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| Unit name |
Political Economy 3 |
| Unit code |
GEOG36000 |
| Credit points |
20 |
| Level of study |
H/6
|
| Teaching block(s) |
Teaching Block 2 (weeks 13 - 24)
|
| Unit director |
. Fannin |
| Open unit status |
Not open |
| Pre-requisites |
All units in Single Honours Geography Year 2C |
| Co-requisites |
Year 3 Human Geography units |
| School/department |
School of Geographical Sciences |
| Faculty |
Faculty of Science |
Description including Unit Aims
This final-year unit will focus on advanced topics in feminist and critical theoretical approaches to the geographies of political economy. The unit will introduce and review key theoretical and empirical research on political economy and the contributions of geographical thinking to analysis of the spaces and times of historical and contemporary capitalist economic formations. The unit will develop students' ability to draw on relevant conceptual vocabularies in feminist, Marxist, post-structural, post-colonial and new materialist thinking in both geography and other social science disciplines, including: labour, work, consumption, class, production, social reproduction, value, the body and the self. Lecture topics include the usefulness of sex and gender as analytical categories in geographical analysis, the significance of service sector work in post-industrial economies, transnational labour migration, the rise of creative labour as the model for other forms of work, and new forms of embodied or 'clinical' labour in the biosciences.
The unit aims to introduce students to contemporary theoretical and empirical debates in political economic geography, specifically in the areas of gender and labour. The unit also aims to help students develop the ability to pose purposeful questions within these debates and to cultivate intellectual curiosity about their context. It provides an extension to the political economic geography principles and perspectives outlined in the Year 2 unit Political Economy 2: State, Economy and Society through research-orientated case studies that detail the social processes, structures and causes underlying capitalist development.
Intended Learning Outcomes
Learning objectives:
- To (further) develop an awareness of the benefits of different theoretical approaches to the study of political-economic processes
- To (further) develop an awareness of relevant conceptual and empirical research in cognate disciplines such as history, sociology, anthropology, political theory, postcolonial studies, cultural studies, and science and technology studies.
- To comprehend key concepts in the historical and geographical study of political-economic processes such as value, labour, gender, corporeality, materiality
- To describe different ways of thinking about gender and other analytical categories in geographical research
Links between learning outcomes and methods of assessment:
- The examination will test your awareness of academic scholarship on the new geographies of political economy and will require you to be conversant with key themes, concepts and case studies covered in lectures, readings and discussions.
- The examination requires to use your written communication skills to demonstrate the relationship between concepts/theories and empirical material, and to make effective use of wider literatures to support your arguments.
- The coursework assignment requires you to use your written communication, critical reasoning, and organisational skills, and to demonstrate your ability to make effective use of wider literatures to support your argument.
- The seminar-based discussions help develop critical reasoning skills and confidence in oral expression. No formal assessment is linked to participation in seminar-based discussions. However, students will be asked to organize contributions to discussion and to facilitate shared conversations about the week’s required readings. Formative feedback will be provided on these activities.
Teaching Information
Teaching will consist primarily of a 1-hour lecture, followed by a 1-hour seminar.
Assessment Information
One unseen two-hour exam, consisting of two sections, 50%
one for each element. One question must be:
- answered from a choice of three from each section.
- One 3000-word research paper 50%
- Percentage of the unit that is coursework: 50%
Reading and References
- Rose, G. (1993) Feminism and Geography. Cambridge: Polity Press.
- Nelson, L. and Seager, J. (eds.) (2005) A Companion to Feminist Geography. Malden, MA: Blackwell
- Ainley, R. (ed.) (1998) New Frontiers of Space, Bodies and Gender. New York and London: Routledge
- Duncan, N. (ed.) (1996) BodySpace: Destabilising Geographies of Gender and Sexuality. London: Routledge
- Hanson, S. and Pratt, G. (1995) Gender, Work and Space. London: Routledge
- Gibson-Graham, J-K. (2006) The End of Capitalism (As We Knew It): A Feminist Critique of Political Economy. University of Minnesota Press
