History

An Introduction to Your Modules

† Some courses may offer optional modules. The availability of optional modules may vary from year to year and will be subject to minimum student numbers being achieved. This means that the availability of specific optional modules cannot be guaranteed. Optional module selection may also be affected by staff availability.

Dissertation (MA History) 2022-23HST9013MLevel 72022-23The dissertation is designed to enable students to conduct a sustained piece of work which draws upon their research and self-organisational skills. The dissertation will require students to explore the problematic nature of primary source materials and they will be expected to analyse the relationship between primary and secondary sources. Engagement with recent scholarship in the field and a synthesis of a substantial amount of secondary literature is expected within the dissertation. Where appropriate, as part of their research, students will need to consider ethical dimensions associated with their area of inquiry.CoreHistorical Research 2022-23HST9064MLevel 72022-23This module offers students the opportunity to develop advanced expertise in historical research, such that they are prepared to undertake the MA dissertation but also to pursue doctoral research or other professional research work. The focus is not just on practical skills involving the finding and recording of material, but on refining skills of analysis and approaches to methodology developed at undergraduate level, as well as the critical incorporation of theoretical approaches into research design.CoreThe Dissertation Map: Dissertation Preparation 2022-23HST9068MLevel 72022-23This module will focus on developing a dissertation proposal as a type of dissertation map that students can refer to as they commence independent research and writing for their MA Dissertation. Students will be introduced to the key aspects of a dissertation proposal (sources, methodology and historiography) and develop their own approaches to these as they relate to their chosen project. The module will finish with a Proposal Roundtable where students will present their proposals to fellow students and staff within the School of History and Heritage.CoreThe Public Historian 2022-23HST9071MLevel 72022-23History is everywhere in the world around us. You can find it in popular fiction, in heritage sites run by organisations like the National Trust or by local communities, in the educational settings of schools and museums, and in government policy shaped by the past successes and failures of the state. This module will reflect the current diversity of non-academic forms of history and will aim to further students' understanding of the nature and practice of public history by exploring the aims, techniques and outcomes of different forms of historical practice. The module encourages students to reflect on the differences between professional and public history in order to enhance their understanding of the purposes of the historical discipline beyond the academy, and to deepen their awareness of how different producers create histories and how audiences interpret these histories. It also encourages students to think practically about how to use such insights in the planning of their own public history resource.CoreBreak Ranks! Antimilitarism, Pacifism and Resistance to War 2022-23HST9027MLevel 72022-23This module aims to examine the history of peace/antiwar movements both nationally and internationally. It explores forms of noncompliance to war regulations among civilians and in the army. Students can study the theoretical underpinnings of this field and apply that knowledge in designing and developing their own research project for the final assessment. Areas covered include theories of pacifism/antimilitarism, war resistance in art and literature, religious opposition to war, women in peace movements and anti-war movements today.OptionalEarly Modern Manhood 2022-23HST9028MLevel 72022-23This module introduces key issues and concepts in gender history, with particular reference to early modern masculinity. An introduction to key ideas and scholars is provided, focussing particularly on the ways in which scholars of the history of masculinity use a variety of texts from journals and letters to visual material and published works in order to elucidate the ideals and experiences of both early modern men and women. The module offers students the opportunity to engage in sustained analysis of developments in scholarship relating to masculinity in the period c.1500-1750. This is designed to enable them to demonstrate their understanding and ability to structure their own research, utilising primary and secondary sources, including works from cognate disciplines such as gender theory and other theoretically-informed approaches.OptionalEveryday Britain: MACE (The Media Archive for Central England) and the Historian 2022-23HST9062MLevel 72022-23This archive-based MA module makes use of the considerable resources of the Media Archive for Central England (MACE) as an entrance into the history of the everyday in 20th century Britain. Students can familiarise themselves firstly with concepts of the everyday within British history and its relationship to a range of identities in the 20th century, secondly with the archival holdings of MACE as a means of exploring these concepts and thirdly, the mediatisation of everyday life in the 20th century.OptionalGender and Material Culture in Modern Britain 2022-23HST9063MLevel 72022-23OptionalLiterature, Politics and Identity in Inter-War Europe 2022-23HST9065MLevel 72022-23The inter-war period in Europe was an unprecedented time of political and social upheaval. Also unique, was the way in which literature had a key role, not only in documenting this upheaval but as a powerful tool of self expression and self making. Many writers during this period saw their words as an intervention in the fight between right and left, alongside fights for gender equality, and the right to sexual freedom. This module will examine five key battlegrounds of political, social and sexual change: Russia, Ireland, Germany, Spain and Britain, and the ways in which writers engaged with this process. This will allow students to reflect upon the relationship between fact and fiction and the ways in which both history and life stories are shaped to fit particular narratives. The course enables students to critically engage with literary material including novels, poetry, memoir and diaries, and to use these materials as a historical source. It is designed to allow students to interrogate the nature of writing fictional and non-fictional material, and the ways in which these genres often overlap in the writing of history and the narrating of individual lives.OptionalPhotographing Empire 2022-23HST9066MLevel 72022-23This module will examine photographs produced during the era of European imperialism. The development of, and greater accessibility to, photography coincided with the era of high imperialism in the late nineteenth century and this module builds on recent scholarship which places the production and the impact of photographs at the heart of studies of the empire. Students can investigate the many ways in which the photographic image became a technology of power in the imperial project.OptionalPolitics and Political Culture in Tudor and Stuart Britain, 1485-1714 2022-23HST9079MLevel 72022-23The Tudor and Stuart periods were times of riot, rebellion and revolution. Monarchy was challenged, abolished and restored; parliaments grew in authority and regularity; England and Scotland became a United Kingdom. It was also a time of rapid change in the depth and quality of political engagement and activity for people across all levels of society: it was an age of mob demonstrations, mass petitioning, printed