BE530-6-SP-CO:
Critical Marketing Perspectives

The details
2024/25
Essex Business School
Colchester Campus
Spring
Undergraduate: Level 6
Current
Monday 13 January 2025
Friday 21 March 2025
15
02 September 2024

 

Requisites for this module
(BE400 or BE501) and BE511 and BE518
(none)
(none)
(none)

 

(none)

Key module for

BSC N2N5 Marketing Management (Including Foundation Year),
BSC NN25 Marketing Management,
BSC NN2M Marketing Management (Including Placement Year),
BSC NNF5 Marketing Management (Including Year Abroad),
MMANNN35 Marketing Management,
MMANNN36 Marketing Management (Including Placement Year),
MMANNN37 Marketing Management (Including Year Abroad)

Module description

This module builds upon students' existing understanding of marketing by considering contemporary issues that are not normally taught and thought about in connection to the marketing management field. Therefore, an advanced understanding of marketing in its contemporary setting will be aimed at.


This module will discuss a variety of issues that show how marketing can be understood in such terms in a range of different, contemporary settings. It will introduce its participants to a range of conceptual and theoretical resources to critically examine the role of marketing in society, and to understand how marketing is brought into being both as a corporate function, as well as a social phenomenon.

Module aims

The aims of this module are:



  • To provide an understanding of marketing as a historical discourse that is contested in a variety of ways.

  • To provide an insight into contemporary issues facing marketing and enable students to engage with and critique these.

  • To engage students in critical analysis of marketing discourses and contemporary marketing issues.

Module learning outcomes

By the end of this module, students will be expected to be able to:



  1. Understand marketing as a discourse that is embedded and reproduced in a variety of different spheres of society.

  2. Engage with a variety of contemporary issues of marketing and apply a critical understanding of marketing to everyday life.

  3. Understand the historical emergence of the marketing discourse.

  4. Critically analyse, using appropriate marketing and social science concepts and theories, marketing discourses and practices in contemporary society.

  5. Through class discussion, reading, participation and assessment develop your abilities to engage in critical analysis of marketing discourses and contemporary marketing issues, and develop an awareness of your own role and position within them.


Skills for your professional life (Transferable Skills)


By the end of this module, students will develop:



  1. Critical thinking skills through coursework assignment and group discussions around contemporary marketing issues and the nature of marketing in society.

  2. Argumentation skills as you present your thoughts and ideas in essays.

  3. Analytical skills as you connect academic theories and concepts to contemporary marketing issues.

Module information

In the current brand-dominated and globalised world of business and management, saturated with advertisements, a critical understanding of marketing activities and how they affect businesses and individuals is a requirement for a general management and marketing career as well as for civic participation in contemporary society.


Today, marketing is arguably part of everyday life and it is embedded in all spheres of society. Besides its normal corporate function of selling products and services to consumers, marketing processes can be observed in wider civil society, such as governments, NGOs, charities and social movements. Thus, one can talk about marketing as a domain, rather than simply as a corporate function.





Learning and teaching methods

This module will be delivered via:

  • 2 hour weekly lectures

Bibliography

This module does not appear to have a published bibliography for this year.

Assessment items, weightings and deadlines

Coursework / exam Description Deadline Coursework weighting
Coursework   Individual Essay   21/02/2025  100% 
Exam  Main exam: Remote, Open Book, 24hr during Summer (Main Period) 
Exam  Reassessment Main exam: Remote, Open Book, 24hr during September (Reassessment Period) 

Exam format definitions

  • Remote, open book: Your exam will take place remotely via an online learning platform. You may refer to any physical or electronic materials during the exam.
  • In-person, open book: Your exam will take place on campus under invigilation. You may refer to any physical materials such as paper study notes or a textbook during the exam. Electronic devices may not be used in the exam.
  • In-person, open book (restricted): The exam will take place on campus under invigilation. You may refer only to specific physical materials such as a named textbook during the exam. Permitted materials will be specified by your department. Electronic devices may not be used in the exam.
  • In-person, closed book: The exam will take place on campus under invigilation. You may not refer to any physical materials or electronic devices during the exam. There may be times when a paper dictionary, for example, may be permitted in an otherwise closed book exam. Any exceptions will be specified by your department.

Your department will provide further guidance before your exams.

Overall assessment

Coursework Exam
40% 60%

Reassessment

Coursework Exam
40% 60%
Module supervisor and teaching staff
Dr Tony Sampson, email: tsamps@essex.ac.uk.
Dr Tony Sampson & Dr Christina Ferreira
tsamps@essex.ac.uk

 

Availability
Yes
Yes
No

External examiner

Dr Muhammad Asif Khan
Resources
Available via Moodle
Of 22 hours, 22 (100%) hours available to students:
0 hours not recorded due to service coverage or fault;
0 hours not recorded due to opt-out by lecturer(s).

 

Further information
Essex Business School

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