HIST2211: Hard Times

• A pass mark in at least ONE level one module in History.

• None.

• None.

• To promote an understanding of social and cultural life in nineteenth-century Britain, and the appropriate concepts for its analysis.
• To place a strong emphasis on examining how contemporaries understood their own life and times.

• How and why did the Britain of 1815 become such a fundamentally different country by 1902?
• This module examines how the sexes, classes, and denominations in the nineteenth century understood and experienced social and cultural change on an unprecedented scale. It begins with class and religious identity before moving onto the world of work and the struggles of employers to establish, and of workers to resist, factory discipline. The module then moves on think about social identities and questions of gender, race and sexuality.
• A key aim of this module is to study how contemporaries understood their own life and times. To this end, seminars are organized around texts by Karl Marx, Harriet Taylor, Frederick Engels, Anne Lister, John Stuart Mill, and James Connolly, as well as by less exalted figures.

Subject-specific Knowledge:

• an understanding of the forces shaping the physical environment of nineteenth-century Britain, and of how the sexes, classes and denominations of nineteenth-century Britain understood and experienced social and cultural change on an unprecedented scale;
• an ability to evaluate both recent and older interpretations of these physical and social changes;
• an ability to construct reasoned arguments about the development of nineteenth-century British society, drawing on work by political and economic, as well as social, historians.

Subject-specific Skills:

• Building on and developing skills gained at Level 1
• Deepening and extending historical understanding through focused, concentrated modules
• Developing precision, depth of understanding, and conceptual awareness.

Key Skills:

• The ability to employ sophisticated reading skills to gather, sift, process, synthesise and critically evaluate information from a variety of sources (print, digital, material, aural, visual, audio-visual etc.)
• The ability to communicate ideas and information orally and in writing, devise and sustain coherent and cogent arguments
• The ability to write and think under pressure, manage time and work to deadlines
• The ability to make effective use of information and communications technology.

• Student learning is facilitated by a combination of the following teaching methods:
• lectures to set the foundations for further study and to provide the basis for the acquisition of subject specific knowledge. Lectures provide a broad framework which defines individual module content, introducing students to themes, debates and interpretations. In this environment, students are given the opportunity to develop skills in listening, selective note-taking and reflection;
• seminars to allow students to present and critically reflect upon the acquired subject-specific knowledge, methodologies and theories, and to identify and debate a range of issues and differing opinions. The seminar is the forum in which students are given the opportunity to communicate ideas, jointly exploring themes and arguments. Seminars are structured to develop understanding and designed to maximise student participation related to prior independent preparation. Seminars give students the opportunity to develop oral communication skills, encourage critical and tolerant approaches to reasoned argument and historical discussion, build the students' ability to marshal historical evidence, and facilitate the development of the ability to summarise historical arguments, think in a rapidly changing environment and communicate in a persuasive and articulate manner, whilst recognising the value of working with others and, occasionally, towards shared goals.
• Assessment:
• Summative essays remain a central component of assessment in history, due to the integrative high-order skills they develop. Essays allow students the opportunity to recognise, represent and critically reflect upon ideas, concepts and problems; students can demonstrate awareness of, and the ability to use and evaluate, a diverse range of resources and identify, represent and debate a range of subject-specific issues and opinions. Through the essay, students can synthesise information, adopt critical appraisals and develop reasoned argument based on individual research; they should be able to communicate ideas in writing, with clarity and coherence; and to show the ability to integrate and critically assess material from a wide range of sources. The additional summative assignments will test knowledge and skills specific to the module, such as analysis of relevant primary sources, or critical engagement with the historiography as demonstrated through book reviews and article abstracts.

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