Hone your courtroom skills
Through mock case scenarios, you have the ability to practise a variety of legal roles in this space. The room has been authentically configured and furnished to simulate a real court environment.
UCAS tariff | 112 - 128 |
UCAS course code | ML26 |
Institution code | P60 |
Duration | 3 years (+ optional placement) |
Course type | Full-time |
Location | Plymouth |
Combine studying the law with asking broader questions about why people commit crime and how society deals with criminality to understand the social justice system better, working with partners like Victim Support and Devon and Cornwall Police. Learn from our experienced academics who are leading researchers, practising lawyers and who have worked in the justice system. Benefit from our extensive contacts across the sector so you can be ready to make a difference in society.
Legal Systems and Skills (LAW4007)
An overview of the English Legal System with reference to the criminal and civil legal processes and procedure. An introduction to the relationship between English law and procedure in a wider international context. To introduce an understanding of the requisite legal, transferrable and practical skills that underpin the study of law, including basic issues of ethical and professional conduct.
Public Law (LAW4008)
This module focuses on Constitutional and Administrative Law, examining fundamental theories and principles, and their application and practice within the British constitution.
European Union Law (LAW4009)
This module focuses on the law of the European Union, exploring aspects such as, for example, its institutional infra-structure, legal sources, preliminary rulings, key principles and means of enforcement
Contract Law (LAW4010)
An introduction to the law of contract through study of the essential elements in contract formation. This module then considers the nature and relative significance of contractual terms.
Tort Law (LAW4011)
The Law of Tort is concerned with the creation and imposition of civil rights obligations on people generally. It is focused on the legal protection of a number of key rights, such as the right to bodily integrity, reputation, enjoyment of property and privacy amongst others.
Criminal Law (LAW4012)
This module provides examination of core principles and concepts of criminal law, an introduction to modes of participation, and analysis of selected offences and defences. This module will include two 2-hour talks that introduce our School and programme level employability related opportunities and support, including details of the optional placement year.
Theorising Crime and Harm (CRM5002)
This module takes recent developments in criminological theory and analyses the potential for criminology as a discipline to contribute to understanding, contextualising and countering some of the greatest challenges facing society and the planet today. The emphasis on harm tests the boundaries of mainstream criminology, and encourages students to think beyond social and legal constructions of crime.
Dispute Resolution Skills (LAW5001)
This module focuses on the development of transferable skills based on real-life scenarios with an emphasis on enhancing employability. It revolves around dispute resolution exercises helping 'clients' to resolve disputes. It is designed to enhance practical lawyering skills. It also includes relevant elements of practice and procedure, such as analysis of the merits of a claim or defence and preparing a case for trial as well as selected pre-action considerations and trial procedures.
Critical Perspectives on Crime Control (CRM5004)
This module examines a range of critical social scientific perspectives which have sought to make sense of crime control within its wider social context and in terms of its wider social significance. It considers the contributions of key social science theorists such as Stanley Cohen, David Garland, and Loic Wacquant and others whose work has focused upon crime control, and it seeks to apply their core ideas in order to illuminate our understanding of contemporary features of policy and practice.
Property Law (LAW5017)
The module examines principles and the law, together with elements of practice, relating to freehold and leasehold property and associated rights and interests.
Stage 2 Professional Development, Placement Preparation and Identifying Opportunities (SSC500)
This module is for students in the School of Society and Culture who are interested in undertaking an optional placement in the third year of their programme. It supports students in their search, application, and preparation for the placement, including developing interview techniques and effective application materials (e.g. CVs , portfolios, and cover letters).
Harm in the 21st Century (CRM5003MX)
This module explores the global challenges of harmful behaviours and activities in contemporary society by considering specific areas of concern for criminologists. By drawing on real-world examples in everyday life, the module examines how social problems and issues have arisen due to processes of globalisation that have changed the social, political and economic landscape of the 21st century.
Crime, Harm and Culture (CRM5009MX)
The module aims to provide students with a critical appreciation of harm and crime by exploring relevant issues from film, television, music, fiction literature and art. By applying a criminological lens to different forms of popular culture, students will be able to examine a variety of media forms in terms of its content and its contemporary political, social and economic context using different theories and concepts.
