BA English Literature and History

In this course, we explore how some of the major ideas and intellectual movements that have shaped modern history came into being. We focus on Europe, Asia and the Americas between c. 1760-1950 to establish how ideas about freedom, society, violence, mankind, race, morality, and politics were transformed into distinctively modern ways of thinking – ways of thinking which we still rely on today.

Each week, we will be encountering epoch-defining texts and reading them directly, trying to understand how they related to the societies and cultures that produced them. Some of these texts will be by thinkers you may be familiar with, like Marx and Darwin. Some are by influential intellectuals you might not have heard of, like Burke, M.K. Gandhi or José Vasconcelos. And others will be by authors whose names might ring a bell, but whom you probably will not have read in depth, like Nietzsche or Freud. We will explore how major ideas come into being, who assembles them, and how they’re consumed, adapted or discarded.

In doing so, the course offers an exhilarating journey into key historical debates and transformative historical phenomena in this critical period in British, European and world history, as well as a unique opportunity to transform your own intellectual awareness and development, both as a student and a citizen.

This module is only available to students on History-owned programmes; and History joint honours programmes owned by other subject areas. Available to students on an Erasmus programme, subject to VSO approval.

• Develop students’ knowledge of the role of ideas in defining many of the key phenomena of modern history.
• Enable a deeper understanding of how ideas are formulated, transmitted, adapted, preserved and discarded.
• Develop an ability to read complex and challenging documents both for the ‘big picture’, and detailed analysis.
• Promote wider critical awareness of intellectual and argumentative processes, in the past and in the present, which will be invaluable both in further study, and in being a responsible citizen after university.
• Develop confidence in researching and writing clear, dynamic, precise prose.

2 x 1 hour lecture per week

1 x 1 hour seminar per week

Weekly office hours 
 

Two required readings per week (one collection of primary sources, one piece of historical scholarship), of c. 15-25 pages each, to prepare for seminars and assessed work, which will be accessed via Canvas.

One or two recommended downloadable podcasts per week, either to develop greater background knowledge, or to encounter a major scholar discussing an idea in depth.

Independent research and reading by students using the extensive holdings of the University Library, using starting-points suggested in the course reading list.

All coursework will be submitted and feedback returned via Canvas/Turnitin.  

Students will develop a deep knowledge and understanding of:

• The key ideas, concepts and movements we focus on, especially through the primary sources from the works of Rousseau, Burke, Tocqueville, Engels, Marx, Hegel, Darwin, Nietzsche, Freud, Gandhi, Vasconcelos and Emma Godman.
• The most important debates amongst scholars about how important ideas shaped, and were shaped by, the societies and cultures in which they emerged between c. 1760-1914.
• How many of our own assumptions, arguments and methods of arguing are based on (often, flawed or corrupted or unconscious) versions of these major ideas.

Upon successful completion of the course, students will be able to:

• Read, understand and critique complex texts with confidence.
• Demonstrate an understanding of some of the most impactful ideas and ways of thinking that shaped European modernity in a global context between c. 1760-19150, with particular reference to ideas about gender, race, the state, freedom, history, society, economics, the mind, morality and violence.
• Debate and discuss some of the key arguments and methods used in the history of ideas.
• Research creatively in the history of ideas and society.
• Develop convincing, coherent arguments about the interplay between ideas and society in historical context.
• Write lucid, accurate, engaging prose to explain their arguments.

This course will transform successful students’ abilities in:

• Reading long and complex texts quickly and effectively.
• Detailed critical reading, especially of shorter pieces.
• Writing critically, precisely and engagingly.

The course unit aims at enabling students to develop the following transferable skills:

• The analysis of complex issues, arguments and debates;
• The close, critical reading of documents and texts;
• The presentation of analysis, argument and independent judgment in essay form.
• The ability to turn curiosity into research, and research into well-reasoned conclusions in elegant prose.

Bay, Mia, Griffin, Farah J., Jones, Martha S. and Savage Barbara D (eds.). Toward an Intellectual

History of Black Women. (Chapel Hill, 2015)

Bayly, C.A. The Birth of the Modern World 1780-1914 (Oxford, 2004).

Burrow, J.W. The Crisis of Reason: European Thought, 1848-1914 (London, 2000).

Haddock, Bruce. A History of Political Thought (Cambridge, 2008).

Hirschmann, Nancy J. Gender, Class & Freedom in Modern Political Theory (Princeton, 2008).

Sluga, Glenda. ‘Turning International: Foundations of Modern International Thought and New Paradigms for Intellectual History’. History of European Ideas, 41.1 (2015), 103-115.

Solomon, Robert C. Continental Philosophy since 1750: the rise and fall of the self (Oxford, 1988).

Turner, Frank M. European Intellectual History from Rousseau to Nietzsche (London, 2015).

Tuition fees for home students will be £10,050 for the 2027/28 academic year. In England and Wales, tuition fees for home undergraduate students are subject to the Government fee cap, which the Government has announced will be £10,050 for the 2027/28 academic year.

Government policy is to increase the fee cap on an annual basis to reflect inflation (i.e. increasing costs), and the tuition fee home students pay in subsequent academic years will reflect any increases in the Government fee cap (which we will communicate to you as soon as we can in advance of the relevant academic year).

Tuition fees for international students will be £29,200 for the 2027/28 academic year. For subsequent academic years, the University reserves the right to increase the tuition fee by up to 7% each year, including to reflect rising costs associated with delivering our education and wider student experience.

For general information please see the undergraduate finance pages.

All students should normally be able to complete their programme of study without incurring additional study costs over and above the tuition fee for that programme. Any unavoidable additional compulsory costs totalling more than 1% of the annual home undergraduate fee per annum, regardless of whether the programme in question is undergraduate or postgraduate taught, will be made clear to you at the point of application. Further information can be found in the University's Policy on additional costs incurred by students on undergraduate and postgraduate taught programmes (PDF document, 91KB).

• Find out more from student finance
• Eligible UK students can apply for bursaries and scholarships
• Funding for EU and international students is on our country-specific pages
• Many students work part-time or complete a student internship