BA (Hons) Art History

Decolonising the Social Sciences (ANT5006MX)

This module responds to contemporary calls to decolonise the social sciences. It reads the history of social science through the lens of post-colonial and indigenous studies. How have non-western voices been marginalised and silenced by academia? What does academia look from the perspective of the subaltern? Can the social sciences shed their colonial robes, or are they doomed to remain racialised and exclusionary disciplines? We explore these questions in regard to emerging disciplines aimed at constructing better and more inclusive futures, including 'indigenous criminology', 'participatory ethnography', and the 'anthropology of the otherwise'.

Brave New Worlds: Ethnography of/on Online and Digital Worlds (ANT5008MX)

This module teaches students how to use ethnographic methods to make sense of the internet, which we now increasingly inhabit. Students learn how to navigate and analyse platforms such as Facebook or TikTok. They study how these technologies transform our relationships, identities, and ideas of truth. The module also examines the socio-cultural and ethical aspects of digital worlds (e.g. Second life).

Coastal Cultures: Marine Anthropology in the age of climate change and mass extinction. (ANT6008MX)

Using ethnography, we analyse how coastal communities use the sea – not only as a source of livelihood, but as a key ingredient in the construction of their identity and place in world. Drawing on a range of cases from across the world – from Polynesian sorcerers, to Japanese whale mourners, to Cornish surfers – we study how coastal communities are responding to climate change, sea level rise, pollution, and extinction.

Advanced Short Story Workshop (ENG6003MX)

In this module we will examine a range of contemporary short story writing and relevant theory as a way for students to learn how to compose their own short fiction. Class time will be divided between discussion of short fiction and theory, writing exercises and peer workshops of student work. The workshops will be substantially informed by staff research practice.

Writing Genre Fiction (ENG5006MX)

This module introduces students to writing in various genres, with possibilities including fantasy, science-fiction, period/historical, young adult fiction, horror, comedy, romance, crime, and thriller. Forms explored will include fiction, dramatic writing for stage and screen, and poetry. The module is taught through lecture, seminars, and workshops where students are asked to submit and feedback to peers and tutors on a regular basis.

Writing Creative Nonfiction: Autobiography, Travel Writing, Reportage (ENG5010MX)

This module introduces students to the key concepts and issues in contemporary works of creative nonfiction, or 'life writing'. Included in our readings will be works of memoir and autobiography, travel writing, personal essays and reportage. The module is entirely taught in workshops where we experiment with producing our own works of creative nonfiction and learning to refine them, as well as critically evaluate and contextualise them.

Literatures of The Atlantic World: Race, Resistance, and Revolution (ENG6004MX)

This module explores a diverse range of writing and cultural formations in Atlantic contexts. Adopting critical paradigms of the Atlantic World, the module investigates literary and cultural exchanges between Africa, Europe, North America and the Caribbean. It explores questions of identity formation, resistance, national memory, and knowledge hierarchies by examining different literary forms and cultural productions, ranging from the colonial period, through nineteenth-century abolitionist texts, to contemporary fiction and memoir. In addition to introducing texts from various locations and time periods, the module will also engage with theoretical perspectives concerning race, memory and nationhood, as well as recent critical work centred on decoloniality in relation to literary studies.

American Novel (ENG5003MX)

This module will explore the development of the novel in America from its beginnings in the eighteenth century through to the twentieth century. As part of this module, students will consider changes in the novel form with particular reference to America’s literary history.

Literatures of The Atlantic World: Race, Resistance, and Revolution (ENG6004MX)

This module explores a diverse range of writing and cultural formations in Atlantic contexts. Adopting critical paradigms of the Atlantic World, the module investigates literary and cultural exchanges between Africa, Europe, North America and the Caribbean. It explores questions of identity formation, resistance, national memory, and knowledge hierarchies by examining different literary forms and cultural productions, ranging from the colonial period, through nineteenth-century abolitionist texts, to contemporary fiction and memoir. In addition to introducing texts from various locations and time periods, the module will also engage with theoretical perspectives concerning race, memory and nationhood, as well as recent critical work centred on decoloniality in relation to literary studies.