Gothic Fictions: Villains, Virgins and Vampires (ENG5002MX)
This module looks at eighteenth- and nineteenth-century novels to trace the variety and scope of literary contributions to the Gothic. It begins by discussing the origins of the Gothic novel, then moves to the heyday of the genre in the revolutionary 1790s, on to authors writing in the early and mid-nineteenth century, through to the decadence of the 1890s.
‘Hurt Minds’: Madness and Mental Illness in Literature (ENG5013MX)
This module considers changing attitudes towards, and a variety of theories of, the mind, examining how different cultures have understood ‘healthy’ and ‘unhealthy’ mental states. It will look at how the experience and treatment of mental illness has been represented in fiction. The mind is at its most fascinating when it behaves outside of expected social norms. By considering a variety of literary texts over several centuries, this module explores shifts in the definition, understanding, evaluation, and management of exceptional mental states.
Writing Genre Fiction (ENG5017MX)
This module takes students into in-depth engagement with prose fiction writing in various genres, with possibilities including fantasy, science-fiction, period/historical, young adult fiction, horror, comedy, romance, crime, and thriller. The module is taught through lecture, seminars, and workshops where students are asked to submit and feedback to peers and tutors on a regular basis.
Law in Context: Commerce and Intellectual Property (LAW5019MX)
This module focuses on the work of commercial lawyers in practice in helping businesses to trade. It analyses a range of contractual agreements dealing with the manufacture, sale, supply and distribution of goods, assets and services in general and intellectual property in particular.
Play and Games for Performance (PER5008MX)
This module will introduce students to practical methods for designing games and play structures for participatory performances that invite audiences to become actively involved in the work. In addition to learning new tools for designing and facilitating play, students will be prompted to consider playfulness from a theoretical perspective, recognising the connection between the play of mimesis and theatrical performance.
Politics Beyond Parliaments (PIR5013MX)
This module analyses the role of civil society and the public sphere in democratic governance and in democratization from a variety of theoretical perspectives.
Voter Behaviour and Effective Election Campaigning (PIR5014MX)
This module undertakes an advanced examination of contemporary trends and developments in theories of electoral behaviour globally; then more specifically the relationship between electoral rules, electoral systems and election outcomes; the evolution of campaign techniques, and the role, mechanics, and accuracy of opinion polls in modern electoral politics. These global understandings are applied directly to the case of British politics.
School of Society and Culture Placement Year (SSC600)
Students have the opportunity to gain work experience that will set them apart in the job market when they graduate by undertaking an optional flexible placement year. The placement must be a minimum of 24-weeks (which can be split between a maximum of two different placement providers) and up to a maximum of 48-weeks over the course of the academic year. The placement is flexible and can be undertaken virtually, part or full time and either paid or voluntary. This year allows them to apply and hone the knowledge and skills acquired from the previous years of their programme in the real world.
Leisure, Consumerism and Harm (CRM6008)
This module explores contemporary developments within the study of leisure and consumerism, offering a theoretically informed understanding of key issues at the forefront of the discipline. Students will have the opportunity to study the changing nature of criminology’s engagement with leisure against a backdrop of global consumer capitalism.
Fear, Crime and Control in the City (CRM6009)
This module critically examines steadfast and emergent social issues at the interplay between social control and the social, providing students with a critical understanding of how the social is regulated socially, culturally and legally. We will do this by looking as social issues in urban space. We will explore meanings, cultural significance, and political consequences from a criminological perspective.
Dissertation (LAW6000)
The production of a substantial dissertation (10,000 words) on a legal or legally related area with content and form determined by the student. For the LLB Law and Criminology the dissertation will be set in context.
Work-Based Learning (LAW6001)
A 40 credit module in which students develop intellectual, practical, transferable and ethical skills in a work-based learning context. The placement may be in or for any work-based organisation, though many of these will be law related. Students may be placed within one of the Law School’s Law Clinic projects or within a Law Clinic partner organisation or they may choose to find the whole or part of their work experience independently.
