Ours is a world that seems to be shaking at its very foundations. Ideas that have shaped the way we see ourselves and the world around us – ideas like democracy, free speech, citizenship, political authority, individualism, free markets, and human rights – are contested at every turn. These ideas took their definitive modern form during a period of political and intellectual upheaval known as the Enlightenment (ca. 1650-1800). If we want to navigate our way through the chaos of today, then we need to return to the roots of our contemporary world – the Enlightenment. This interdisciplinary module explores this revolutionary period so that we can better understand our world today and bring about the world we want tomorrow. We will focus on political revolutions, on societal inequality, sickness, and control, and the dark side of technology. Graduating students often rank it among the most useful modules they've taken.

Ours is a world that seems to be shaking at its very foundations. Ideas that have shaped the way we see ourselves and the world around us – ideas like democracy, free speech, citizenship, political authority, individualism, free markets, and human rights – are contested at every turn. These ideas took their definitive modern form during a period of political and intellectual upheaval known as the Enlightenment (ca. 1650-1800). If we want to navigate our way through the chaos of today, then we need to return to the roots of our contemporary world – the Enlightenment. This interdisciplinary module explores this revolutionary period so that we can better understand our world today and bring about the world we want tomorrow. We will focus on debates surrounding knowledge, censorship and freedom of speech, the state of nature of the scope of political authority, and colonialism. Graduating students often rank it among the most useful modules they've taken.

What is “Politics”? How have people conceived of political analysis, the state, laws, wars and political parties, across cultures and over time? Gain an understanding of essential concepts in the study of politics and explore the economic, social and intellectual trends that have made democracy possible.

What is “Politics”? How have people conceived of political analysis, the state, laws, wars and political parties, across cultures and over time? Gain an understanding of essential concepts in the study of politics and explore the economic, social and intellectual trends that have made democracy possible.

American politics have long dominated the global stage; these are crucial times for the study of the United States. Discuss policymaking and contemporary political events in order to gain a basic introduction to the politics and government of the United States.

Why do we grow up knowing some histories, and not others? The histories taught in schools and discussed in the public realm often tell us about the past experiences of dominant groups – and the fact that these histories are so prominent also tells us that those groups still hold power. Approaching the past from the perspective of those ‘hidden from history’, this module uncovers ideas and experiences often overlooked in traditional accounts of modern Britain. Hidden Histories begins in the revolutionary years of the mid-seventeenth century to examine how radicals questioned dominant ideas about democratic rights and property ownership. It traces the influence of these radicals through to Chartism and Owenism, movements forged in the crucible of industrial capitalism in the nineteenth century. These revolutionaries and radical movements highlighted power imbalances between men and women, in the family and the private sphere as well as in the public. As Britain reached the height of its imperial power, hierarchies of “race”, class, and gender increasingly structured elite discourse. In exploring how the working class, women, and migrants created their own vibrant cultures, the module emphasises histories of protest, resistance, and liberation – and shows that these hidden histories are essential to understanding modern Britain.

What are human rights? How do we protect them? And what challenges do we face when promoting human rights on an international level? Discover the fundamental principles and practices, including topics related to international law and ethics, which underpin the protection and promotion of our human rights.

In this module, we will introduce you the theories of translation and interpreting, placing and emphasis on theories that explicitly address the intercultural component of translation and interpreting, i.e. understanding translation and interpreting as a form a intercultural communication. An emphasis will also be placed on the selection of materials that will feature a wide range of genres. This is because cultural differences may manifest differently across a variety of text types, for example, literature texts or diplomatic statements. By learning about the cultural background of the material selected, students are encourages to engage in a critical decision-making activity where they are challenged to navigate the nuances across cultural meanings and find the most suitable translation solutions. This module takes you a step further and encourages you to not just be translators or interpreters but intercultural mediators. To this end, text analysis, paraphrasing, condensation and summarising exercises, together with production of oral speeches, presentations (speaking in public) and short essays writing will constitute part of the module content and assessment. These tasks will also improve both language fluency and accuracy. Lectures are dedicated to the introduction of translation and interpreting theory. Seminars are language-specific and dedicated to the practice of translation and interpreting.

This module is for students with little or no knowledge of French. It is an interactive and intensive language module which uses various strategies for fast paced progress through the French language. It explores both the communicative and the structural aspects of the French language.

Continuing on from French Intensive Initial 1, this is an interactive and intensive language module for those who have little or no knowledge of French. It explores both the communicative and the structural aspects of the French language.

Want to develop your French comprehension? Improve your spoken and written language skills? Sharpen your grammatical accuracy? Make use of a range of materials to further advance your language abilities, building coherent and cohesive skills for both speaking and writing in French.

Want to build your confidence when both speaking and writing in French? Develop your university-level French language skills, improving your aural comprehension while boosting your grammar knowledge and vocabulary. Learn to appreciate, summarise and evaluate a piece of text. Expand your understanding of French culture and society.

