MA by Dissertation in Digital Arts

The degree is aimed at students with a strongly articulated research interest. Research can be produced as written academic research or as a combination of written research and practice research.

Details of the two research paths

1. Purely academic research, in which the candidate is expected to produce only a written dissertation.
2. Combination of academic and practice research. in which the candidate is expected to produce a smaller written dissertation along with a body of practical work. The weighting can be either 50 / 50 or 60 /40, dependent on the scope of the project. The dissertation should provide a theoretical framework as well as an analysis of the practical work produced. A permanent record of the practical production must accompany the dissertation.

Admission Requirements for the MA in Digital Art:

• An appropriate Honours Degree (equivalent to an NQF level 8) with marks 65% or above.
• A written motivation as to why you would like to pursue an MA in Digital Arts.
• A creative portfolio for evaluation. Portfolios must be digital and should consist of work showing skills related to an interest in creative research in either digital design, animation, interactive media or game design.
• A writing sample – an essay or an academic article written in the last 24 months.

Apply for this programme

For Queries on Postgraduate studies in Digital Arts email Post Graduate Coordinator: Dr. Tegan Bristow on Tegan.bristow@wits.ac.za 

Digital Arts Postgraduate Supervisors

Dr. Tegan Bristow

Senior Lecturer and Fak’ugesi Principal Researcher, Bristow additionally acts as Editor in Chief of the WSOA Ellipses Journal for Creative Research.  Bristow directed the Fak’ugesi African Digital Innovation Festival from 2016 to 2020 and now works closely between Fak’ugesi Festival, Tshimologong Innovation Precinct and the Wits School of Arts developing research on the Digital Creative Industries in Africa.

In 2021 Bristow won the National Science and Technology Forum Award for Sustainable Development in the Creative Industries for her work in co-founding and directing the Fak’ugesi Festival.

Tegan’s Research Areas:

Art, Culture and Technology in Africa, Interactive Media Arts, AI & ML and Art, Vernacular Algorithms, Algorithmic Thinking in Culture & Society, African Futures & Post African Futures, Decolonising Methodologies in Knowledge Production, Digital Creative Industries in Africa, Culture & Policy Development with 4IR & Innovation Sectors.

Tegan’s Wits 足球竞彩app排名 Profile

Link to: /staff/academic-a-z-listing/b/teganbristowwitsacza/

Stephen Cloete

Steve Cloete has lectured in the Digital Arts program since 2014. He has a background in Fine Arts with a focus on digital production and 3D asset creation. He was involved in the early phases of the Game Design program at Wits and helped to develop several of the courses which are now taught as part of the degree.

He has a Bachelor’s degree in Fine Art, and a Masters degree in Digital Art, as well as a diploma in Graphic Design. His MA thesis focused on the intersection of Anthropology and Table-Top Roleplaying games.

His teaching is primarily focused on practical asset creation and integration for games and interactive media, with primary interests in character design, animation, narrative integration and communication, and procedural asset creation.

Steve’s Research Areas:

Spatial practice and production in virtual environments, digital artistic production, the anthropology of games, socio-politics of virtual spaces/places.

Steve’s Wits 足球竞彩app排名 Profile

Link to /staff/academic-a-z-listing/c/stephencloete1witsacza/

Kirsten du Preez

Kirsten du Preez has taught in Digital Arts at Wits University since 2018. Kirsten has a background in theatre, where she has written, directed, and stage managed numerous student and professional productions. This work was the beginning of learning and experimenting with crafting an audience’s experience. Looking for ways to make those experiences more interactive, she found her way to Wits Digital Arts.  Kirsten’s MA dissertation focused on narrative design in board games, further cementing her interest in interactive storytelling.

Kirsten’s current research is exploring the relationship between behavioural economics and the act of playing board games. By identifying board game players as economic agents, Kirsten is studying their decision making through economic models (and variations therein).

Kirsten’s Research Areas:

Board games, Gamification, Behavioural Economics, Narrative, Playful and Interactive Storytelling, Theatre, Applied Games, Serious Games. Game Design and Development, Player Studies and Research, Diversity in Games.

Contact Kirsten on kirsten.dupreez@wits.ac.za

Hanli Geyser

Hanli Geyser is a Lecturer in Digital Arts at Wits University where she was Head of Department of Digital Arts from 2015 - 2019. Hanli developed the Game Design Programs at Wits, which kicked off in February 2012, as well as the BA in Digital Arts degree. These programs provide an introduction to the technical, conceptual and critical foundations needed for students wishing to enter the field of practice that merges technology and the arts.