Criminal Law and Practice (LAW6003)
This module will build on the principles taught in Criminal Law, and introduces students to the practical/professional application of criminal litigation; it will look at the criminal justice process from investigation and the decision to charge; detention and interrogation, and introduce the substantive law and rules around criminal evidence; funding criminal legal services; through to the criminal litigation process; and sentencing and appeals.
Family Law (LAW6004)
This module will examine the principles of family law from both theoretical and practical perspectives.
Human Rights (LAW6005)
This module provides an in-depth analysis of the law relating to human rights with reference to national, regional and international law principles. It examines the development and scope of fundamental rights in both theory and practice, and the legitimate limits and restrictions on rights in the interests of balancing conflicting interests in democratic societies.
Trusts and Practice (LAW6006)
The module examines equitable principles and the law relating to trusts and estates. The module supports the development of a practical understanding of the law sitting behind wills and the administration of trusts and estates.
Business Law and Practice (LAW6007)
This module considers the “life” of business organisations, how they operate and how they are governed. It critically assesses the concepts and principles of corporate law as well as key elements of practice and procedure in how they operate and are governed. The module builds upon elements of contract law and applies them in a commercial setting.
Immigration Law (LAW6010)
This module focuses on the key and topical issues in Immigration, Nationality and Refugee law in the UK. The UK’s system of immigration control is fully considered and there is some emphasis on the application of decision making to those entering the UK both for immigration purposes and as refugees. There is consideration of the global and European context and of the influence of policy, politics and the media in the field.
American Crime Writing (ENG6005MX)
This module considers the development of twentieth-century American crime fiction from hard-boiled detectives, to myths of the mafia, and postmodern reinventions of the genre. This module will explore the cultural contexts of American crime writing, prevailing conventions of the genre, as well as challenges to those conventions.
Features Journalism Workshop (ENG6008MX)
This module offers students an in-depth experience of professional writing. We will explore technique in features and literary journalism; music reviews, opinion columns and longer immersion features as well as other contemporary works of non-fiction feature writing, both short- and long-form, from sub-genres including profiles and interviews, autobiography and columns, travel writing, and reportage. We will learn to research and produce our own works of professional nonfiction and critically evaluate them.
Equality and the Law (LAW6016)
This module will consider how Equality Law has developed over the last century and introduce students to key principles and debates in this area. To promote inclusion, the module will look at Equality Law in a social, political, and legal context. In respect of the latter, there will be a key focus on discrimination in the workplace. The module will also consider how we enforce equality rights (including the challenges for enforcement), and how they may evolve in the future.
Every undergraduate taught course has a detailed programme specification document describing the course aims, the course structure, the teaching and learning methods, the learning outcomes and the rules of assessment.
The following programme specification represents the latest course structure and may be subject to change:
The modules shown for this course are those currently being studied by our students, or are proposed new modules. Please note that programme structures and individual modules are subject to amendment from time to time as part of the University’s curriculum enrichment programme and in line with changes in the University’s policies and requirements.
Decolonising the Social Sciences (ANT5006MX)
This module responds to contemporary calls to decolonise the social sciences. It reads the history of social science through the lens of post-colonial and indigenous studies. How have non-western voices been marginalised and silenced by academia? What does academia look from the perspective of the subaltern? Can the social sciences shed their colonial robes, or are they doomed to remain racialised and exclusionary disciplines? We explore these questions in regard to emerging disciplines aimed at constructing better and more inclusive futures, including 'indigenous criminology', 'participatory ethnography', and the 'anthropology of the otherwise'.
Brave New Worlds: Ethnography of/on Online and Digital Worlds (ANT5008MX)
This module teaches students how to use ethnographic methods to make sense of the internet, which we now increasingly inhabit. Students learn how to navigate and analyse platforms such as Facebook or TikTok. They study how these technologies transform our relationships, identities, and ideas of truth. The module also examines the socio-cultural and ethical aspects of digital worlds (e.g. Second life).
