Crisis, What Crisis The West, c.1970-2000
| Code | School | Level | Credits | Semesters |
| HIST3128 | History | 3 | 20 | Spring UK |
- Code
- HIST3128
- School
- History
- Level
- 3
- Credits
- 20
- Semesters
- Spring UK
Summary
In the historiography, the 1970s and 1980s are often referred to as a ‘landslide’ (E. Hobsbawm) or a ‘time of troubles’ (A. Marwick) for the West. At the same time, historical scholarship is only just beginning to make inroads into a field that has been extensively documented by cultural critics, the media and the social sciences. The module will engage critically with the dominant conceptualisation of the 1970s and 1980s as ‘crisis decades’ and ask about the contribution that historians can make to our understanding of the period. The module will also look beyond the 1970s and 1980s to cover the 1990s – a decade that historians are only just beginning to explore seriously.
While the broader frame of reference for the module is ‘the West’, for practical reasons we shall focus on the UK, the FRG and the US in the first instance. Taking thematic approaches, we shall explore economic, social and cultural change in a period that, according to some scholars, marks a decisive turning point in the history of the twentieth century. We shall analyse topics including:
• social change, with special emphasis on the class structure;
• the disintegration of ‘consensus politics and the rise of the New Right;
• liberalisation, new social movements and cultural politics;
• domestic terrorism, the public and the state;
• heritage, memory and nostalgia;
• the emergence of a new world order in the aftermath of the collapse of Communism;
• New Labour.
Target Students
Third-Year finalist Single Honours and Joint Honours Students in History. Available to Liberal Arts students.
Classes
- One 2-hour seminar each week for 10 weeks
- One 1-hour lecture each week for 10 weeks
Students will be instructed via a series of lectures and seminars
Assessment
- 50% Coursework 1: Essay 3,000 words.
- 50% Coursework 2: Primary source analysis 3,000 words.
Assessed by end of spring semester
Educational Aims
By the end of the academic year, students should have acquired deepened knowledge and understanding of:the role of the discipline of contemporary history in exploring the recent past;the comparative method in the study of history;the body of secondary literature addressing and interpreting the subject, and the variety of approaches and conclusions it has taken;a diverse body of primary texts, spanning government records, ego-documents, social science literature, fiction, popular music and feature films;an understanding of how the 1970s and 1980s (and 1990s) helped to shape the present.Learning Outcomes
Intellectual skills:
By the end of the module students should be able to:
- engage with key problems in interpreting the sources;
- assess and evaluate competing interpretations put forward by historians;
- construct coherent arguments about the subject matter.
Professional and practical skills
The module will develop students’ ability to:
- analyse information and arguments from a wide range of secondary and primary sources;
- Plan, research and write a sustained piece of historical research;
- use IT to access sources and complete written assignments.
Transferable skills
Finally, the module will help students to develop their ability to:
- work effectively in collaboration with other students to research primary and secondary sources;
- manage large and often incomplete bodies of information;
- develop oral and written communication skills;
- improve IT skills in word processing.
Conveners
- Dr Joerg Arnold