This module puts European history in its place. An abiding theme of European world histories written between the eighteenth and the late twentieth century has been the West's unique rise to global pre-eminence through a range of diverse but interlinked processes that might collectively be called modernization. This historiographical assumption of a peculiarly 'European' modernity, and the dominant concepts and frameworks within which historians have characterized it, has left two significant areas of human history - medieval Europe and the non-West - out in the cold, the former seen as backward and contributing little to the story, the latter seen as the passive subject of Western political and economic dynamism and/ or, as the exoticized 'Other'.
Learning Outcomes
By the end of the module students should be able to:
analyse and critically appraise key events and historical processes relevant to the subject under scrutiny
analyse and critically evaluate a wide range of relevant primary source material
critically evaluate the historiographical context and trends of the subject under exploration
summarise, synthesise and evaluate the subject material in a sophisticated written form
