Course summary

BA Sociology and Politics programme equips you with the practical tools to understand the world around you, but also to think about how to change it for the better. By bringing together the concerns, theories and methodologies of both sociology and politics, you’ll develop rich, analytical and informed engagement with contemporary local and global events in departments with active research centres, excellent teachers and an engaged and friendly student body. In sociology, you’ll explore how social inequalities operate and how social movements might combat oppression; you’ll analyse how historical processes such as colonialism continue to shape today’s societies and how the contemporary climate crisis requires us to develop new ways of thinking and acting. And in politics, you won’t just learn about voting systems, parliaments and conventional arenas of power in the West since you’ll be part of a department that brings into focus the politics of everyday life right across the world. Why study BA Sociology & Politics at Goldsmiths

• You’ll be joining one of the world’s leading sociology departments. We've been rated top 10 in the UK for Sociology in the QS World University Rankings 2023.

• Staff in both the Department of Sociology and the Department of Politics and International Relations are specialists and pioneers in their fields. They write the books that are on reading lists across the country and you’ll be working with them directly.

• Our focus is on helping you become the type of sociologist and political scientist that you want to be. You’ll tailor your own learning journey from day one by choosing from a wide range of exciting option modules, including work placements.

• You'll ‘get messy’ with hands-on research methods modules in your first two years of study, before designing and carrying out your own research project in your final year. Recent projects have explored stigma and South Asian Muslim experiences of mental health, Green Party policies from a feminist persepctive, and an ethnography of labour practices and workers’ organisations in a Chinese street market.

• Our departments are committed to decolonising the curriculum and we offer expertise on questions of culture right around the world, as well as on radical approaches to race, gender, sexuality, and the organisation of political life.

• You’ll join an active community and be able to get involved in campaigns, debates, activities and societies and meet other people as passionate about the subject as you.