To earn a master’s degree at Washington University, a student must complete all courses required by their department; maintain satisfactory academic progress; pass certain examinations; fulfill all academic and residence requirements; and apply for program completion (graduation) via Workday Student.
For the details of master’s degree general requirements in Arts & Sciences, including an explanation of Satisfactory Academic Progress, students should review the Master’s Degree Academic Information page of the Arts & Sciences Bulletin.
Program Requirements
- Total Units Required: 36 (16 from undergrad and 20 during graduate)
- Degree Length: Two semesters/one additional year
- Note: Students must be enrolled in 9 graduate credits each semester to retain full-time status. As students complete their coursework, if enrolled in fewer than 9 graduate credits, they must enroll in a specific Arts & Sciences graduate course that will show 0 units but does count as full-time status. Students should connect with their department to ensure proper enrollment prior to Add/Drop.
- Grade Requirement: The minimum grade required for a course to count toward the MA is a C.
Students already enrolled at Washington University in St. Louis may wish to consider this program as part of an accelerated BA/MA option. This program is designed to provide students who are interested in the history, criticism, and theories of moving image-based visual culture, from the 19th through the 21st centuries, an opportunity to extend their formal intellectual training and explore film and electronic media as evolving global phenomena. The degree will advance a student’s scholarly understanding of all forms of the moving image and their artistic, cultural, industrial, philosophical, political, and social implications. In addition to providing knowledge, the degree will emphasize multiple approaches of academic study of the subject that may lead to curating, researching, teaching, and other professional activities centered on film and other moving image media as key aspects of visual culture centrally implicated in debates about culture and commerce, art and technology, entertainment and ideology.
Students who are spring-graduating seniors at Washington University may apply for this program as a combined BA/MA degree by March 15 to start this program during the subsequent fall semester.
Required Courses (18 units)
Visual Analysis
Students complete the following course (3 units):
| Code | Title | Units |
|---|---|---|
| FILM 5010 | Advanced Moving Image Analysis and Criticism | 3 |
Moving Image Theory
Students complete one of the following courses (3 units):
| Code | Title | Units |
|---|---|---|
| FILM 5419 | Theories of Mass Media | 3 |
| FILM 5420 | Film Theory | 3 |
Historiography of the Moving Image
Students complete one of the following courses (3 units):
| Code | Title | Units |
|---|---|---|
| FILM 5421 | Film Historiography | 3 |
| FILM 5423 | Histories of Media Convergence | 3 |
Television & Digital Studies
Students complete any of the following 5000-level courses in television or electronic media (3 units):
| Code | Title | Units |
|---|---|---|
| EALC 5300 | Topics in Chinese Media Culture | 3 |
| FILM 5424 | Broadcasting Equality: Radio, Television and Social Change in Postwar America | 3 |
| FILM 5425 | Seminar in Video Games: Video Games, Gender and Sexuality | 3 |
| FILM 5451 | American Television Genres | 3 |
| FILM 5453 | Experiential Design for Immersive Media | 3 |
| FILM 5457 | From Vitaphone to Youtube: Popular Music and the Moving Image | 3 |
| FILM 5478 | Topics in Transmedia Franchises | 3 |
Cinema and Television Beyond the United States
Students complete any of the following 5000-level national, regional, or transnational cinema or television studies courses offered in FMS (3 units):
| Code | Title | Units |
|---|---|---|
| EALC 5300 | Topics in Chinese Media Culture | 3 |
| FILM 5431 | Renegades and Radicals: The Japanese New Wave | 3 |
| FILM 5432 | Global Art Cinema | 3 |
| FILM 5443 | Memory, Tears and Longing: East Asian Melodrama Film | 3 |
| FILM 5444 | Topics in Chinese Language Cinema | 3 |
| FILM 5445 | Horror in Japanese Media | 3 |
| FILM 5446 | The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict Through Cinema | 3 |
| FILM 5458 | Major Film Directors (rotating topics; depends on topic) | 3 |
| FILM 5479 | Seminar in Interdisciplinary Approaches (rotating topics; depends on topic) | 3 |
Practicum
Students complete the following course (3 units):
| Code | Title | Units |
|---|---|---|
| FILM 5510 | Graduate Practicum in Film & Media Studies | 3 |
Electives (18 units)
Students may select any of the 5000-level FMS courses not used to fulfill the requirements, including the following:
| Code | Title | Units |
|---|---|---|
| EALC 5300 | Topics in Chinese Media Culture | 3 |
| FILM 5000 | Independent Study | 3 |
| FILM 5007 | The 007 Saga: James Bond and the Modern Media Franchise | 3 |
| FILM 5422 | Film Stardom, Performance, and Fan Culture | 3 |
| FILM 5424 | Broadcasting Equality: Radio, Television and Social Change in Postwar America | 3 |
| FILM 5425 | Seminar in Video Games: Video Games, Gender and Sexuality | 3 |
| FILM 5429 | Mass Culture and Modern Media: Fantasylands: Cinema, Spectatorship, and the Spatial Imagination | 3 |
| FILM 5432 | Global Art Cinema | 3 |
| FILM 5439 | Clown Princes | 3 |
| FILM 5443 | Memory, Tears and Longing: East Asian Melodrama Film | 3 |
| FILM 5444 | Topics in Chinese Language Cinema | 3 |
| FILM 5445 | Horror in Japanese Media | 3 |
| FILM 5446 | The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict Through Cinema | 3 |
| FILM 5450 | American Film Genres | 3 |
| FILM 5451 | American Television Genres | 3 |
| FILM 5452 | Advanced Screenwriting | 3 |
| FILM 5453 | Experiential Design for Immersive Media | 3 |
| FILM 5454 | American Film Melodrama and the Gothic | 3 |
| FILM 5457 | From Vitaphone to Youtube: Popular Music and the Moving Image | 3 |
| FILM 5458 | Major Film Directors | 3 |
| FILM 5460 | Taboo: Contesting Race, Sexuality and Violence in American | 3 |
| FILM 5465 | Theory and Practice of Experimental Film | 3 |
| FILM 5475 | Screening the Holocaust | 3 |
| FILM 5478 | Topics in Transmedia Franchises | 3 |
| FILM 5479 | Seminar in Interdisciplinary Approaches | 3 |
| FILM 5485 | Visualizing Orientalism: Art, Cinema and the Imaginary East 1850-2000 | 3 |
Contact Info
| Contact: | Pat Harris |
| Phone: | 314-935-4056 |
| Email: | fms@wustl.edu |
| Website: | https://fms.wustl.edu/graduate |