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HI-M01
Historical Methods and Approaches
This module provides training in advanced historical research. It is designed to introduce students to methods of historical investigation, writing, and presentation, and to important historical resources (including archives, collections of sources, and museums). Attention will be given to the use of IT in historical work work as well as more traditional paper-based methods.
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HI-M2001
History and Heritage Postgraduate Study Trip
Medieval Poland, Prussia and the Crusading Order of the Teutonic Knights (2024).
Students will visit a variety of medieval and more recent sites of historical significance over the course of a roughly week-long journey around northern Poland. Sites will include the medieval city of Toru¿ (a UNESCO World Heritage Site), the home of Nicolaus Copernicus, and Malbork Castle (a UNESCO World Heritage Site), seat of the Grandmaster of the Teutonic order. A series of lectures will precede the trip itself, the trip taking place during the Easter break. During the trip, students will be expected to undertake collaborative interpretive work on site.
This module runs in conjunction with HIH2001 Ancient and Historic Places Study Trip, going to the same location at the same time.
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HI-M326
The Urban Colonization of Medieval Wales: Understanding Anglo-Norman and Germanic Urbanization
Writing around the year 1188, the Anglo-Norman and Welsh clergyman Gerald of Wales, in composing his Journey Through Wales, wrote 'the Welsh do not live in towns, villages or castles ... they pay no attention to commerce, shipping or industry'. However, as Gerald was undoubtedly aware, this was an already anachronistic depiction of Wales which, while perhaps reflective of Welsh society in the mid eleventh century, was highly inaccurate in Gerald¿s day. Prior to the incursions of Norman adventurers into Wales in the decades immediately after 1066 the Welsh landscape had been almost totally devoid of towns or urban development, by English or continental standards. However, by 1350, the Welsh landscape would feature c.100 towns and boroughs founded largely ¿ but not exclusively ¿ by Anglo-Norman conquerors, and the proportion of persons living in Wales and dwelling in urban communities would be equivalent to England or Spain (around 15 to 20 per cent). This transformation was accompanied by large-scale immigration from England, the linguistic and cultural Anglicization of large parts of lowland Wales in the vicinity of town foundations, the development of local and regional trade networks and, perhaps most importantly, the foundation of the overwhelming majority of the network of towns in Wales, as we have it today. Moreover, the urbanization of Wales was not a unique event in northern Europe, but was paralled by the Anglo-Norman urban colonization of Ireland and the urbanization of Prussia and the Baltic coastal regions by Germanic traders and settlers. These parallel colonial movements offer fertile scope for the construction of analytical comparasons between Wales, Ireland and the Baltic. The module covers: the rationale behind, and mechanics of, urban foundation; the relationships between urbanization, colonization and economic reorganization; urbanization and the formation of ethnic and cultural identities; the emergence of trade networks; institutionalized and non-institutionalized relationships between ethnicity and economic opportunity; architectural expressions of colonization, both domestic and eccleastical; and, throught the module, comparative aspects of Anglo-Norman and Germanic urbanization movements.
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HIH117
Medieval Europe: An Introduction
The module is a basic introduction to the history of Europe c600-c1450, a period usually described as 'Medieval'. It outlines the political and economic structures of the period, and examines the medieval 'world view' by discussing attitudes to life, death and the afterlife. Its first theme, expansion, charts the growth of Europe as a major world power and includes topics such as the crusades against the Muslims and pagans, political and economic growth, and intellectual development in the foundation of the universities. Its second theme, crisis, focuses on the devastating impact of plague, famine and warfare, and the increasing persecution of heretics, lepers, homosexuals, and Jews.
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HIH122
Making History
How do historians study the past? Why do their accounts of the past differ, and why do they change over time? This module will help you to understand the various concepts, methods, and approaches that academic historians use when writing history and generating historical explanations. By the end of it, you will understand how and why professional historians disagree on many topics, and you will be equipped to evaluate competing interpretations of the same past events and processes.
The module also trains you in the fundamental skills required to study history as an undergraduate, and gives you an opportunity to learn more about the interests and expertise of the history staff you¿ll be working with at Swansea. It will help you make the transition from being taught history at school or college to studying history at university, and it will introduce you to the many different kinds of history you can explore in the course of your degree.
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HIH122W
Creu Hanes
Sut mae haneswyr yn astudio'r gorffennol? Pam bod eu fersiynau o'r gorffennol yn amrywio a pham ydynt yn newid dros amser? Bydd y modiwl hwn yn eich helpu i ddeall y cysyniadau, y dulliau a'r ymagweddau gwahanol y mae haneswyr academaidd yn eu defnyddio wrth ysgrifennu hanes a chreu esboniadau hanesyddol. Erbyn diwedd y modiwl, bydd gennych ddealltwriaeth o sut a pham bod haneswyr proffesiynol yn anghytuno ar lawer o bynciau a bydd modd i chi werthuso dehongliadau cyferbyniol o'r un digwyddiadau a phrosesau o'r gorffennol.
