Directed Reading and Research (II) (P01928)

? Credit Points : 40 ? SCQF Level : 11 ? Acronym : HCA-P-DirectRR2

Students should meet at regular intervals (normally a minimum of five times per semester) with their supervisor(s), in order to continue the course of directed reading and research in their chosen area of research that they began in the first semester. Under the direction of his/her supervisor(s) the student will identify the main primary sources related to their research topic. S/he should undertake to address a major research question by a close reading of the primary sources. This course is assessed by means of a 6,000 word essay, based mainly on primary sources, addressing a major problem, question or issue in the student's field of study.

Entry Requirements

none

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 : Semester 2 (Blocks 3-4)

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

Summary of Intended Learning Outcomes

Students who successfully complete this course should:

- Familiarise themselves with the archival and published primary sources in their chosen field available at the University in particular and Edinburgh more generally as well as electronically..

- Acquaint themselves with various finding aids - electronic, printed, and human - which will allow them to make the best possible use primary sources.

- Be able to engage in historiographical debates - both orally and in writing, through the use of primary sources.

- Develop and awareness of the difficulties which different types of primary sources present to the historian.

- Understand the interaction between historical sources and explanation.

- Appreciate the historical and historiographical context of their individual area of research

- Be able to analyse, assimilate and deploy critically a range of primary sources relevant and essential to the student's individual research subject.
- Be able to formulate hypotheses relating to their research subject and to test them by marshalling a range of primary and secondary evidence.

- Be able to reflect critically on the processes and methods which they utilise in both their research and their writing.