The Civil Rights Movement (P01705)

? Credit Points : 20 ? SCQF Level : 11 ? Acronym : HCA-P-CivRights

Scholarship on the Civil Rights Movement has grown extensively since the 1980s, which has also spawned a range of interpretations about the movement's origins, longevity, composition, and geographical extent. Scholars have also probed the function and nature of leadership in the movement, the influence of religion, the practice of non-violence, self-defence and the movement, the contribution of women, generational and class divides, organised labour and the movement, anticommunism and the movement, the relationship between civil rights and Black Power, the diversity and range of white response, and connections between civil rights and foreign policy. There are many readily available primary sources with which students can work. Apart from conventional documentary collections, they include memoirs, web-based documents and oral history transcripts, such as those available through the University of Southern Mississippi's website, video documentary series, film and photography, and songs. The library has a good collection of relevant works which continues to expand, and civil rights courses recruit well at the undergraduate level in the UK, suggesting that there is a good potential market for taught postgraduate study in this field.

The course will explore:

- the origins of the civil rights movement
- the composition, diversity, and nature of the movement
- the meanings of freedom in the movement
- the movement's strategies and tactics
- documentary sources and historiographical debates

Entry Requirements

? This course is not available to visting students.

Subject Areas

Home subject area

Postgraduate (School of History and Classics), (School of History, Classics and Archaeology, Schedule E)

Delivery Information

? Normal year taken : Postgraduate

? Delivery Period : Not being delivered

? Contact Teaching Time : 1 hour(s) 50 minutes per week for 11 weeks

Summary of Intended Learning Outcomes

On successful completion of the course, students will have developed a detailed knowledge and understanding of the Civil Rights Movement and key historiographical isssues. Specifically, they will:

- be able to discuss and analyse issue of continuity and discontinuity in the movement's history
- be able to debate the extent of the movement's success and the issue of defining success
- have developed an advanced understanding of the ideas of Martin Luther King, Jr., and his contribution to the movement
- have formulated a defensible conception of the role of the major civil tights groups and a sophisticated understanding of their interaction

Further, they will also be able to:

- understand the relationship between civil rights and the US foreign policy in the context of the Cold War
- discuss the interrelationship between local and national civil rights struggles
- analyse and discuss a range of different types of documentary materials
- contribute to informed classroom discussion
- work independently and in groups
- research materials using libraries and IT equipment