• Home
• Study
• Study Information
• Modules
• Module Information

Transmedia Adaptations

Module description

Adapting stories across media is one of the most established practices across creative industries. This module will introduce you to advanced study of these practices across several disciplines. You will consider the creative, cultural, and commercial decisions of media creators, considering how stories move across forms such as stage, screen, games, print, podcasts, series and franchises. The module will draw on interdisciplinary expertise from tutors  and is underpinned by the unique research collections on literary and media history held at the University’s Bill Douglas Cinema Museum. This module is suitable for individuals wishing to gain interdisciplinary understanding of the ways that transmedia adaption operates as a creative, commercial, or political practice. There are no pre-requisite modules; however, it will be useful if you have relevant educational experience in any part the humanities, social sciences or creative industries.

Module aims - intentions of the module

This module aims to introduce you to high level study of transmedia adaptations in varied forms, genres, and styles across media forms and platforms that may include, but are not limited to stage, page, film, television, VOD, graphic novels, games, radio, podcasts and more.

It will also develop case studies derived from different disciplines, aiming to foster interdisciplinary expertise in areas that may include, but are not limited to: media and communications, film studies, TV studies, English, and drama.

Intended Learning Outcomes (ILOs)

ILO: Module-specific skills

On successfully completing the module you will be able to...

• 1. Understand advanced aesthetic, theoretical, and historical questions which arise from the transformation of stories across media
• 2. Interpret and apply critical debates about creativity, authorship, genre and intercultural adaptation
• 3. Develop detailed research concerning historical, cultural and industrial contexts of specific transmedia adaptations and media franchises

ILO: Discipline-specific skills

On successfully completing the module you will be able to...

• 4. Demonstrate advanced and precise skills in the close formal, thematic, generic and authorial analysis of different kinds of media content
• 5. Apply advanced and autonomous skills in the research and evaluation of relevant critical, historical or industrial sources and materials relating to varied media

ILO: Personal and key skills

On successfully completing the module you will be able to...

• 6. Employ advanced communication skills and articulate your views convincingly both individually and in groups
• 7. Develop independence of thought and confidence in the planning and organisation of research projects and an advanced proficiency in information retrieval and analysis
• 8. Demonstrate correct research and bibliographic skills, and an advanced and intellectually mature capacity to construct a coherent, substantiated argument and to write clear and correct prose

Syllabus plan

he syllabus will shift on an annual basis depending on the research interests of the staff team. However, it will be structured in sections following broad themes, as follows:

1. Transmedia: the module will deal with contemporary and historical movements between media, as well as variants of ‘convergence cultures’ associated with them, and related cultures of activation and aggregation. The opening section of the module will introduce and seek to apply these ideas.
2. Adaptation: drawing from a closely related scholarly field, the second section of the module will pick up on ideas of textual adaptation from the field of ‘Adaptation Studies’, again seeking to apply them to clear examples.
3. Case Studies: the final part of the module will seek to apply many of these ideas to a range of transmedia adaptations. The content will vary from year to year, but indicative study themes include the following:

• Adaptation and Industry.
• Remediation/media archaeology and seriality.
• Gaming in transmedia contexts.
• Cross/Intercultural Adaptation.

Learning activities and teaching methods (given in hours of study time)

Details of learning activities and teaching methods

Formative assessment

Summative assessment (% of credit)

Details of summative assessment

Details of re-assessment (where required by referral or deferral)

Re-assessment notes

Deferral – if you miss an assessment for certificated reasons judged acceptable by the Mitigation Committee, you will normally be either deferred in the assessment or an extension may be granted. The mark given for a re-assessment taken as a result of deferral will not be capped and will be treated as it would be if it were your first attempt at the assessment.

Referral – if you have failed the module overall (i.e. a final overall module mark of less than 50%) you will be required to submit a further assessment as necessary. If you are successful on referral, your overall module mark will be capped at 50%.

Indicative learning resources - Basic reading

• Arcane: League of Legends (Riot Games/Fortiche Television; Netflix 2021-)
• Baahubali: The Beginning (S.S.Rajamouli, 2015).
• Harry Potter: Hogwarts Legacy (Avalanche Software, 2023)
• If Beale Street Could Talk (Barry Jenkins, 2018) and The Underground Railroad series (Barry Jenkins, Amazon, 2021-) and Colston Whitehead The Underground Railroad (2016)
• The Last of Us (Sony Pictures Television/PlayStation Productions; HBO Max 2023-)
• Little Women (Gillian Armstrong, 1994) and Little Women (Greta Gerwig, 2019)
• Naked City (Weegee, Da Capo, 2002); Naked City (Jules Dassin, 1948); Naked City (ABC, 1958-1963)
• Rebecca (Daphne du Maurier, 1938) and Rebecca (play text by Daphne du Maurier, 1939), Radio Version (Orson Welles, The Campbell Playhouse Radio Theater 1938), novel Mrs De, Winter (Suan Hill, 1993), TV series (Jim O'Brien, Carlton Television 1997), Netflix film (Ben Wheatley, 2020)
• Scarlet Nexus (Bandai Namco, 2021)
• Under the Skin (Michael Faber, Canongate, 2000) and Under the Skin (Jonathan Glazer 2013)

Indicative learning resources - Web based and electronic resources

• Materials in the University of Exeter’s Special Collections: https://www.exeter.ac.uk/departments/library/special-collections/

Indicative learning resources - Other resources

• Cobb, Shelley, Adaptation, Authorship and Contemporary Women Filmmakers (Palgrave, 2014).
• Elsaesser, Thomas, Film History as Media Archaeology (Amsterdam University Press, 2016).
• Evans, Elizabeth, Understanding Engagement in Transmedia Culture (London: Routledge 2019)
• Jenkins, Henry, ‘Transmedia Storytelling and Entertainment: An Annotated Syllabus’, Journal of Media and Cultural Studies 24:6 (2010), pp. 943-958.
• Klein, Amanda Ann and Barton Palmer (ed) Cycles, Sequels, Spin-Offs, Remakes and Reboots: Multiplicities in Film and Television (University of Texas Press, 2016).
• Ley, Graham, ‘Cultural Adaptation’, Journal of Adaptation in Film and Performance, vol 8, no. 1, (2015), 23-38.
• Meikle, Kyle, Adaptation in the Franchise Era: 2001-2016 (Bloomsbury, 2019).
• Murray, Simone, The Adaptation Industry: The Cultural Economy of Contemporary Literary Adaptation (Routledge, 2012).
• Parody, Claire, ‘Franchising/Adaptation’, Adaptation, Volume 4, Issue 2, September 2011, 210–218.
• Ryan, Marie-Laure, ‘Transmedia Narratology and Transmedia Storytelling’ in Artnodes 16 (2016)
• Venuti, Lawrence ‘Adaptation, Translation, Critique’ Journal of Visual Culture, vol. 6, no. 1, (2007), pp. 25-43.

• Wang, Longyan and Longhai Zhang ‘Autonomous Art, Heterogeneous Heterotopias: Barry Jenkins’ Cinematic Adaptation of James Baldwin’s If Beale Street Could Talk’ Adaptation (Sept 2022).

Key words search

Transmedia, adaptation, literature, film, gaming