Postgraduate Course: The Grand Tour and Beyond: British Travellers in Eighteenth-Century Europe (PGHC11545)
Course Outline
| School | School of History, Classics and Archaeology |
College | College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences |
| Credit level (Normal year taken) | SCQF Level 11 (Postgraduate) |
| Course type | Sandwich |
Availability | Available to all students |
| SCQF Credits | 20 |
ECTS Credits | 10 |
| Summary | Throughout the eighteenth century, Britons continually crossed the English Channel to mainland Europe. Their purposes for doing so were many-fold: education, health, work, leisure, exile, social betterment. This course explores eighteenth-century Britain's complex and rich cultures of travel to Europe and it's attitudes towards the foreign. |
| Course description |
This course explores the many ways in which eighteenth-century Britons travelled to and encountered the European continent. Starting with an overview of eighteenth-century attitudes towards travel and the foreign, it explores the Grand Tour, the period's most famous culture of travel shared by young elite men that held enormous social and cultural influence over Britain's political, economic, and cultural systems, alongside the development of more diverse forms of travel: the 'professional' travels of diplomats, soldiers, explorers and merchants, the rapidly rising culture of pleasure travel amongst older elites, middling sorts, women and families, the development of domestic travel, and the more hidden travel experiences of numerous attending servants and even pets. Uncovering the rich, varied and well documented travel cultures of eighteenth-century Britain, it ends by pondering the implications of the Napoleonic War and rise of Romantic travel at the end of the long eighteenth century, and the afterlife of travel once travellers had returned safely home.
In this course, we will use a wealth of primary sources and a range of interdisciplinary methods to explore the rapidly developing historiography of travel history. We will situate the practices, writings and cultures of travel within the wider context of eighteenth-century Britain and engage critically with the diverse methodological and theoretical approaches that scholars are currently using to revise and develop this field of scholarship. The course offers a chance to examine a fascinating phenomenon that has left a rich legacy of printed, manuscript, artistic, architectural and other material traces, and provides a timely opportunity to explore how British people saw themselves and their changing relationships with continental Europe across the eighteenth century.
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Entry Requirements (not applicable to Visiting Students)
| Pre-requisites |
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Co-requisites | |
| Prohibited Combinations | |
Other requirements | None |
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 ** |
| High Demand Course? |
Yes |
Course Delivery Information
| Not being delivered |
Learning Outcomes
On completion of this course, the student will be able to:
- Demonstrate a detailed and critical command of the body of primary sources concerning the eighteenth-century cultures of British travel to Europe.
- Analyse and reflect critically upon relevant scholarship and debated regarding eighteenth-century British travel and relationships with Europe, along with connected conceptual discussions.
- Develop and sustain original scholarly arguments in oral and written forms by independently formulating appropriate questions and utilising relevant evidence.
- Demonstrate in oral and written form originality and independence of mind and initiative; intellectual integrity and maturity; an ability to evaluate the work of others, including peers; and a considerable degree of autonomy.
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Reading List
Ansell, Richard, "Educational travel in Protestant families from post-Restoration Ireland," Historical Journal, 58:4 (2015), pp. 931-958.
Ayres, P., Classical Culture and the Idea of Rome in Eighteenth-Century England (Cambridge, 1997).
Black, Jeremy, The British Abroad: The Grand Tour in the Eighteenth Century (Stroud, 2003).
Bohls, Elizabeth. Women Travel Writers and the Language of Aesthetics, 1716-1818 (Cambridge, 1995).
Buzard, James. The Beaten Track: European tourism, literature and the ways to culture (Oxford, 1993).
Chard, Chloe, Pleasure and guilt on the grand tour: travel writing and imaginative geography, 1600-1830 (Manchester, 1999).
Cohen, Michèle. Fashioning Masculinity: National identity and language in the eighteenth century (London, 2002).
Conway, Stephen, Britain, Ireland and Continental Europe in the Eighteenth Century: Similarities, Connections, Identities (Oxford, 2011).
Goldsmith, Sarah, Masculinity and Danger on the Eighteenth-Century Grand Tour (London, 2021).
Sweet, Rosemary et al (eds.), Beyond the Grand Tour: Northern Metropolises and Early Modern Travel Behavior (Aldershot, 2016).
Sweet, Rosemary, Cities and the Grand Tour: The British in Italy, c. 1690-1820 (Cambridge, 2012).
Turner, Katherine, British Travel Writers in Europe, 1750-1800: authorship, gender, and national identity (Aldershot, 2001). |
Additional Information
| Graduate Attributes and Skills |
On completion of the course, the students will attain skills in the following graduate attributes: critical awareness; the ability to clearly and critically communicate in verbal and written format; time management; independent research and project management skills. |
| Keywords | Not entered |
Contacts
| Course organiser | Dr Sarah Goldsmith
Tel: (0131 6)50 4620
Email: Sarah.Goldsmith@ed.ac.uk |
Course secretary | |
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