Postgraduate Course: Historical Methodology (PGHC11335)
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) |
Availability | Available to all students |
| SCQF Credits | 20 |
ECTS Credits | 10 |
| Summary | This second-semester course follows on from the first-term Historical Research: Skills and Sources course, by providing MScT students with the methodological training they require to orientate their research strategies in an increasingly interdisciplinary field. Through a series of core lectures, and a wide-ranging series of pathways with members of academic staff, students will develop a meaningful familiarity with the interpretive strategies and secondary materials that define major approaches in current historical scholarship. |
| Course description |
This course will comprise three elements:-
1. Core lectures attended by the whole MSc History cohort, weeks 1, 6 & 11.
2. Two pathways in the methodologies chosen by the student, running weeks 2-5 & 7-10.
3. Submission of a final research paper (4-5,000 words) for numerical assessment.
Students on the MSc in Medieval History are strongly advised to take a medieval pathway.
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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 | None |
| High Demand Course? |
Yes |
Course Delivery Information
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| Academic year 2024/25, Available to all students (SV1)
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Quota: 100 |
| Course Start |
Semester 2 |
Timetable |
Timetable |
| Learning and Teaching activities (Further Info) |
Total Hours:
200
(
Seminar/Tutorial Hours 22,
Programme Level Learning and Teaching Hours 4,
Directed Learning and Independent Learning Hours
174 )
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| Assessment (Further Info) |
Written Exam
0 %,
Coursework
100 %,
Practical Exam
0 %
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| Additional Information (Assessment) |
4-5000-word essay relating to one of the pathways chosen. |
| Feedback |
Not entered |
| No Exam Information |
Learning Outcomes
On completion of this course, the student will be able to:
- Demonstrate a detailed and critical command of the methodology, the primary sources, and related secondary literature from one of the pathways that they have chosen
- Analyse and reflect critically upon relevant scholarship concerning the specialised methodology of the pathway that they have chosen to do the coursework for, its relevant primary source materials, and conceptual discussions about that methodology
- Understand and apply specialised methodology, its techniques and practices considered in the specialised field of the pathway chosen
- Develop and sustain original scholarly arguments in oral and written form
- Demonstrate 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
Gunn, Simon, & Lucy Faire (eds), Research Methods for History (Edinburgh, 2011)
Gunn, Simon (ed.), History and Cultural Theory (Longmans, 2006)
Iggers, G., 'The History and Meaning of the Term "Historicism"', Journal of the History of Ideas 56, 1995, 129-152
Braudel, Fernand, 'History and the Social Sciences: La Longue Durée', tr. Sarah Matthews, On History. Chicago, 1980. 25-54.
Jones, Max, 'What Should Historians Do with Heroes? Reflections on Nineteenth- and Twentieth century Britain', History Compass 5:2 (2007), 439-54
Hobsbawm, Eric, and Terence Ranger, The Invention of Tradition (1983, 2012 edition)
Anderson, Benedict, 'Introduction', Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism (London, 1991)
Scott, J. W., "Gender: A Useful Category of Historical Analysis," American Historical Review 91 (Dec 1986): 1053-75.
Houlbrook, Matt, '"Lady Austin's camp boys": constituting the queer subject in 1930s London', Gender & History, 14:1 (2002) 31-61
Burke, Peter What Is Cultural History? (Cambridge, 2008)
Joyce, Patrick, 'What is the Social in Social History?', Past and Present, 206:1 (2010)
Darnton, Robert, 'Workers Revolt: The Great Cat Massacre of the Rue Saint Séverin', in History Today, 34:8 (1984) |
Additional Information
| Graduate Attributes and Skills |
Not entered |
| Keywords | HistMeth Historical Methodology |
Contacts
| Course organiser | Dr Robert Crowcroft
Tel: (0131 6)50 3764
Email: R.G.Crowcroft@ed.ac.uk |
Course secretary | Mr George Bottrell-Campbell
Tel: (0131 6)50 8349
Email: g.bottrell-campbell@ed.ac.uk |
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