Coastal Cultures: Marine Anthropology in the age of climate change and mass extinction. (ANT6008MX)
Using ethnography, we analyse how coastal communities use the sea – not only as a source of livelihood, but as a key ingredient in the construction of their identity and place in world. Drawing on a range of cases from across the world – from Polynesian sorcerers, to Japanese whale mourners, to Cornish surfers – we study how coastal communities are responding to climate change, sea level rise, pollution, and extinction.
Painting Sex and Power (ARH5008MX)
The module examines the link between the perception of sexuality and power in a variety of media, and from diverse historical and geographic contexts. Critical approaches from gender studies will be combined with visual analysis in order to contextualize the biased and stereotypical nature of the imagery.
Imagery in Online and Offline Worlds: Film, Television and Video Games (ARH5002MX)
This module provides students with a comprehensive understanding of current approaches towards mass media and visual culture. Particular emphasis will be put on medium-specificity, content analysis and audience studies.
Questions in Contemporary Art (ARH6002MX)
The module introduces and examines selected questions raised in the last three decades in contemporary art. Case studies drawn from art history, critical and cultural theory, and where appropriate related disciplines, will be examined.
Writing Creative Nonfiction: Autobiography, Travel Writing, Reportage (ENG5010MX)
This module introduces students to the key concepts and issues in contemporary works of creative nonfiction, or 'life writing'. Included in our readings will be works of memoir and autobiography, travel writing, personal essays and reportage. The module is entirely taught in workshops where we experiment with producing our own works of creative nonfiction and learning to refine them, as well as critically evaluate and contextualise them.
Global Cold War: Politics, Culture and Society (HIS5004MX)
This module is an introduction to major themes in the political, social and cultural history of the modern world with special focus on the 20th century and the Cold War.
Eighteenth-Century Empires (HIS5007MX)
This module is designed to explore the ‘long eighteenth century’ with a broad geographical focus, encompassing, but not limited to the Atlantic Isles, Atlantic world, formal and informal empire, and trading connections. It takes in the slave trade and impact of slavery globally, studies voyages of exploration, examines the scientific and political enlightenment, and wider cultural and social impacts of imperialism.
Middle Kingdoms: Themes in Early Modern Asia (HIS5009MX)
This module introduces the history of early modern Japan (c.16th-19th centuries). At one level, it explores key questions shaping the histories of the late Sengoku (‘Warring States’) and Tokugawa Japan. Building on these questions, it then situates the Japanese experience in a trans-regional perspective with reference to early modern China, Korea, Ryukyu, as well as Europe.
Dunkirk to D Day: The Second World War in Europe (HIS5014MX)
The module examines the Second World War in Europe and the Atlantic Ocean from 1940 to late 1944.
Piracy and Privateering, c.1560-1816 (HIS6002MX)
This module explores piracy and privateering activity in the seas around the British Isles and further afield from the reign of Queen Elizabeth to the end of the second Barbary War in 1816. This course focuses on the social history of piracy and privateering, the organisation of pirate society, and the economic impact of piracy and privateering.
America, the United Nations and International Relations 1945 to the present (HIS6006MX)
This module provides a detailed examination of the relationship between the United States of America and the United Nations in the management of international relations from 1945 to the present.
Global Environmental Politics (PIR6007MX)
This module examines the problem of environmental degradation and its implications for our global political economy. It discusses the major debates in political thought around the primary causes of environmental degradation. The module outlines the major attempts to build international regimes for global environmental governance, and the difficulties and obstacles that such attempts have encountered. A range of ideas, critiques, policy proposals, innovations in governance, and templates for political activism within the environmental movement are critically evaluated.
Refugee Studies (PIR5009MX)
This module focuses on the political, economic and social context of forced migration and considers the complex and varied nature of global refugee populations. It analyses responses at international, national and regional level and engages with a range of challenging questions around international co-operation, the framework of international protection, humanitarianism and the causes of displacement.
Global Development (PIR5011MX)
This module embraces both theoretical and empirical approaches to understanding development issues and policies, at international and multilateral scale. The approach incorporates historical, economic, political and social perspectives. The module considers issues faced by international development agencies, as well as the impact on populations in the developing world to illustrate and provide context for the discussion of various developmental concerns.
