BSc Management (Marketing) / Course details

Year of entry: 2021

View tabs
View full page

Coronavirus information for applicants and offer-holders

We understand that prospective students and offer-holders may have concerns about the ongoing coronavirus outbreak. The University is following the advice from Universities UK, Public Health England and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office.

Read our latest coronavirus information

Course unit details:
Madness and Society in the Modern Age

Unit code	UCIL30832
Credit rating	10
Unit level	Level 3
Teaching period(s)	Semester 2
Offered by	Centre for History of Science, Technology & Medicine (L5)
Available as a free choice unit?	Yes

Overview

This unit introduces you to the social, cultural, intellectual and institutional history of madness, psychiatry and mental health. Through lectures, interactive workshops and reading a combination of primary sources and secondary analyses, you will gain an appreciation of:

How madness has been understood, by experts and by everyday people
How madness has been managed, socially and institutionally
How science, medicine, and culture interact in shaping responses to madness

Our focus is primarily on the period 1780 to the present, and primarily on the UK, but with some discussion of Western Europe and North America.

Aims

This unit explores the history of madness and psychiatry from the late eighteenth century to the present. It examines how insanity has been understood, treated, and represented within larger social, cultural, and intellectual frameworks. It also relates changing ideas and approaches to mental illness, health, and functioning to larger questions in the history of the medical and biological sciences.

Learning outcomes

On successful completion of the unit, you will be able to:

Identify historical approaches to medical thinking and practice
Describe how approaches to madness changed from 1780 onwards, including changing definitions of both mental health and insanity
Analyse historians' arguments, through exploration of primary sources and historical data
Contribute to informed group discussions and debate, including presenting your own arguments effectively
Write a short, structured report/essay combining a range of viewpoints

Syllabus

Topics covered in previous years:

The Birth of the Asylum
The Expansion of the Asylum
Theorising Insanity: Minds and Bodies
Gender, Madness and Society
Race, Madness and Colonial Psychiatry
Freud, Psychoanalysis and Culture
Shell Shock, Psychiatry and War
The Normal and the Difficult Child
The Psychiatrisation of Everyday Life

Teaching and learning methods

12 x 1 hour lectures

12 x 1 hour workshop seminars

Independent study

Employability skills

Analytical skills: Essays and workshop discussions require research and analysis of information
Group/team working: Weekly workshop seminars require students to work and discuss together in small groups
Research: Students expected to engage in their own independent research for essays

Assessment methods

Essay (50%) and 2 hour examination (50%)

Feedback methods

Students will receive individual feedback on all of their written assignments as well as general feedback given to the whole class.

Study hours

Scheduled activity hours
Assessment written exam	2
Lectures	12
Seminars	12

Independent study hours
Independent study	74

Teaching staff

Staff member	Role
Carsten Timmermann	Unit coordinator

Additional notes

Madness and Society is offered through the Centre for the History of Science, Technology and Medicine http://www.chstm.manchester.ac.uk/

Return to course details