Eco-Emergency! Literatures of Environmental Crisis (ENG5014MX)

This module explores the ways in which contemporary literature and culture are responding to our current era of ecological emergency. It introduces students to key debates and concepts, from the identity of the Anthropocene, to the relation between humans and nonhumans, to the influence of ideas of utopia and dystopia. It also familiarises students with different modes of reading in ‘texts’ across a range of media, such as fiction, nonfiction, poetry and film.

Global Cold War: Politics, Culture and Society (HIS5004MX)

This module is an introduction to major themes in the political, social and cultural history of the modern world with special focus on the 20th century and the Cold War.

Eighteenth-Century Empires (HIS5007MX)

This module is designed to explore the ‘long eighteenth century’ with a broad geographical focus, encompassing, but not limited to the Atlantic Isles, Atlantic world, formal and informal empire, and trading connections. It takes in the slave trade and impact of slavery globally, studies voyages of exploration, examines the scientific and political enlightenment, and wider cultural and social impacts of imperialism.

Middle Kingdoms: Themes in Early Modern Asia (HIS5009MX)

This module introduces the history of early modern Japan (c.16th-19th centuries). At one level, it explores key questions shaping the histories of the late Sengoku (‘Warring States’) and Tokugawa Japan. Building on these questions, it then situates the Japanese experience in a trans-regional perspective with reference to early modern China, Korea, Ryukyu, as well as Europe.

Dunkirk to D Day: The Second World War in Europe (HIS5014MX)

The module examines the Second World War in Europe and the Atlantic Ocean from 1940 to late 1944.

Piracy and Privateering, c.1560-1816 (HIS6002MX)

This module explores piracy and privateering activity in the seas around the British Isles and further afield from the reign of Queen Elizabeth to the end of the second Barbary War in 1816. This course focuses on the social history of piracy and privateering, the organisation of pirate society, and the economic impact of piracy and privateering.

America, the United Nations and International Relations 1945 to the present (HIS6006MX)

This module provides a detailed examination of the relationship between the United States of America and the United Nations in the management of international relations from 1945 to the present.

Green Criminology (CRM6010MX)

This module will address theoretical perspectives, methodological issues, and empirical research related to the field of green criminology, including applied concerns, such as policy and social/political praxis, through a range of concepts, topics, and themes that are central to green criminology.

Forensic Criminology: Social Investigations (CRM5006MX)

This module focuses on how social science can contribute to criminal investigations. This involvesforensically investigating the backgrounds and experiences of individuals involved in criminal or deviantbehaviour. The sociology of the police who are tasked to conduct investigations is also analysed. Students will be encouraged to apply criminological techniques and theory to scenario-based examples which will focus on victims, offenders and the police, and their positions in society.

Contemporary Issues in Criminology (CRM5007MX)

This module focuses upon a contemporary criminological or criminal justice-related issue that has received attention in the media and in official reports but may not be well covered yet in an established academic literature. The purpose of the module is for students to collect data on the issue and to subject it to a criminological analysis appropriate to the topic.

Security and Policing Today: Debates and Issues (CRM5008MX)

This module provides students with a contemporary overview of debates and issues in policing and security environments that inform practice and development in the field. The module examines how modern policing and security function, the impact of professionalization on all aspects of policing tasks and the tensions and benefits attained from multi-agency working. The module considers policing legitimacy, the ethics of crime control and associated engagement with the diversity of contemporary society, competing community interests and professional practice.

Security Management (CRM6011MX)

This module provides students with a critical insight into the professional domain of security management. It provides an overview of the theories, policies, procedures and practices that underpin the work of the security manager, and focuses upon a career-relevant knowledge and understanding of this significant area of expertise.

Global Environmental Politics (PIR6007MX)

This module examines the problem of environmental degradation and its implications for our global political economy. It discusses the major debates in political thought around the primary causes of environmental degradation. The module outlines the major attempts to build international regimes for global environmental governance, and the difficulties and obstacles that such attempts have encountered. A range of ideas, critiques, policy proposals, innovations in governance, and templates for political activism within the environmental movement are critically evaluated.

Refugee Studies (PIR5009MX)

This module focuses on the political, economic and social context of forced migration and considers the complex and varied nature of global refugee populations. It analyses responses at international, national and regional level and engages with a range of challenging questions around international co-operation, the framework of international protection, humanitarianism and the causes of displacement.

