Course Details in 2024/25 Session

Module Title	LI Public History
School	History and Cultures
Department	History
Module Code	09 30693
Module Lead	Dr Kate Smith
Level	Intermediate Level
Credits	20
Semester	Semester 1
Pre-requisites
Co-requisites
Restrictions	None
Contact Hours	Lecture-20 hours Seminar-10 hours Guided independent study-170 hours Total: 200 hours
Exclusions
Description	This module provides students with the opportunity to reflect on what it has meant (and still means) to do history in public, from the medieval world to the present day. It explores how the process of turning the past into history has been shaped by the competing demands of politics and profit, education and entertainment, nation-building and self-fashioning. Ranging across periods and places, it moves beyond chronicles and academic histories to consider the many ways in which history has been made in public. Films, folk tales, and family trees, music, museum exhibitions, and personal memories, rituals and performance, pedagogy and printing will analysed to this end. Delivery will be through a mixture of staff lectures and seminar. Topics covered might include: TV or film representations of particular historical periods or phenomena; ‘Nations and Their Others’; ‘Historical Fictions’, ‘Genealogies – then and now’, ‘Teaching History’, ‘Hidden Histories; ‘History in the News’, ‘History in the Classroom’, ‘History in the City’, or ‘History on Display’. Students will be provided with skills training relevant to the process of producing the various forms of output. These tasks will be assessed against the specific marking criteria for assessing student blogs etc. that are already available on the History in Public handbook/Canvas site.
Learning Outcomes	By the end of the module students should be able to: analyse and reflect the position of history within public life, and demonstrate an informed awareness of the extent and variety of forms in which different types of history are made available to different audiences. reflect on the changing relationship between diverse forms of history making and public life from the medieval period to the present. assess what is at stake in public controversies and debates about the representation of the past – including, for example, remembrance and commemoration, films and historical novels, and school curricula. using appropriate technologies to produce a piece of public history by writing a blog post to widen public understanding of a historical topic. demonstrate skills including written communication.
Assessment	30693-04 : 1,000 word essay : Coursework (30%) 30693-05 : 2,000 word essay : Coursework (70%)
Assessment Methods & Exceptions	Assessment: 1 x 1,000-word essay (30%); 1 x 2,000-word essay (70%) Reassessment: Resubmission of failed component(s)
Other
Reading List