Studying Liberal Arts at Lancaster offers you the opportunity to expand your mind and become a creative and critical thinker, able to take a holistic view of global issues. Engage with local communities, tackle societal challenges, and explore influential ideas.

By exploring ideas from a range of arts, humanities and social science subjects, you will develop a sophisticated understanding of the key issues facing humanity, hone your problem-solving skills and innovative thinking. Prepare to become a versatile, global citizen ready to make a meaningful impact in an ever-changing world.

Why Lancaster?

• Think big and think differently: Develop your creative and critical thinking through dynamic, interdisciplinary approaches in humanities, arts, and social sciences

• Unleash your creativity: Choose innovative assessments that develop your interests and skills, from producing a podcast to crafting a case study or creating a performance piece

• Make a real-world impact: Collaborate with local communities to design and deliver meaningful, hands-on projects that make a difference

• Build a future-ready skillset: Apply your learning in practical, professional settings to master problem-solving, negotiation, communication, and empathy

• Turn learning into action: Graduate with experiences and skills that demonstrate your ability to innovate, connect, and lead in a rapidly changing world

• Embark on an adventure: Expand your horizons by studying, working, or teaching abroad and gaining a truly international perspective

• Expand your horizons: study, work or teach abroad

Apply your ideas to current issues

Many challenges we face today are complex and require input from a range of disciplines and perspectives. You will develop a holistic understanding of real-world issues and learn how to solve problems drawing on a range of methodologies and approaches.

Topics could include the environment and climate change, objectivity and subjectivity in information, relationships between human and non-human, as well as our digital presents and futures. As we explore different topics, we will draw on principles from Fine Art to Politics, from English Literature to Cultural Studies and from History to Philosophy. You will encounter big thinkers, game-changing ideas, and influential theories that shape the way we understand the world, challenge conventional thinking, and inspire innovation across various fields.

You will learn to analyse, critique and question relationships between different perspectives.

You will also learn how to relate cultural artefacts such as paintings, literature, buildings and iconic figures to the contexts of their production and reception and ask how these principles have impact in the real world. For example, what is the link between the literary and industrial heritages of Lancaster and the Lake District? Between the global leisure industry and climate change? How do legacies of colonialism impact local communities?

Learn through real-world encounters

We emphasise the importance of ‘place’ in our teaching, encouraging you to engage with local communities within their own unique locations on their own terms. A key part of the course is connecting your studies to the real world, applying what you have learned to current social issues.

You will develop awareness of and engagement with community partners such as councils, charities, arts and heritage groups, health care partners and businesses; local community settings may also include Lancaster Castle, Preston Archives, the Gregson Community centre or the proposed Eden Project in Morecambe.

As you progress through the course, you will work collaboratively on live briefs aiming to produce creative solutions to social challenges set in various local contexts across the globe. Through these immersive experiences and collaborative projects, you will address pressing societal challenges. You will learn how to apply your knowledge and skills in professional contexts preparing you for your future career and empowering you, as a graduate to make a difference in the world.

New ways of thinking. New ways of assessment.

As you experience alternative ways of thinking and develop your awareness of the relationship between global issues and local realities, your sensitivity to cultural diversity will increase.

You will become a more flexible, lateral and creative thinker. Through human interactions you will develop negotiation skills grounded in empathy and insight. We believe that it’s not about looking for the right answers but finding the right questions to ask.

An innovative approach to study requires alternatives to traditional assessment methods. On some modules you will have creative choice over the kind of work you submit for assessment. For example, you might deliver a podcast, present a theatre performance, create a case-study or make a piece of art!

Tailor your degree to your interests

In the later stages of your degree, you will be able to tailor your journey by choosing your options from a range of modules offered across the Faculty, whilst keeping a core of shared modules with your fellow Liberal Arts students.

Language modules are available to all Liberal Arts students, whether or not you choose the four-year Global Engagement Year course.You can opt to develop an existing language or start a new one from beginner’s level. You can choose from French, German, Spanish, Italian, Chinese or Arabic.

Language learning not only equips you with communication skills but enhances your knowledge and understanding of diverse cultural mind-sets and practices preparing you to take your place in the world as a global citizen.

If you are interested in consolidating the skills you have learned and expanding your horizons via working or studying abroad in one or more countries, you may be interested in our four-year course that includes a Global Engagement Year.