Global Development (PIR5011MX)

This module embraces both theoretical and empirical approaches to understanding development issues and policies, at international and multilateral scale. The approach incorporates historical, economic, political and social perspectives. The module considers issues faced by international development agencies, as well as the impact on populations in the developing world to illustrate and provide context for the discussion of various developmental concerns.

Civil Society and the Public Sphere (PIR5010MX)

This module analyses the role of civil society and the public sphere in democratic governance and in democratization from a variety of theoretical perspectives.

Voter Behaviour and Effective Election Campaigning (PIR6008MX)

This module undertakes an advanced examination of contemporary trends and developments in theories of electoral behaviour globally; then more specifically the relationship between electoral rules, electoral systems and election outcomes; the evolution of campaign techniques, and the role, mechanics, and accuracy of opinion polls in modern electoral politics. These global understandings are applied directly to the case of British politics.

Democracy and Globalization: Citizens and the Modern State (PIR5012MX)

Students taking this course will discover how social and economic change in the modern era impacts upon traditional political structures. The course demonstrates how structures face increasing challenges from alternative forms of political action, ranging in scope from the local to global, as well as a resurgence of the forces of populism and nationalism. Much of the analysis will be comparative in scope.

Globalisation and Social Justice (SOC5005MX)

This module investigates the key debates of globalisation and critically evaluates, in terms of its economic, political, socio-cultural and legal dimensions, the causes and consequences of a globalising world. It furthermore explores a range of international social justice issues to examine the relationships (causative and ameliorative) between policies and (in)justice

Gender, Sex and Sexuality (SOC5006MX)

This module introduces students to the sociology of gender, sex and sexuality. It interrogates these concepts with particular reference to identity, activism, social justice and social change. It develops an understanding of the similarities, differences and intersections between gender, sex, sexuality and other social signifiers of difference/diversity including ‘race’, ethnicity, dis/ability, class and age.

Health, Medical Power and Social Justice (SOC6004MX)

This module considers a range of issues concerning health, illness and medical power in contemporary society. The module seeks to develop an understanding of the impact of ‘medicalisation’ on everyday life, as well as the importance of social divisions, such as age, gender, ethnicity and socio-economic status. There will be a focus on a range of sociological perspectives on health with an opportunity to focus upon areas of particular interest.

Environmental Law (LAW5009MX)

The module provides an examination of key themes in environmental law, with a focus on the generation, application and enforcement of this law within a critical and applied context.

Law in Society (LAW5010MX)

To introduce students to the real-world impact and operation of domestic English law in society and consider social, cultural, practical and ethical implications.

Intellectual Property Law (LAW5011MX)

This module focuses on the law and concepts of intellectual property, examining in addition related legal themes of information access, dissemination and control.

Law, Literature and the Screen (LAW5012MX)

To introduce students to fictional and factional representations of the legal order in prose, film and TV, and to examine the inter-connections between law, literature and the screen.

Environmental Law (LAW6011MX)

The module provides an examination of key themes in environmental law, with a focus on the generation, application and enforcement of this law within a critical and applied context.

Public and International Law (LAW6012MX)

A module that focuses on the primary legal principles of the public international legal order, before supporting the development of in-depth understanding of a chosen international legal area of a contemporary nature.

Security Management (CRM6011MX)

This module provides students with a critical insight into the professional domain of security management. It provides an overview of the theories, policies, procedures and practices that underpin the work of the security manager, and focuses upon a career-relevant knowledge and understanding of this significant area of expertise.

Security and Policing Today: Debates and Issues (CRM5008MX)

This module provides students with a contemporary overview of debates and issues in policing and security environments that inform practice and development in the field. The module examines how modern policing and security function, the impact of professionalization on all aspects of policing tasks and the tensions and benefits attained from multi-agency working. The module considers policing legitimacy, the ethics of crime control and associated engagement with the diversity of contemporary society, competing community interests and professional practice.

Forensic Criminology: Social Investigations (CRM5006MX)

This module focuses on how social science can contribute to criminal investigations. This involvesforensically investigating the backgrounds and experiences of individuals involved in criminal or deviantbehaviour. The sociology of the police who are tasked to conduct investigations is also analysed. Students will be encouraged to apply criminological techniques and theory to scenario-based examples which will focus on victims, offenders and the police, and their positions in society.