The Diploma of Arts provides you with opportunities to interpret human culture and behaviour from different perspectives and periods. Your studies will explore today's big questions. You'll learn how to support the social and economic development of the human race and/or to be immersed in creativity, performance and innovation. This award is designed to allow you to choose your path: it can be the first year of your Bachelor of Arts study, or you may enrol in this degree to pursue your passion and undertake one of the majors in the Bachelor of Arts, or if you decide you would like to extend your curiosity and try units from a number of disciplines. The Diploma of Arts gives you the flexibility to choose from a wide range of subjects with over twenty named majors and minors, you can select subjects to build your knowledge, and electives to enhance your skills.<br><br>When you study language and culture through the best and most compelling books and stories of the ages you will learn to read the world around you actively and critically. You will come to understand how texts work as well as the key elements of poetry, narrative, theatre and filmmaking. Reading texts from the medieval period to the present, from fiction and poetry to theatre, film, television and the Internet, you will discover how to analyse texts and genres in their cultural, historical and contemporary contexts. Through reading, viewing and writing you will discover how to reflect, imagine and create while learning to develop your own voice as a writer. Through mastering different styles you will establish an understanding of how to write in different disciplines and for different purposes. A major in English and Writing prepares students for any field in which careful reading, clear thinking, and persuasive writing are valued. Our emphases on textual analysis and writing skills make English a traditionally strong undergraduate major for any professions requiring advanced communication skills