In this module you will explore the operas by Benjamin Britten, one of Britain’s most influential composers. Britten’s operas are among the few 20th-century works that hold a central position in today’s operatic canon. They are produced regularly by world-leading opera companies, and they are available in numerous audio and video recordings. Proceeding in rough chronological order from Peter Grimes (1945) to Death in Venice (1973), you will become acquainted with Britten’s most popular works, including Billy Budd, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, The Turn of the Screw, and Owen WIngrave. Each opera discussed in the module will serve as a case study to explore a broad theme in operatic culture, including reception and dissemination, the adaptation of a literary source to an opera libretto, national identity, social issues, sexuality, and opera and the media.
Are we living in an age of climate change or climate crisis? In her 2019 speech to the World Economic Forum, Greta Thunberg famously declared “Our house is on fire”: a statement underscored by the Australian bushfire crisis of 2020 and the mass devastation of more than one million acres of ‘gigafires’ in California the same year (worse even than previous seasons of ‘megafires’). But how did we get here? What stories could have been—or were—told about the gradual changes to our global climate over time? This module returns us to a pivotal moment in the history of climate change: to the rise of a new geological age defined by human influence (the Anthropocene). It charts the course of increasing fossil-fuel consumption, changes to rural and urban economies and, ultimately, the rise of smoke-filled city skies. Over the course of the semester, we will explore how British fiction, non-fiction prose, plays, and poetry from the mid-to-late Victorian age (ca.1850-1900) place empire, economics, and ecology at the centre of an emerging planetary crisis. In learning from the writers of a newly-global, capitalist society on the cusp of massive geologic change, we will explore our own position as critical readers, writers, and thinkers in an era of ‘sustainability.’
The Philosophy of Value offers students the opportunity to explore in detail some central issues and texts in the Western philosophical tradition that address questions in the philosophy of value broadly construed (i.e. including ethics, aesthetics, political philosophy, etc.). The module may focus on an important text, or on a body of significant literature.
This module explores how psychological processes shape political behaviour in contexts of conflict, crisis, and instability. It examines how emotions, identity, leadership, and perception influence decision-making in high-stakes environments, from international crises to domestic political polarisation. You will engage with key theories and real-world case studies to understand how fear, threat, and uncertainty affect political actors, public opinion, and policy responses. The module also considers the role of political communication, media, and narratives in escalating or resolving conflict. By combining theoretical insight with empirical analysis, the module equips you to critically evaluate political behaviour in times of crisis and to understand the psychological dynamics underlying contemporary global challenges.
This module focuses on the European Union (EU) as a system of public policy-making and aims to provide students with a working knowledge of the history of European integration, the main EU institutions, the EU policy process, main theoretical debates as well as the key EU policies, such as the Monetary Union, Brexit and Enlargement, or the EU’s growing activity in Justice and Home Affairs. Towards the end of the module, students will have the opportunity to discuss some of the key current issues and challenges confronting the EU’s future direction: its democratic legitimacy; the process of Brexit; the Eurozone crisis and Britain’s relationship with the EU.
This module focuses on the European Union (EU) as a system of public policy-making and aims to provide students with a working knowledge of the history of European integration, the main EU institutions, the EU policy process, main theoretical debates as well as the key EU policies, such as the Monetary Union, Human Rights and Enlargement, or the EU’s growing activity in Justice and Home Affairs. Towards the end of the module, students will have the opportunity to discuss some of the key current issues and challenges confronting the EU’s future direction: its democratic legitimacy; the process of Europeanization; the Eurozone crisis and Britain’s relationship with the EU.
The Roman empire has held the imagination of successive generations. Conquest by Rome brought social, cultural and economic change to large swathes of what is now Europe, the Middle East and north Africa. Never before or after did these parts of the world enjoy centuries of stability and peace as they did under the Romans. It was a unique political institution that encompassed a mosaic of peoples, languages and cultures that was unprecedented in its richness, leaving a legacy that has profoundly shaped the course of Western civilisation. The success and longevity of the Roman empire has fascinated many, and long after its demise it remained a model for the European and American imperialism in the nineteenth, twentieth and even twenty-first centuries. The great wealth of the archaeological evidence has produced a long tradition of scholarship, but in the last twenty years, new approaches have reawakened these debates, making the study of the Roman world one of the most dynamic fields within archaeology, with major implications for other areas of the Humanities. Post-colonial discourse, theorists of Globalisation and North African states trying to raise their agricultural output, to name just few, have all looked back to the Roman Empire for clues. So what was the story of the Roman empire’s success? How did it come to be, how was it maintained, and what factors were involved in the fracture and transformation of the system? In this module, you will look at the causes, consequences and the changing nature of Roman imperialism and its political, social, cultural and economic foundations. You will touch upon key issues and debates in Roman archaeology and learn about major sites and artefact types from all parts of the Roman world, as well as having the opportunity to handle Roman material culture. Assessment is through an essay based on a group presentation, and a final exam.
