CODE | HST2011 | ||||||||
TITLE | The Practice of History | ||||||||
UM LEVEL | 02 - Years 2, 3 in Modular Undergraduate Course | ||||||||
MQF LEVEL | 5 | ||||||||
ECTS CREDITS | 2 | ||||||||
DEPARTMENT | History | ||||||||
DESCRIPTION | This study-unit will guide students through the process of acquiring the knowledge, skills and methods necessary in the study of History. This module will look at historical methodology, the exploration of historical records, and the analysis of different types of sources. It aims to help students develop a practical understanding of key approaches and methods in historical studies. This will include a familiarisation with libraries, archives and electronic resources, and an emphasis on effective academic writing. Study-unit Aims: - To offer students insights into the study of history as a discipline; - To highlight developments in historiographical studies; - To make students aware of debates within history, and historical-related fields, about the nature of the subject; - To equip students with the required practical and intellectual skills to process sources, think critically and write as historians at undergraduate level; - To encourage students to reflect about the nature of the historical discipline, its epistemological claims, and why historians do what they do in the way they do it; - To introduce students to the department’s guidelines for academic writing. Learning Outcomes 1. Knowledge & Understanding By the end of the study-unit the student will be able to: - demonstrate the ability to undertake research with the aim of addressing a particular question, or problem, relating to a variety of historiographical approaches; - master the ability to communicate their analysis of historical sources accurately and appropriately, using coherent and well-structured arguments, and utilising historical methodologies and approaches; - grasp knowledge of the conceptual, practical and intellectual principles in the discipline of history that they will build upon during the remainder of their degree; - use and understand a wide variety of historical methods, schools and genres that will increase their understanding of the discipline and the historian’s relation to it; - identify and use a range of historical sources (both primary and secondary) to help promote critical thinking and analytical awareness. 2. Skills By the end of the study-unit the student will be able to: - analyse methodological pluralism within the field of History; - navigate through a number of theories relevant to writing History; - conduct academic research from primary and secondary sources from libraries and electronic resources; - develop an argument and keep track record of references to be inputted properly in the research; - analyse data, synthesise arguments and integrate findings properly in academic writing; - formulate research questions for a project. Main Text/s and any supplementary readings: Core Readings: - Ann Williams and Roger Vella Bonavita (eds.), Maltese History: What Future? (Msida, 1971). - Emanuel Buttigieg and Simone Azzopardi, ‘Outlines of Maltese History and Ġrajjet Malta: An Analysis of Representations of Colonialism in Maltese History Textbooks’, Melita Historica, 17:1, (2017). - Edward H. Carr, What is history? (Vintage Books, 1961). - Georg Iggers, 'The History and Meaning of the Term "Historicism"', Journal of the History of Ideas, 56, (1995). - Joan W. Scott, "Gender: A Useful Category of Historical Analysis," American Historical Review, 91 (Dec 1986). - Keith Jenkins (ed), The Postmodern History Reader, (Routledge, 1997). - Michael Bentley (ed), Companion to Historiography, (Routledge, 1997). - Patrick Joyce, 'What is the Social in Social History?', Past and Present, 206:1 (2010). - Peter Burke, What Is Cultural History? (Cambridge, 2019). - Peter N. Miller, History and its Objects: Antiquarianism and Material Culture since 1500 (2017). - Simon Gunn, (ed), History and Cultural Theory (Longmans, 2006). - William Lamont (ed), Historical Controversies and Historians, (University College London Press, 1998). Supplementary Readings: - Benedict Anderson, 'Introduction', Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism (London, 1991). - Eric Hobsbawm and Terence Ranger, The Invention of Tradition, (Cambridge University Press, 2012 edition). - Dane Kennedy, ‘Postcolonialism and History’ in G. Huggan (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Postcolonial Studies, (Oxford University Press, 2013). - Fernand Braudel, 'History and the Social Sciences: La Longue Durée', tr. Sarah Matthews, On History, (Chicago, 1980). - Florike Egmond and Peter Mason, The Mammoth and the Mouse: Microhistory and Morphology (1997). - Peregrine Horden and Sharon Kinoshita, (eds.), A Companion to Mediterranean History, (2014). - John H. Arnold, History: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford University Press, 2000). - Matt Houlbrook, '"Lady Austin's camp boys": constituting the queer subject in 1930s London', Gender & History, 14:1, (2002). - Max Jones, 'What Should Historians Do with Heroes? Reflections on Nineteenth- and Twentieth century Britain', History Compass, 5:2, (2007). - Faye Sayer, Public History: A Practical Guide (Bloomsbury, 2015). - Simon Gunn & Lucy Faire (eds), Research Methods for History (Edinburgh, 2011). |
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ADDITIONAL NOTES | This study-unit is offered only to History/EGH students. | ||||||||
STUDY-UNIT TYPE | Lecture | ||||||||
METHOD OF ASSESSMENT |
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LECTURER/S | Charlie Abela Simone Azzopardi Emanuel Buttigieg Charles Farrugia Dominic Fenech Dennis Mizzi Valeria Vanesio |
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The University makes every effort to ensure that the published Courses Plans, Programmes of Study and Study-Unit information are complete and up-to-date at the time of publication. The University reserves the right to make changes in case errors are detected after publication.
The availability of optional units may be subject to timetabling constraints. Units not attracting a sufficient number of registrations may be withdrawn without notice. It should be noted that all the information in the description above applies to study-units available during the academic year 2024/5. It may be subject to change in subsequent years. |