Unit information: Cities in 2018/19

Unit name	Cities
Unit code	HIST10047
Credit points	20
Level of study	C/4
Teaching block(s)	Teaching Block 2 (weeks 13 - 24)
Unit director	Dr. Hanna
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

We now live in a world where the majority of people live in cities. Urbanization is recognized as a key driver of social and cultural change: the urban environment not only creates problems but also offers opportunities for societies across the globe. The unit explores key and dynamic themes via the methods and historiography of urban history, and will help make sense of the cities in which we live and visit.

Focusing on the history of cities across a broad geographical and chronological range, this unit will explore the historiography of urban history and will offer ways of understanding the cities in which we live and those we visit. The unit will consider examples of cities from the medieval to the modern period in order to highlight both the commonalities of the urban past and the distinctiveness of particular places. The lectures will focus on cities that epitomise trends and narratives of urbanization. These will vary from year to year, but will typically include: Shanghai, Delhi, Singapore, London, Paris, Rome, Jerusalem, Baghdad, Chicago, and New York. Weekly topics might include: urbanization in history; urban economics; urban environments; religion and the city; governance; consumption; colonialism; sex and vice; and cities of the past and of the future.

Intended Learning Outcomes

On successful completion of this unit, students will be able to:

1. Identify and analyse key themes in the history of cities in various contexts
2. Discuss and evaluate the historiographical debates that surround the topic
3. Interpret primary sources and select pertinent evidence in order to illustrate specific and more general historical points
4. Present their research and judgements in written forms and styles appropriate to the discipline and to level C.
5. Employ historical methods specific to the study of cities.

Teaching Information

Weekly:

2 x one-hour lecture
1 x one-hour workshop
1 x one-hour seminar

Assessment Information

One summative essay (50%) (3000 words) [1-5]
One two-hour exam (50%) [1-5]

Reading and References

Peter Hall, World Cities (London, 1970)
Peter Hall, Cities in Civilization (London, 1998)
Judith Walkowitz, City of Dreadful Delight
William Cronon, Nature’s Metropolis (Chicago, 1992)
Christopher Klemek, The Transatlantic Collapse of Urban Renewal: Postwar Urbanism from Chicago to Berlin (Chicago 2011)
Marshall Bermann, All that is Solid Melts into Air (New York, 1982)
Anthony King, Colonial Urban Development (London, 2010)