In 2017, global recorded music revenues totalled $17.3 billion, the majority of which comes from the consumption of what we would classify as songs. This module aims, through lectures and practical work, to investigate & demonstrate how new production, distribution and consumption technologies are changing the way songs are made.
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The Professional Geographer is a high-level skills practical module. The module aims to help students understand the changing nature of work, the dynamic and diverse labour market for geography graduates and to develop skills, knowledge and experience to successfully identify and pursue career suitable paths. By working with internal and external experts (people from industry) students will develop academic knowledge and professional skills. Lectures will be complemented with interactive workshops and practical sessions that will enable students to reflect on and develop different aspects of career development and employability. For example, identifying potential jobs and career trajectories, preparing personal statements and applications, developing traditional resumes as well as a web-presence and successfully negotiating interviews and assessment centres. Students will complete a series of professional development tasks throughout the semester and complete a professional development reflection and labour market entry plan.
This module will be an introduction to the psychology of metal health and wellbeing. Students will first learn about the links between wellbeing and mental health. We will also cover how we define and categorise mental health using modern diagnostic systems, with examples from a few mental health conditions. They will also cover how research has influenced our evolving scientific understanding of mental health. Students will be introduced to different perspectives of mental health, links between physical and mental health, sustainability, and how we use mental health theory and research in real-world contexts, such as treatments, policy, and global mental health. The module will also cover how experiences of stigma and inequalities influence the risk, development, and maintenance of mental health problems in the context of different perspectives. Applied examples will be provided throughout relating to mood and psychotic disorders. Optional individual wellbeing exercises are also introduced to demonstrate theory and research in practice. Coursework requires students to demonstrate their knowledge and ability to think critically about the module content in novel, applied tasks.
This module will introduce you to how books are published, printed and brought to market, and to key issues relating to the regulation of print and digital media. We will focus on publishing books in the United Kingdom, but will make useful comparisons with publishing industries beyond the UK. We will be thinking about fiction and non-fiction works, and we will be focussing on ‘trade publishing’. This module will give you the opportunity to engage with research on all the key aspects of the publishing world.
In this module, you will examine one of the greatest armies in European history. The Roman army has long excited interest, whether out of an interest in the past, or as a model for more recent military powers. The far-flung province of Britain hosted the largest contingent of Roman military units of any province, with 3-4 citizen legions and up to 50 non-citizen auxiliary units. From the end of the first century AD, conquest ceased, and a frontier was established in the north of England, at first an informal frontier and then the fixed frontier of Hadrian’s Wall. This area has been one of the most important sources of evidence for the Roman army, both textual and material, in particular, the fort of Vindolanda and the Vindolanda Tablets, a unique repository of written evidence from letters to daily manpower reports. What do we know about life on this frontier? Where were the soldiers from? What were their daily routines? How was such a large force supplied? Who else formed part of the military community? Addressing these and other questions, you will study the Vindolanda Tablets and other evidence to reconstruct the lives of this fascinating community.
This module explores the Russian Revolution, assessing the 1880s up until the eve of the First World War. We will look closely at the old regime, considering the political culture of the autocracy and the dynamics behind tsarist rule. It will consider the personality of the tsar, Nicholas II, and his key advisors. But the module will depart from traditional perspectives quite frequently: we will look closely too at wider society – the development of key questions around the peasantry, the working class and also non-Russian identities in the empire. The development of political radicalism will be surveyed from the late nineteenth century through to the Revolution of 1905, as well as the mobilization of the forces of counter-revolution, thinking too about the impact of Russia’s first revolution. The last weeks of the module will explore the era of politics and parliament, the wider crisis in tsarist power in this period, the mobilization of conservative opinion, and the pre-war atmosphere of anxiety. Primary sources are key to the special subject, which will use different genres of sources, including literature, film and the visual arts, to understand historical change. Key to the module are the rich historiographical debates concerning the revolution, and the module will start by looking at some of the more recent developments in the ‘imperial turn’ to help us understand old regime Russia.
This module explores the Russian Revolution, following a chronology from 1914 until 1924. Part two explores the turmoil of the First World War, the Revolutions of 1917 and then the Civil War period (c. 1917-21). It will look closely at the First World War period (1914-17) and integrate recent literature into its study. We will then turn to the Revolutions of 1917 – the role of the opposition, the abdication of the tsar, the uncertain era of Provisional Government and the Bolshevik seizure of power in October 1917. Then we survey developments during the tumultuous Civil War era and consider how this critically impacted upon the development of the Bolshevik party. The chronology ends with an exploration of the political culture of the early Soviet state, concluding with the death of Lenin, and the culture-building around the Bolshevik party. The module will consider a wide variety of different source materials during seminars and focus on the role of culture in the construction of the revolutionary project throughout Russia’s early twentieth century. It will end with consideration of the Revolution’s contested legacy: what has the Russian Revolution done for us?
