysis is a three-year Bachelor’s degree of 180 ECTS credits. Each academic year accounts for 60 credits (ECTS) and comprises two semesters, with each semester composed of two 8-week blocks and one 4-week block. As a Bachelor’s student, you are expected to spend an average of 42 hours a week on your studies. 

• In your first year, 12 to 15 of those hours will be spent attending classes, while in your second and third years you will have classes for approximately 8 to 10 hours a week.  
• The remaining time will be spent on self-study, preparing for lectures and seminars, completing coursework and assignments, as well as exams. 
• You will attend both lectures and small group seminars. 
• Lecture courses will generally introduce the main topics of the course, and help you understand the course readings. 
• In the seminars, you will work closely with your fellow students​ across both tracks​, collaborating on assignments, presentations and talks. 
• You will be assessed by means of essays, presentations, exams, reports and other assignments. 

It is possible to enrol in this programme as a part-time student. 

• Part-time students follow the same programme as full-time students. However, you follow less fewer courses per year and the course load of the programme will be 30 credits per year instead of the full-time course load of 60 credits per year. Part-time students complete the programme within six years.
• As for full-time students there is a Binding Study Advice (BSA): in the first year it is required to obtain a minimum of 24 credits in order to re-enrol for the second year. 
• The tuition fee for part-time students is lower than the fee for full-time students, for more information see tuition fees. 
• Part-time students are not entitled to the Dutch student loan system.