Explore Culture, History & Humanities Courses

Relatively new to writing poetry? This inspiring course offers an opportunity to experiment with language and a variety of poetic devices alongside fellow emerging poets. Discover the key elements of a poem in a friendly and interactive class.

Are you curious about reading literature from across the world? Would you like to encounter some of the world’s finest literary works, reading across cultures and national borders, and in translation? This in-college session will give you a flavour of what it’s like to study and explore what global literature is, reading excerpts from major works.

The course examines the postwar political, economic and social consensus in Britain in the 30 years after the Second World and the extent to which there was continuity in successive government policies.

This one-day introductory course on Global Politics for Beginners is designed to provide participants with a foundational understanding of key political concepts, global power dynamics, and contemporary international issues.

Covering the early 19th century to the early 20th century, we will examine the East End and analyse how it was portrayed in works of fiction, thinking about how imaginative fiction and historical fact intertwine to create local legend.

Join this one-day course to explore the vital role the Atlantic Ocean plays in contemporary international relations and examine the geopolitical significance of the Atlantic, focusing on the key political actors and regional powers that shape its dynamics.

This course will consider Claire Denis’ importance as a filmmaker by exploring in some detail a number of her key films from Chocolat (1988), I can’t sleep (1994), Beau Travail (1999), White material (2009), and High Life (2018). Claire Denis’ transnational postcolonial work, from Djibouti, South Africa to multi-ethnic France, deals with themes of migration, human desires and fears. Her films are renowned for being filmed mainly on location, for playing with many cinematic genres and languages and they are internationally acclaimed.

Explore Realism in the nineteenth century, focusing on Manet as its key example, considering such issues as social and political change, formal and subject developments, theoretic interests and artistic influences.

King John is remembered as a murderer, treacherous, and a loser; ‘a bad king’. On the plus side, he was probably the cleanest medieval king around, carrying a tin bath wherever he went travelling!

Learn how Russia’s past is remembered, contested, and rewritten in the present day. This study day explores Soviet and imperial legacies, historical narratives, and how memory is instrumentalised to shape national identity, politics, and contemporary conflicts.

What is a short story? Come and discuss its characteristics, its length, design, mood and style. What distinguishes it from other kinds of short narrative? We’ll compare short stories to other forms, such as myths, legends, anecdotes, fabliaux, parables, fables, and ‘tales’. We’ll look at some of the greatest practitioners including Edgar Allan Poe, Katherine Mansfield, and O’ Henry.

The early 2000s saw the emergence of a number of Swedish and Norwegian crime series onto UK TV screens, including Wallander (dir. various, 2005-10), Forbrydelsen/The Killing (dir. Various, 2007), Borgen (dir. various 2010) and The Bridge (dir. various 2011), all broadcast on BBC4. The popularity of these dramas led to one critic to refer to them as ‘Nordic noir, the gift that keeps on giving’. Similarly successful were the film adaptations of Stieg Larsson’s hugely popular Millenium trilogy, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (2009 and 2011), The Girl who Played with Fire (2009) and The Girl who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest (2009). This one-day course will explore the history, context, development and reception of these TV dramas and films while also considering the various processes of adaptation and remaking involved in their production.