Courses and qualifications

Open University courses are the main 'building blocks' of our qualifications. You can take a single course or take several to build towards an Open University diploma or degree.

Studying Faustus

The new Open University course, The Arts Past And Present, includes a section examining Marlowe's reputation and the role of the play in making it. Find out more about the course, and what skills you'll need for it with getting ready for AA100.

Access Course

Making Sense of the Arts (Y160)
This course introduces some of the key ideas and ways of thinking involved in studying the arts and humanities.

Level 1 Short Courses

Shakespeare: An Introduction (A177)
This course focuses on two of Shakespeare’s plays: The Taming of the Shrew, a dark comedy about the battle of the sexes; and Romeo and Juliet, one of the most famous tragedies ever written.

Start Writing Fiction (A174)
This short online course provides a practical introduction to writing fiction.

Start Writing Poetry (A175)
This course will introduce you in a gradual and accessible way to the basic 'tools of the trade'.

Start Writing Plays (A176)
This course will help you develop the necessary skills, so you will be able to tell a story on stage, fully realising the potentials of the medium.

Level 1 Courses

An Introduction to the Humanities (A103)
You will get from this course a lively and varied grounding in the eight disciplines in the Arts Faculty: art history, literature, music, philosophy, classical studies, history, religious studies, and history of science.

Level 2 Courses

Approaches to Literature (A210)
How do we work out what a text means? How does a play move from page to performance? Study of a variety of texts will give you knowledge and skills with which to tackle such questions, preparing you for literary studies at Level 3.

Creative Writing (A215)
This course takes a student-centred approach to creative writing, offering a range of strategies to help you develop as a writer, and encouraging you to value your own resources of memory, observation and voice.

Level 3 Courses

Shakespeare: Text and Performance (AA306)
This intensive study of Shakespeare develops your knowledge of the range and variety of Shakespeare’s dramatic work through study of the texts and performances of nine plays and broadens the critical perspectives, examining how their reception and status has been shaped by cultural and institutional factors, and explore in more detail earlier themes such as questions of genre, politics, sexuality and gender.