satires and armed rebellions. While historical studies have long recognised the constitutional and political significance of this period, the approaches taken by historians have evolved substantially in recent decades. The module allows students to investigate the history of monarchy, parliaments and the state, as well as the issue of popular politics, and the ways in which men and women outside of the political elite engaged with those in authority. It offers the chance to develop skills in locating, accessing and reading early modern printed and manuscript sources and to engage with Lincolns rich early modern archives.OptionalPrint Culture and the Book in the Nineteenth Century 2022-23ENL9040MLevel 72022-23OptionalSex and Science in the Western World, 1800 to the present 2022-23HST9067MLevel 72022-23This module explores the medicalisation of sexuality from the nineteenth century to the present. Although what was considered healthy sexual behaviour had long occupied Western medical thought, in the nineteenth century physicians grouped together a series of sexual issues and made them the object of intense specialised analysis unparalleled in previous medical study. Students can explore how medical knowledge has shaped understandings of sex differences, gender, sexual behaviour and sexuality over time, and how, in turn, political and cultural problems have influenced science.OptionalThe British Image of the United States (1896-Present day) 2022-23HST9029MLevel 72022-23The Anglo-American relationship has been a central facet of British foreign policy throughout the twentieth century. Its pioneering historian, H.C. Allen, asserted the relationship could only be understood by considering political factors in conjunction with cultural links. This module examines one aspect of this process through the representation of America and Americans in British novels, films and TV series since the Great Rapprochement of the 1890s. It considers what the British image of the United States was and asks how did it develop over the course of the century? How far do the fictionalised relationships reflect the political relationships of the time in which they were written, and how far do they present an alternative story of Anglo-American relations? How far should we accept Allens contention that the cultural dimension of the relationship is critical to understanding its history?OptionalThe History of the Book: Media and Print Culture in Early Modern Europe 2022-23HST9069MLevel 72022-23OptionalThe Making of Contemporary Britain: From Sexual Liberation to Deindustrialisation, 1970-1990 2022-23HST9070MLevel 72022-23The 1970s and 1980s in Britain were contradictory decades. They saw the advent of second wave feminism, gay rights, vibrant youth subcultures and the weakening of the class system, alongside a return to the right in politics, institutionalised sexism and homophobia, and the destruction of the traditional working class. This module will examine key issues and events in these decades to understand these contradictions and analyse their lasting impact on contemporary Britain. Students will be able to engage with various themes such as sexuality, gender, class, race and identity, and tailor their assessments to pursue a combination of these areas.OptionalThe Study of Political History in Britain 2022-23HST9011MLevel 72022-23This module provides students with the opportunity to engage critically with the writing of British political history in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. A variety of different approaches to this subject are in turn analysed and contextualized. Their relationships with other approaches are examined through scrutiny of a series of historiographical debates. In the second half of the module, students can examine a number of modern texts and historical writing dealing with the period 1885-1924, in order to test out how these different approaches have influenced political historians.OptionalThemes and Issues in Media History 2022-23HST9072MLevel 72022-23This module aims to introduce postgraduate students to recent methodologies, theories and debates in media history. It combines an examination of the development of modern media technologies and institutions (especially the press, photography, cinema, television and radio) with an analysis of new scholarship to highlight past and present approaches to media history, as well as future directions in the field. Students can explore a range of perspectives on media history, including technological, social, economic and political accounts. They will be asked to engage critically with up-to-date media history research, and to develop their own positions on current historiographical questions.OptionalThemes and Issues in the History of Gender and Sexuality 2022-23HST9073MLevel 72022-23This course focuses on the history of gender and sexuality and introduces some of the key concepts and thinkers in the field, from feminists to queer theories. It examines some of the historical debates about notions of gender and sexuality, and the complex structures binding them together. It looks at the intersections of gender and sexuality with class, race, ethnicity and other modes of social belonging, and covers different geographical areas. It also introduces students to the main methodologies with which to approach the historical documents relevant to the history of gender and sexuality, from the early modern period to the present. This module also aims to widen students understanding of the themes and issues in the history of gender and sexuality, provide students with the conceptual and practical skills of an historian of gender and sexuality, and strengthen students critical thinking in the field.OptionalThemes in Contemporary British History 2022-23HST9074MLevel 72022-23This module will explore recent works and debates within contemporary British history, with a focus on the 20th and 21st centuries. Students will examine key animating questions within the field relating to class, race, gender and sexuality, while further exploring recent new directions such as urban history and the emotional turn within contemporary British history. The module is organised thematically with an emphasis on recent work in the field. The module emphasises journals, monographs and online debates as key sites for contesting and contributing to the field of contemporary British history. Students have the opportunity to develop a strong understanding of contemporary British history as it currently stands, as well as the multiple avenues through which it is articulated.OptionalThemes in Global History 2022-23HST9077MLevel 72022-23This module introduces students to some of the most important and innovative themes, debates and controversies relating to global history. Global understanding of the early modern and modern world presents challenges that are shared among several sub-fields in historical studies. Students will engage with the major themes in the field, which may include, but are not limited to, transoceanic communication, the circulation of knowledge, technological development, race, empire, trade, climate, urban expansion, among others. Students will have the opportunity to critically examine scholarly research which has focused in one or more regions of early modern and modern history, namely, the Pacific, Indian, Atlantic and Mediterranean worlds.Optional

Key Information

MA History

Key Information

Welcome to MA History

How You Study

An Introduction to Your Modules

How you are assessed

Fees and Funding

Programme-Specific Additional Costs

The School of History and Heritage MA Bursary

International Postgraduate Taught Application Deadline

Entry Requirements 2022-23

Features

Career Opportunities

Postgraduate Events

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Prioritising Face-to-Face Teaching