This module is intended for students of all departments with an outside option in their course structure, leading from no knowledge in German to a level equivalent to CEFR A1. You will acquire fundamental language skills in German alongside a specific focus on professional skills such as summarising and reporting, filtering written and spoken material for essentials, business communication, giving simple professional oral presentations in German. You will develop an understanding of the working environment and cultural background in German speaking countries. You will obtain the tools to enhance your employability via transferable skills, work on sample cover letters for applications and your CV in German and your German LinkedIn profile. You will have the opportunity (optional) to plan, report and reflect on work related experience, as part of your portfolio assessment. This will be in collaboration with the Placement Team.

Want to learn German from scratch? Study the German language from basic to advanced level, so that you can communicate in complex situations and read extended texts, like newspaper articles. Learn how to give short talks or presentations in German and be able to write German coherently.

Want to learn German from scratch? Study the German language from basic to advanced level, so that you can communicate in complex situations and read extended texts, like newspaper articles. Learn how to give short talks or presentations in German and be able to write German coherently.

Want to develop your German comprehension? Improve your spoken and written language skills? Sharpen your grammatical accuracy? Learn to master complex situations in German and how to deal with extended texts, like newspaper articles. Advance your language abilities, building coherent and cohesive skills for both speaking and writing in German.

Want to build your confidence when both speaking and writing in German? Develop your university-level German language skills so that you are fairly fluent with the ability understand spoken and written work. Be able to express yourself orally and in writing on demanding topics that face modern Germany.

Have you knowledge of French, Spanish, Italian or Romanian? Do you want to speak Portuguese too? Develop advanced written, aural/oral and reading skills, as well as build your knowledge of Brazilian/Portuguese culture and society. Learn to understand short texts, be able to write letters and interact in everyday situations in Portuguese.

Want to build your confidence when both speaking and writing in Portuguese? Develop your language abilities, expanding your vocabulary and improving your listening and oral skills. Expand your understanding of the Portuguese-speaking culture and history through the use of texts, films and online resources.

To whom do you say “¿Cómo estás?” And to whom do you say “¿Cómo están?” Gain the basic linguistic skills to enjoy a visit to Spain. Learn the dialogue, structures and tenses needed for everyday situations, and develop the writing skills required for short messages.

Want to improve your Spanish? Need a chance to focus on difficult areas of Spanish for English speakers? Further your language abilities by undertaking practice of oral skills. Learn to produce written work in Spanish. Expand your Spanish so that you can incorporate more sophisticated structure in your communication.

Want to learn Spanish from scratch? And spend four weeks abroad during the summer? Build your language abilities, so you can read short stories or novels in Spanish, as well as articulate your ideas verbally or in writing. Undertake a research project, in Spanish, on a topic of your choosing.

Want to learn Spanish from scratch? And spend four weeks abroad during the summer? Build your language abilities, so you can read short stories or novels in Spanish, as well as articulate your ideas verbally or in writing. Undertake a research project, in Spanish, on a topic of your choosing.

Want to develop your Spanish comprehension? Improve your spoken and written language skills? Sharpen your grammatical accuracy? Study topics related to Hispanic culture, starting with text to improve vocabulary and grammar, then undertaking related listening and speaking activities. Build coherent and cohesive skills for both speaking and writing in Spanish.

Want to build your confidence when both speaking and writing in Spanish? Develop your language abilities, expanding your vocabulary and improving your listening and oral skills. Expand your understanding of Spanish and Latin American culture and history through the use of texts, films and conversations with native speakers.

Want to learn Italian from scratch? Reach A-level Italian standard, gaining understanding of Italian language structure and functions. Take part in a variety of class activities, including individual and group work, to build your Italian communication skills.

Want to learn Italian from scratch? Reach A-level Italian standard, gaining understanding of Italian language structure and functions. Take part in a variety of class activities, including individual and group work, to build your Italian communication skills.

Want to develop your Italian comprehension? Improve your spoken and listening language skills? Be able to communicate effectively with native speakers? Study a range of topics and a variety of texts to build your spoken Italian and reading abilities.

Want to build your confidence when both speaking and writing in Italian? Develop your language abilities, expanding your vocabulary and improving your listening and oral skills. Improve your Italian understanding through reading, analysing and discussing topics in class. Build your awareness of spoken Italian through activities in our multimedia lab.

This is an interactive, intensive language module using blended-learning strategies to allow fast-paced progress through the Mandarin Chinese language and Mandarin Chinese speaking world. There is a dual focus on communicative and structural aspects of the language. Language learning is supported by an online guided independent study program and extended by multimedia activities. The module is designed for students with no or little knowledge of Mandarin Chinese. The aim of the module, in correlation with Intensive Initial Mandarin Chinese 2 in the Spring Term, is to enable students to attain a level of Mandarin Chinese equivalent to an A1/A2 level. It is the compulsory path for those students with no knowledge of Mandarin Chinese who intend to take the study of the language to a Higher Intermediate/Advanced level in their second/final year of study. This module can also be taken as an outside option.