To introduce the theoretical underpinnings of the democratic state; to outline theoretical and practical changes and challenges to the democratic state both today and in the future; to draw links between theoretical ideas about the democratic state and democratic politics in action.
The Supernatural has always had a privileged place in audiovisual culture. Earliest films manifested ghosts through double exposures and the ‘Pepper’s Ghost’ special effect, at the same time that the mediums of film and sound recording were thought to have the ability to capture aspects of the paranormal that were not immediately apparent (Ruffles, 2004). Although a product of developments in science and technology, writers and audiences alike have throughout its existence noted the eerie, spectral nature of a medium that brings physical beings to life in light and shadow. As noted by Sconce (2000), the close relationship between the Supernatural and electronic media has been intimate to the point where disintricating the two can be difficult. The two have also developed side by side: recording technologies are exploited by investigators of the Supernatural, while ideas and visions of the Supernatural have been both defined by and manifested in audiovisual culture. Horror films, in particular, have developed certain ways for depicting, and giving a direct feeling of, the Supernatural, which allows for a distinctive range of ideas about the subject to be presented. But the Supernatural also appears in films from animation to art cinema and films with religious themes. These depictions can be understood as displacements or metaphors for engaging with other ideas. For example, ghosts can often be construed as manifesting a return of unfinished business, as examples of hauntology or a Freudian ‘Return of the Repressed’. They can also embody taboo or unacceptable ideas, suggest political allegories, or function as a means for solving intractable situations. The central concern of this module is with the Supernatural as a metaphor, as a theory, and as an unanswerable enigma. Rather than considering Supernatural beings in their more obvious form, such as vampires and werewolves, the module will be more interested in the ethereal and ephemeral (ghosts, demons and possession, and spiritualism). The module will address the Supernatural in terms of culture and history but focus particularly on film and related audiovisual culture. This will also include television, music and video games, all of which intersect significantly with film and all of which continue the Supernatural as both a representation and an embodiment.
The Sustainability Professional is a high-level skills practical module delivered in partnership with a range of contributors from local and regional environmental and sustainability consultancies and other organisations. This module aims to provide students with the skills, knowledge and expertise to pursue a career in this rapidly growing employment field. Students will be able to develop academic knowledge of the subject area, but also be able to gain practical experience of professional project work through working in partnership with internal and external experts on ‘real-life’ case studies on a weekly basis. The emphasis in this module is on professional skills development, problem-solving, and group exercises. Students are encouraged to participate in discussion and development of solutions as opposed to traditional lecture-based classes. Students will complete a series of weekly case study exercises, to be included in a 'Professional Development Reflection and Analysis Report' as an individual submission. written up in the form of a summary analysis report to be submitted as a ‘Sustainability Portfolio’. Students will work in groups to submit one full consultancy report as the primary assessment. By the completion of the module, all students will have a sophisticated professional level understanding of this diverse field, experience of working with experienced on case study exercises in a professional capacity, and high number of professional skills to add to their CVs.
The Sustainability Professional is a high-level skills practical module delivered in partnership with a range of contributors from local and regional environmental and sustainability consultancies and other organisations. This module aims to provide students with the skills, knowledge and expertise to pursue a career in this rapidly growing employment field. Students will be able to develop academic knowledge of the subject area, but also be able to gain practical experience of professional project work through working in partnership with internal and external experts on ‘real-life’ case studies on a weekly basis. The emphasis in this module is on professional skills development, problem-solving, and group exercises. Students are encouraged to participate in discussion and development of solutions as opposed to traditional lecture-based classes. Students will complete a series of weekly case study exercises, to be included in a 'Professional Development Reflection and Analysis Report' as an individual submission. written up in the form of a summary analysis report to be submitted as a ‘Sustainability Portfolio’. Students will work in groups to submit one full consultancy report as the primary assessment. By the completion of the module, all students will have a sophisticated professional level understanding of this diverse field, experience of working with experienced on case study exercises in a professional capacity, and high number of professional skills to add to their CVs. Students will complete a series of weekly case study exercises, to be written up in the form of a summary analysis report to be submitted as a ‘Sustainability Portfolio’. Students will work in MSc groups to submit one full consultancy report as the primary assessment. By the completion of the module, all students will have a sophisticated professional level understanding of this diverse field, experience of working with experienced on case study exercises in a professional capacity, and high number of professional skills to add to their CVs.
