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Course details

Students take two historical training modules, one special project module, and then complete a supervised dissertation of 15,000 words.

Specific training in the use of documentary and other sources is included in Module 1, while skills training in other areas (eg. databases, palaeography, quantification) is delivered through the IHR's many dedicated training courses.

Module 1. Historical Training: Methods and approaches to historical research

The module will introduce students to advanced historical studies. It will focus on providing students with practical historical skills and a practical understanding of different historical approaches and methods. It will offer students and introduction to the theoretical basis of historical approaches and offer the opportunity to explore how related disciplines (such archaeology, anthropology, sociology and political science) have helped historians adopt new approaches to the past.Westminster

Topics will include:

• Sources and their interpretation
• Quantitative skills and the use of statistics
• Research and writing techniques
• The nature of historiographical development
• Skills in comparative history
• Theories of history
• History and interdisciplinary
• History, modernity and postmodernity
• The politics of history

The course will be taught through two-hour lectures and seminars over a period of 15 weeks. It will be assessed by two 2,500 word written exercises, one of which may have an oral component.

Module 2. History in Context: Cities, States and Localities in History

This module will introduce students to the historiography of cities, states and localities from the medieval period to the twentieth century. Students will examine the ways in which historians have interpreted the development of modern culture and society and their use of sources in historical research. The history of Britain, London and southern England will be used as the test-bed for these issues, but students will also be encouraged, where possible, to adopt a national and international comparative perspective. The course will help to provide students with a robust historiographical and methodological framework for their own studies, equipping them with the intellectual toolkit for their own independent work. Some of the key themes will be:

• Landscape and human settlement: rural, suburban, urban and metropolitan; dynamics of change
• The idea of the metropolis in history, and its historiography
• The nature of regions and regional cultures
• Cities and colonies, imperialism and hinterland
• Lordship, politics and government
• Networks of trade and manufacture
• Class and class consciousness
• Migration, ethnicity and identities
• Cities, states and regions in European comparative perspective
• The uses of topographical, archaeological and architectural evidence
• The interpretative politics of historical sources

Teaching will be delivered through 15 two-hour classes, shared between staff of the CMH and VCH, augmented where appropriate by lectures, visits to archives and field trips. Students will be required to make presentations based on the topics covered by the module. Assessment will be through one 5,000-word assignment.

Module 3. Option Module

The special project is an original extended assignment based around the individual student’s particular area of interest. It requires students to show that they can analyse primary source material in an effective and convincing way and place it in context to throw new light on a specific historical problem or controversy. The project may focus on a particular historical event or how a particular cultural activity (such as an exhibition, film or play) has interpreted such an event. Students will not be required to attend formal weekly classes but they will attend group discussions on the practical application of historical methods and at least four supervisory sessions. The project will be assessed by a 5,000 word report.

Module 4. Supervised Dissertation (15,000 words)

This will be on a topic of the student's choice, agreed with the Course Director, to be completed by 30 September of the first year of enrolment (full-time) or second year of enrolment (part-time).

2009-10 MA Student Handbook

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