Public History and Heritage

The importance of the past to contemporary society is best shown by exploring some of those instances when various organisations and individuals, politicians, journalists, local and national governments have been drawn into discussion and debate regarding the purpose, rights and responsibilities of History. From the Holocaust denial trial of David Irving (which saw professional historians called to the witness stand), to the ethics of museum curatorship in our post-colonial age, to the significance and worth of history and heritage to local and national communities, this module interrogates the value of the public past in the 21st century through revealing public controversies.  

Public History and Heritage students have a placement element to the dissertation, working with a local heritage group, a library or archive. This dissertation will be a negotiated assessment which can therefore take one of several forms: for example, a dissertation, a historical project in partnership with an outside organisation, or a product resulting from a work placement scheme (e.g. a museum).

This course provides detailed training in the methods used to record heritage and the historic environment, with the aim of equipping you with practical skills to enhance your employability in the professional heritage sector. It will focus on the process of heritage assessment and evaluation in the UK professional context, including field-recording of heritage assets, the production of industry-standard reports, and the integration of heritage decision-making into various areas of public administration.

This module will focus on developing the necessary research and writing skills needed for postgraduate study in History, suited to your chosen exit award pathway. In part one, all students will receive skills training in advanced historical research, proposal writing, and archival research. The second part of Research Methods will involve focussing on skills specific to the research interests and needs of the student.

This module will consider the origins and development of modern terrorism. The module will consider why individuals chose to join violent political groups and how they have sought to justify political violence. It will address state responses to political violence and their influence in shaping conflicts, looking particularly at the burgeoning field of critical terrorism studies. The emergence of terrorism as a global phenomenon shall be addressed, alongside disputes over the accuracy of the term.

This module provides a social, cultural, military and diplomatic political history of the ‘Friendly Invasion’ of Britain by American forces during World War II. This was the largest ever presence of foreign troops on British soil and had profound ramifications for British society and culture then and since. You will gain a detailed understanding of the shape and extent of the ‘Friendly Invasion’ and also examine the many points of cohesion and tension in the relationship.

The most important statement made by the country house is its size, form and style, both internally and externally. These communicate the wealth, status, taste and ambition of the owner and thus form an important way of understanding the motivations to build. They also impacted upon the cost and spatial organisation of the house. This module provides you with knowledge of how to “read” the language of country house architecture and decoration; an awareness of how form reflected function, and an understanding of the processes and practicalities of financing, designing and building country houses.  

This module examines key themes and sources for the study of history in a global context. You can explore an area related to your potential bracketed award so topics and subjects on offer can vary year to year.

This module will provide a case study on warfare in the medieval period. It will look at how and why war was launched, how armies were recruited and deployed, and the impact that this had in Western Europe or the Near East. By looking at a Case Study in depth, such as on the Second Crusade, the Wars of Edward I, or the Hundred Years War, you will be able to explore the ways in which medieval conflict and its outcomes defined medieval society, for the elites and increasingly for those who served them, and how it shaped the course of history.

This module looks at the changing interpretations and treatments of gender and race across a broad chronological and geographical range in order to consider how and why prejudices arose. You will examine the shift from toleration to persecution of specific racial and gendered groups and ask why some societies were more prejudicial than others. 

This module focuses on crime and disorder, authority and order, in the Victorian city (from c. 1837 to c. 1914). It draws on newspapers and periodicals, criminal records, Parliamentary Papers, fictional writing and the work of social investigators, to explore Victorian urban society. The main emphasis of the module will be on working-class communities, considering crime and policing, protest movements, leisure and rational recreation, childhood and youth, health, poverty and education; as well as exploring elite, religious and political representations of the what was often perceived as the disorderly and intractable urban working class. The module will engage with key historiographies and draw on digital sources (such as the Old Bailey Online, British Newspaper Archive and the Punch Historical Archives), as you develop your analysis and understanding of working-class lives under pressure in the Victorian city. There will be a particular focus on the cities of the North-West (Manchester and Liverpool), the latter allowing you to access and incorporate local archives as part of your study.

This module brings together elements of history, art, literature and politics to enable a thorough study of the world of the royal court in a shared European past, with a focus on the early modern period (roughly 1450 to 1800). Key concepts to be discussed include debates over the decline of the old nobility at the expense of the rise of the state; the ‘civilising nature’ of the court; the rise of diplomacy; the roles of women at court; and the importance of visual representation in the expression of power.

This module will give you an in-depth understanding of the intersections between race, class and gender in the slaveholding South. Gender has become an indispensable category of analysis in the study of slavery in the Americas, illuminating the day-to-day lives of enslaved and enslaving peoples and ideas about race and slavery. This module examines women’s lives across the south, with a sharp focus on slaveholding women and their enslaved property. It will examine the gendered division of labour, reproduction, sexuality, family life, black femininity and masculinity and white gender identities.