Hanli graduated with an MA in History of Art from Wits. She is fascinated by the conjunction of visual arts and narrative texts found in games, interactive and experimental storytelling, comic books and film.

Hanli’s Research Areas:

Decolonising Programming Education, Critical Code Studies, Interactive and Experimental Storytelling – user participation in the narrative: literary, visual and experimental storytelling forms.

Hanli’s Wits 足球竞彩app排名 Profile

Link to /staff/academic-a-z-listing/g/hanligeyserwitsacza/

André Gopal

André Gopal is an Associate Lecturer in Digital Arts at the University of Witwatersrand since 2021.

He started his academic career abroad designing the Network Penetration Program for Computer Sciences in August 2017 at Shandong University, China. These new programs provided instruction as to the technical and conceptual components of programming in the face of the rising need for defense against Cybercrime for those who wish to enter the popular field of Digital Security.

André graduated with an MSc in Computer Science from the University of Kwa-Zulu Natal and holds several other professional qualifications such as the CISSP and OSCP - and is enthralled by all things puzzling in code and technology.

André’s Research Areas:

Gamification of Cybercrime in the Digital Era, Economic shifts in response to Global Digitalization, Social shifts (psychological, cultural, political) due to increases in Rapid Digitalization.

André’s Wits Research Profile

Link to /staff/academic-a-z-listing/g/andregopalwitsacza/

Kieran Reid

Head of Department, Wits Digital Arts. Kieran Reid is a teacher, theatre maker and play and games scholar.

He has been teaching at the University of the Witwatersrand since 2012 in Theatre and Performance and Digital Arts. He has been involved in Wits Digital Arts and the Game Design programme since its inception in 2012. His teaching focus is on analogue games, play studies, theatre and interactive narratives.

Kieran has also worked extensively as a production manager, director and facilitator in the theatre and gaming sectors. He has directed theatre pieces both for Joburg Theatre and the National Arts Festival and has hosted and produced MegaGames. He served as a project manager for the Fak’ugesi Festival and A-MAZE festival from 2013 - 2018. Kieran has also worked as a game consultant and co-designer.

Kieran’s Research Areas

Audience Studies, Player Studies, Board Game Studies, Game Literacy and Pedagogies, Histories (Gaming), Media Archaeology, Theatre Studies, Digital Gaming, Digital Narratives, Interactive Storytelling, Theories of Decision Making.

Keiran’s Wits 足球竞彩app排名 Profile

Link to /staff/academic-a-z-listing/r/kieranreidwitsacza/

Digital Arts Postgraduate Supervisors in Associated Departments

 Dr. Catherine Duncan

Catherine Duncan is a researcher and lecturer in the Department of Interdisciplinary Arts and Culture in the Wits School of Arts. She has a PhD in Media Studies and a M.Ed in Higher Education and a MA in Journalism and Media Studies. Her current research interests are popular media and the participatory cultures that arise in relation to them. This includes audiences broadly defined, as well as different kinds of interpretive and creative communities that orbit media texts and the fan cultures that both draw from, and feed into the flow of cultural consumption and production. Catherine is primarily interested in working via ethnographic methods (both digital as well as more traditional face-to-face methods in physical sites) and is currently focused on the intersection of media practises in everyday life including work, home, and leisure.

Catherine’s Research Areas:

Audience studies, fandom studies, participatory media cultures, translocal and transcultural consumption, creative and cultural industries, creative methodologies, critical theory.

Catherine’s Wits 足球竞彩app排名 Profile

Link to /staff/academic-a-z-listing/d/catherineduncanwitsacza/

Dr. Haseenah Ebrahim

Haseenah Ebrahim (Ph.D., Northwestern University, Illinois)  teaches in the Dept. of Interdisciplinary Arts and Culture Studies (IACS) in the Wits School of Arts at the University of the Witwatersrand.

Her research interests, teaching and postgraduate supervision span a range of topics in the fields of film, media and cultural studies, and storytelling across various media and cultural contexts.  She has published on gender representations in Pixar animation films, African spirituality in independent African American cinema, South African women screenwriters, Bollywood in South Africa, and the political economy of micro-entrepreneurial filmmaking in South Africa. Her current research focuses on reaction videos on YouTube.

Dr. Ebrahim’s Research Areas:

Film Studies, Media Studies, Cultural Studies (representation, ideologies, power relations, etc.), Genre Studies, Narratology/Storytelling, Intercultural discourse on YouTube, Reaction videos on YouTube

Dr. Ebrahim’s Wits 足球竞彩app排名 Profile

Link to /staff/academic-a-z-listing/e/haseenahebrahimwitsacza/