Voter Behaviour and Effective Election Campaigning (PIR6008MX)
This module undertakes an advanced examination of contemporary trends and developments in theories of electoral behaviour globally; then more specifically the relationship between electoral rules, electoral systems and election outcomes; the evolution of campaign techniques, and the role, mechanics, and accuracy of opinion polls in modern electoral politics. These global understandings are applied directly to the case of British politics.
Globalisation and Social Justice (SOC5005MX)
This module investigates the key debates of globalisation and critically evaluates, in terms of its economic, political, socio-cultural and legal dimensions, the causes and consequences of a globalising world. It furthermore explores a range of international social justice issues to examine the relationships (causative and ameliorative) between policies and (in)justice
Gender, Sex and Sexuality (SOC5006MX)
This module introduces students to the sociology of gender, sex and sexuality. It interrogates these concepts with particular reference to identity, activism, social justice and social change. It develops an understanding of the similarities, differences and intersections between gender, sex, sexuality and other social signifiers of difference/diversity including ‘race’, ethnicity, dis/ability, class and age.
Health, Medical Power and Social Justice (SOC6004MX)
This module considers a range of issues concerning health, illness and medical power in contemporary society. The module seeks to develop an understanding of the impact of ‘medicalisation’ on everyday life, as well as the importance of social divisions, such as age, gender, ethnicity and socio-economic status. There will be a focus on a range of sociological perspectives on health with an opportunity to focus upon areas of particular interest.
Security Management (CRM6011MX)
This module provides students with a critical insight into the professional domain of security management. It provides an overview of the theories, policies, procedures and practices that underpin the work of the security manager, and focuses upon a career-relevant knowledge and understanding of this significant area of expertise.
Security and Policing Today: Debates and Issues (CRM5008MX)
This module provides students with a contemporary overview of debates and issues in policing and security environments that inform practice and development in the field. The module examines how modern policing and security function, the impact of professionalization on all aspects of policing tasks and the tensions and benefits attained from multi-agency working. The module considers policing legitimacy, the ethics of crime control and associated engagement with the diversity of contemporary society, competing community interests and professional practice.
Forensic Criminology: Social Investigations (CRM5006MX)
This module focuses on how social science can contribute to criminal investigations. This involvesforensically investigating the backgrounds and experiences of individuals involved in criminal or deviantbehaviour. The sociology of the police who are tasked to conduct investigations is also analysed. Students will be encouraged to apply criminological techniques and theory to scenario-based examples which will focus on victims, offenders and the police, and their positions in society.
UCAS tariff
112 - 128
Student | 2023-2024 | 2024-2025 |
---|---|---|
Home | £9,250 | £9,250 |
International | £15,600 | £17,100 |
Part time (Home) | £770 | £770 |
To reward outstanding achievement the University of Plymouth offers scholarship schemes to help towards funding your studies.
International progression routes
Through mock case scenarios, you have the ability to practise a variety of legal roles in this space. The room has been authentically configured and furnished to simulate a real court environment.
The Foulston Room gives our students hands-on, real-world experience of the court room. Setting foot in this Grade II listed building, walking up its grand staircase and into a historic room that looks and feels just like a real court is thrilling! With interactive teaching, court room simulation and ‘mooting’, our students get to experience what it is really like to represent clients in court. It is the perfect space to grow confidence and develop craft, and it’s the best possible preparation for future success in their legal careers.
John Matthews
Interim Head of School
Whilst working in the law clinic, we had the opportunity to help those who needed it, and have been able to make a positive impact in difficult times. It was also a huge factor in helping me stand out when applying for jobs.
Learn more about the diverse range of successful career pathways our LLB (Hons) graduates take after completing the course
Jennifer Smith
Jennifer shares her journey since graduation and how studying at Plymouth shaped her career as a Pupil Barrister specialising in law.
Dhanisha Falguni Chandrakant Bharadia
Fundraiser and volunteer Dhanisha has big plans for her future in environmental law.
Ciaran Cronnelly
Ciaran volunteered while studying at the University of Plymouth to launch his career as a politician and strategic change consultant.
“The best module yet!"