Unit information: Conflict and Community in 2019/20

Unit name	Conflict and Community
Unit code	HIST20118
Credit points	20
Level of study	I/5
Teaching block(s)	Teaching Block 1 (weeks 1 - 12)
Unit director	Professor. Smith
Open unit status	Not open
Pre-requisites	None
Co-requisites	None
School/department	Department of History (Historical Studies)
Faculty	Faculty of Arts

Description including Unit Aims

This unit will explore different types of community in the medieval world. It will consider how collective identities were created and sustained, and how individuals saw themselves, especially when they were members of more than one group. Particular attention will be paid to the processes by which communities came into being, to changing patterns of conflict and cooperation, and to the conceptual frameworks within which medieval people understood communal identities. The terms and models used by historians to understand communities and identities will also be assessed. Specific topics are likely to include: gendered identities; kingdoms and nations; frontier communities; aristocratic identities; urban communities; religious identities; monastic orders; rural communities; transnational networks; intellectuals.

Intended Learning Outcomes

Successful students will be able to:

1. Explain how collective identities were created and sustained in different types of community in the medieval world;
2. Respond critically to the terms and approaches used by historians to analyse communities and identities;
3. Discuss and evaluate the key historiographical debates surrounding the topics;
4. Understand and interpret primary sources and select pertinent evidence in order to illustrate specific and more general historical points;
5. Present research and judgements in written forms and styles appropriate to the discipline and to level I.
6. Demonstrate skills in oral presentation appropriate to level I.

Teaching Information

Weekly:

1 x two-hour lecture

1 x one-hour seminar

Assessment Information

1 x 10-minute presentation (25%) [ILOs 1, 6]

1 x 2-hour exam (75%) [ILOs 1-5]

Reading and References

Nancy Caciola, Discerning Spirits: Divine 'and' Demonic Possession in the Middle Ages (Ithaca, N.Y. 2003)

Barbara Harvey, Living 'and' 'Dying in England 1100-1540: The Monastic Experience (Oxford, 1993)

Sarah Lambert and Helen Nicholson, eds., Languages of Love 'and' 'Hate: Conflict, Communication and' Identity in the Medieval Mediterranean (Turnhout: Brepols, 2012)

David Nirenberg, Communities of Violence: Persecution of Minorities in the Middle Ages (Princeton, 1996)

Susan Reynolds, Kingdoms and Communities in Western Europe 900-1300 (Oxford, second edition, 1997)

Phillipp R. Schofield, Peasant 'and' Community in Medieval England 1200-1500 (Basingstoke, 2003)