Mae'r modiwl hefyd yn eich addysgu am y sgiliau sylfaenol angenrheidiol i astudio hanes fel myfyriwr israddedig ac mae'n rhoi cyfle i chi ddysgu mwy am ddiddordebau ac arbenigedd y staff hanes y byddwch chi'n gweithio gyda nhw yn Abertawe. Bydd yn eich helpu i bontio o bwnc sy'n cael ei addysgu yn yr ysgol neu'r coleg i astudio hanes yn y brifysgol a bydd yn eich cyflwyno i'r mathau gwahanol o hanes y gallwch chi eu harchwilio yn ystod eich cwrs gradd.
How do historians study the past? Why do their accounts of the past differ, and why do they change over time? This module will help you to understand the various concepts, methods, and approaches that academic historians use when writing history and generating historical explanations. By the end of it, you will understand how and why professional historians disagree on many topics, and you will be equipped to evaluate competing interpretations of the same past events and processes.
The module also trains you in the fundamental skills required to study history as an undergraduate, and gives you an opportunity to learn more about the interests and expertise of the history staff you¿ll be working with at Swansea. It will help you make the transition from being taught history at school or college to studying history at university, and it will introduce you to the many different kinds of history you can explore in the course of your degree.
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HIH2016
America in a Nutshell: A History of Pennsylvania from William Penn to Donald Trump, 1631-2016
This module surveys the political, social, cultural and economic history of the State of Pennsylvania. It allows students to explore the rich history of America as it is researched and taught by American historians with the Unites States, that is, through the lens of `state¿ history. This module will allow students to explore the foundation of a key British colony in North America, to follow its trajectory of growth and interaction with other colonies before the American Revolution and its trajectory of growth and interaction with both other states and the United States Federal Government from 1776 to 2010. This module aims to help students capture the nature of `state identity¿ in America, so fundamental to American political and social history. Students will be encouraged to view America as most Americans see it, looking out from within a state context, with all of the historical and historiographical considerations that approach entails. Some core strands are political, social and cultural life against the backdrop of colonial life, revolution, civil war, industrialisation and deindustrialisation.
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HIH237
The Practice of History
The purpose of the module is to encourage you to think more deeply about how historians work and, in particular, about how we as historians can locate and use primary historical sources effectively as a means of interpreting and understanding the past. During the module we will learn about the survival of historical evidence, how it is organised and made accessible to historians to undertake their research, and how to effectively locate and interpret it in your studies. We will consider how the process of doing historical research changes over time, in particular with the impact of recent developments like digitization.
At the core of the module will be the work you undertake with others in your seminar group using a range of primary sources which your seminar tutor will introduce to you. As part of the module assessment you will also undertake your own primary source based research project using items from these collections. The module is designed strengthen your analytical skills and to help prepare you for the more extensive uses of primary evidence which you will encounter in final year special subjects and dissertation.
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HIMM00
Reading Medieval Manuscripts
Medieval manuscript sources are crucial to our understanding of the Middle Ages. Research across the disciplines of medieval studies is grounded in the study and use of medieval books and documentary sources. This module aims to give students the skills, knowledge and confidence to engage with original manuscript sources of various types, from early Anglo-Saxon Gospel books to medieval chronicles, from illustrated books of hours to critical legal documents. Students will engage with these sources via digital and printed images and full-scale printed facsimiles, learning to recognise and transcribe medieval hands from all periods. Students will be given the chance to read original manuscripts during visits to the West Glamorgan Archive Service (Swansea) and the National Library of Wales (Aberystwyth). This module assumes no prior knowledge of medieval manuscripts, nor any prior knowledge of the medieval languages featured in the manuscript samples, including Latin, Old English and Middle English.
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HIMM04
Introduction to Advanced Medieval Studies 2: Themes and Sources
This module aims to apply the skills and approaches learned in the module HIMM01: Introduction to Advanced Medieval Studies 1: Skills and Approaches to a range of important themes in Medieval Studies, including gender, identity, laws and customs, spirituality, heritage. The module is interdisciplinary and draws on historical, literary and visual sources. The content of the module will be arranged in 2-weekly blocks, with the first week in each block dedicated to introducing students to the specific theme and the second week being used as a practical application of this knowledge to a source or text.
