Undergraduate Course: Book Battles: European Intellectual Culture from the Renaissance to the Enlightenment (HIST10460)
Course Outline
| School | School of History, Classics and Archaeology |
College | College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences |
| Credit level (Normal year taken) | SCQF Level 10 (Year 3 Undergraduate) |
Availability | Available to all students |
| SCQF Credits | 20 |
ECTS Credits | 10 |
| Summary | The wars, fragmenting religions, global empires, and courtly intrigues of early modern Europe also posed challenges for intellectual culture. Scholars themselves fought over the uses and limits of the supernatural, art, science, church, and state. This course sets out the kinds of people who created this culture, considering how they experienced their institutions and worlds. |
| Course description |
Between the Renaissance and the Enlightenment (1400-1800), Europe developed much of the intellectual culture we take for granted: universities, anatomy theatres, the essay, academic journals, and other creative forums of debate over art, human rights, civility, and even how to study nature and control the environment. Men and women hotly debated the characteristics of a true artist, whether new inventions like telescopes should be trusted, or whether women can think as well as men - such book battles revealed a politics of knowledge that reached from courts to coffee-houses, from print-houses to salons. This course will introduce students to key thinkers and the dynamic places which defined this rich intellectual culture.
This course will also serve as a good introduction to further electives and special subjects on Intellectual History.
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Entry Requirements (not applicable to Visiting Students)
| Pre-requisites |
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Co-requisites | |
| Prohibited Combinations | |
Other requirements | A pass or passes in 40 credits of first level historical courses or equivalent and a pass or passes in 40 credits of second level historical courses or equivalent.
Before enrolling students on this course, Personal Tutors are asked to contact the History Honours Admission Secretary to ensure that a place is available (Tel: 504030). |
Information for Visiting Students
| Pre-requisites | Visiting students should have at least 3 History courses at grade B or above (or be predicted to obtain this). We will only consider University/College level courses. Applicants should note that, as with other popular courses, meeting the minimum does NOT guarantee admission.
** as numbers are limited, visiting students should contact the Visiting Student Office directly for admission to this course ** |
Course Delivery Information
| Not being delivered |
Learning Outcomes
On completion of this course, the student will be able to:
- Process and critically assess information derived from historical research, using historiographical, theoretical and methodological knowledge and skills to develop the students' research programme.
- Construct and pursue a coherent historical argument based on the hypotheses which have been formulated and tested by reference to primary and secondary source material.
- Write clear, accurate, precise and concise prose.
- Master practical skills in making effective contributions to group based learning.
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Reading List
William J. Bouwsma, The Waning of the Renaissance, 1550-1640 (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2001).
Peter Burke, A Social History of Knowledge: From Gutenberg to Diderot (Cambridge: Polity, 2000).
Desmond C. Clarke and Catherine Wilson, eds., The Oxford Handbook of Philosophy in Early Modern Europe (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011).
Peter Dear, Revolutionizing the Sciences: European Knowledge and Its Ambitions, 1500-1700, 2nd ed. (Houndmills: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009).
Daniel Garber and Michael Ayers, eds., The Cambridge History of Seventeenth-Century Philosophy, 2 vols (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998).
Anthony T. Grafton, 'A Sketch Map of a Lost Continent: The Republic of Letters', Republic of Letters 1, no. 1 (2009).
Paul Hazard, The European Mind 1680-1715, trans. J. L. May (London, 1964; repr. 1990)
Richard H. Popkin, The History of Scepticism: From Savonarola to Bayle, 3rd ed. (Oxford University Press, 2003).
Eugene F. Rice, Jr. and Anthony Grafton, The Foundations of Early Modern Europe, 1460-1559, 2nd ed. (W. W. Norton & Company, 1994).
Charles B. Schmitt et al., eds., The Cambridge History of Renaissance Philosophy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988). |
Additional Information
| Graduate Attributes and Skills |
This course will help students develop a range of transferable skills, including;
- the ability to manage one's time effectively, work to deadlines, and perform effectively under pressure;
- the ability to gather, sift, organise and evaluate textual evidence;
- the ability to marshal argument in both written and oral form;
- the ability to work independently and as part of a pair or larger group. |
| Keywords | Not entered |
Contacts
| Course organiser | |
Course secretary | |
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