This is an interactive, intensive language module using blended-learning strategies to allow fast-paced progress through the Mandarin Chinese language and Mandarin Chinese speaking world. It is a reinforcement and continuation of LA921, Intensive Initial Mandarin Chinese 1. It is a practical module which makes use of a wide range of authentic materials depicting real-life situations and activities. The aim of the module is to enable students to attain a level of Mandarin Chinese equivalent to an A1/A2 level. It is the compulsory path for those students with no knowledge of Mandarin Chinese who intend to take the study of the language to a Higher Intermediate/Advanced level in their second/final year. This module can also be taken as an outside option.

This is an interactive, intensive language module using blended-learning strategies to allow fast-faced progress through the Mandarin Chinese language and Mandarin Chinese speaking world. It is a reinforcement and continuation of LA922, Intensive Initial Mandarin Chinese 2. It is a practical module which makes use of a wide range of textbook and online materials depicting real-life situations and activities. The aim of this module is to enable students to attain a level of Mandarin Chinese equivalent to a B1/B2 level. It is the compulsory path for those students with initial preliminary knowledge of Mandarin Chinese who intend to take the study of the language to a Higher Intermediate/Advanced level in their second/final year. This module can also be taken as an outside option.

What is US literature? What makes it different from other writing in the English language, particularly work from the UK? Study classic texts that have established US literature as a distinct tradition in itself and gain an understanding of the issues surrounding this.

In this module you will explore childhood from a local and a global perspective. You will discover a broad range of topics related to children and childhood, including psychology, sociology, history, media, law and education.

Discover how the discipline of psychology informs and shapes five psychological professions: clinical psychology; educational psychology; forensic psychology; occupational psychology; and sports and exercise psychology. In a mixture of lectures and classes, you will evaluate how psychological theories and knowledge gained from research are used in each of these aspects of human behaviour, and how they can be used to solve some of the problems encountered in different areas of life.

This module encourages students to reflect on what kind of knowers they want to be and what kind of knowledge community they want to belong to. We begin by considering why we possess the concept of knowledge at all. What good is it? What does it do for us? We will then explore some recent work in social epistemology, reflecting on how knowledge is an interpersonal phenomenon, focusing on the phenomena of echo chambers, epistemic injustice, and the role of trust in our knowledge practices. Next, we turn to work in political epistemology, looking at how politics shapes knowledge production and vice versa; we will focus in particular here on propaganda and belief polarization. Finally, we turn our attention to virtue and vice epistemology, which study the so-called virtues and vices of the mind. We will discuss important epistemic virtues that can help us flourish as knowers, e.g., self-reflection and intellectual perseverance; and we will also read about epistemic vices that undermine our capacity to acquire knowledge, e.g., closed-mindedness and dogmatism. By the end of the module, students will better understand how individual, social, and political factors interact in the human pursuit of knowledge.

In this module, you will explore ethical challenges from today's world (such as how to treat animals, the climate emergency, or making decisions about who should be prioritised in allocating medical resources). You will also explore ethical theories as tools for navigating these challenges. Shall we look to the consequences of our actions for orientation? Or to constraints on the means we take as agents? Or might we fare better by considering character dispositions and taking our cue from exemplars? And what methods do we have at our disposal to decide between these alternatives? Is there such a thing as ethics anyway? Or are there just personal opinions and everything is relative?

City space matters to criminology: it is the physical and symbolic locus where crime and disorder take place, where social conflicts manifest and aggravate, where social control and resistance to it are exercised, and where broader harms and suffering are produced. This module examines local responses to the governance of crime, seeking to understand conceptions of urban ‘disorder’ by attending closely to how communities experience rapidly changing and expanding city environments. The course contrasts public experiences of crime and crime control in the context of highly securitised, enclaved, and surveilled urban spaces in London, Karachi, Maputo and other unequal global cities. Drawing on theories and methodologies from criminology, sociology, and urban studies, the course asks you to consider the possible futures of public and private urban landscapes in the context of rapid urban development.

Does the media make people violent? Objectify women? Tell you what to do? Study the modern media as a social terrain, order of communication and domain of ideas, using examples from cinema, photography, newspapers and TV. Examine popular debates and consider practical methodologies for undertaking media research in the future.

This module provides a broad overview of the foundations of medical sociology. The module begins in autumn term by situating medicine in the social world and providing an overview of historical context and the development of current health theories. We chart the emergence of medical sociology as a distinct sub-discipline and outline key contributions in the anthropology of health and medicine. We will then consider various theories, conceptual paradigms and frameworks for understanding the social dimensions of health, illness and the sociological aspects of the relationships between bodies and minds. We then address other topics such as global health, the influence of culture on health, complementary medicine and ethics in social health research. In spring term, we begin with a discussion of how health inequalities are created and perpetuated throughout the life course. We then take a closer look at specific health inequalities introducing concepts such as cumulative disadvantage, and the associations between health inequalities and social characteristics such as class, race, and gender. We also discuss environmental inequalities.

Who were the key sociologists studying the United States? And how have issues like democracy, inequality, gender roles, poverty, gangs and guns become sources of enchantment and disenchantment in the US? Studying one sociologist per week, we explore important and exciting interpretations of American society.