Explore Culture, History & Humanities Courses
Explore our extraordinary range of History, Culture and Writing courses and lectures. We offer both introductory and specialist in-depth courses to suit all levels of interest and experience, from ‘How to read a film’ and World literature, to Creative non-fiction writing courses and American history and Politics courses.
Our tutors are experts in their fields and experienced educators; many have published, teach in universities or share their expertise in the media. Tutors share their knowledge and passion through presentations, readings, interactive discussion and exercises, analysis, and other activities.
Many students return to take more courses, telling us they enjoy being part of our City Lit Learning community.
Our popular courses often sell out quickly, so we invite you to browse and book your place now.
- Fifties Free Cinema: No Film can be too PersonalCourse start date: Sat 22 Feb 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: John WischmeyerJohn Grierson has a lot to answer for. Not only did he popularise that most dreary and off-putting term ‘documentary’ in the 1930s, he only approved those that were utilitarian, pedagogic or impersonal. But in the 1950s a new generation of filmmakers rejected these restrictive forms and a Free Cinema was born: an interest in the poetry of the everyday and a talent for finding art hiding in plain sight in unsung and unprepossessing neighbourhoods. Documentary to provoke change. No film can be too personal. An urgent cultural revolution was suddenly exploding everywhere. New York’s ‘off Broadway’ film movement, influenced by Italian neorealism, shot Little Fugitive (1953 Morris Engel/Ruth Orkin) on location on Coney Island. It was nominated for an Oscar. This landmark film led to John Cassavetes’ independent style and was an acknowledged influence on the French New Wave, Direct Cinema (U.S.) and Cinema Verite (France). As if on cue, Agnes Varda filmed La Pointe Courte (1955) on location in Sete, inventing and kick-starting the New Wave of Godard and Truffaut and her own Cleo from 5 to 7 (1962). However, the biggest stirring of a new kind of documentary impulse was the Free Cinema in Britain, where Lindsay Anderson scorned the Griersonian style as didactic and dull and led the way to the British New Wave’s ‘kitchen sink’ films that were about our lives.Full fee £69.00 Senior fee £55.00 Concession £45.00 - European design 1915-1935: designing utopiaCourse start date: Sat 1 Mar 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Rachel SandersStudy the dominant design aesthetic of the twentieth century, considering its development, successes and failures. Movements will include Russian Constructivism, the Bauhaus and Purism. Design practices will include graphics, furniture and architecture.Full fee £79.00 Senior fee £63.00 Concession £51.00 - Satan and the Devil: a cultural eye view through text, image and traditionCourse start date: Sat 15 Mar 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Ann JeffersThe figure of Satan/devil has pervaded many centuries of the cultural imagination of the Western world. The course will examine the literary and iconographic sources for this enduring phenomena and will ask why ideas about the devil have continued to both frighten and fascinate and why its long-lasting association with sexuality and deceit continues to make it an attractive theme in contemporary culture.Full fee £69.00 Senior fee £55.00 Concession £45.00 - 19th Century Movements in Italian Literature: Manzoni, Verga, TarchettiCourse start date: Sat 15 Mar 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Francesco BucciolDiscover some key literary movements and novels that influenced the Italian cultural scene in the 19th century, through the study of three writers: Alessandro Manzoni, Giovanni Verga and Arrigo Boito.Full fee £69.00 Senior fee £55.00 Concession £45.00 - Exploring the memory politics of East AsiaCourse start date: Sat 15 Mar 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Qiuyang ChenDiscover how memory shapes politics in East Asia. Explore pivotal case studies from China, South Korea, and Japan to understand the impact of collective memory on national identities and international relations.Full fee £69.00 Senior fee £55.00 Concession £45.00 - Women in Horror FilmsCourse start date: Sat 22 Mar 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Mary WildIn this course, we will investigate the feminine discursive position in 21st century horror cinema through the framework of psychoanalytic theory. It is sometimes claimed that the portrayal of women in such films is misogynistic, but here the proposition is that the horror genre affords us an indispensable language for approaching complex elements of feminine subjectivity.Full fee £69.00 Senior fee £55.00 Concession £45.00 - 19th century fashion: colour, design and revolutionCourse start date: Sat 29 Mar 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Rachel SandersExplore the relationship between nineteenth-century society, from the Napoleonic era to the suffrage movement, and men’s and women’s fashions which witnessed constant change, restrictions, extremes and the start of the dress reform movement.Full fee £69.00 Senior fee £55.00 Concession £45.00 - Masters of cinema: Paolo SorrentinoCourse start date: Sat 29 Mar 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Paul SuttonPaolo Sorrentino has been described as ‘the most promising Italian director of his generation’. This one-day course will explore the cinema of this Neapolitan filmmaker renowned for his ‘commitment to style’. We will look at a number of his films as well as his television work, and examine some of the themes that he has returned to throughout his career, for example, power, nostalgia and solitude. We will also consider his Sorrentino’s relationship with figures such as the cinematographer Luca Bigazzi and the actor Toni Servillo, both of whom have collaborated frequently with the director. So, join us in City Lit’s Cultureplex screening space for day-long immersion into the beautifully stylish cinematic world of Paolo Sorrentino.Full fee £69.00 Senior fee £55.00 Concession £45.00 - Full fee £69.00 Senior fee £55.00 Concession £45.00
- International Monetary Fund (IMF): Friend or Foe?Course start date: Sat 12 Apr 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Tariq HassanAfter more than 75 years since the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the world’s lender of last resort, made its first loan, the effects of its policies in general and lending practices in particular remain contested.Full fee £69.00 Senior fee £69.00 Concession £45.00 - A women’s history of modern ChinaCourse start date: Sat 3 May 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Qiuyang ChenDiscover the untold stories and hidden legacies of women in modern China in this illuminating one-day course. Traverse time, from the late Qing Dynasty to the present, to examine how women have shaped and been shaped by social, political, and cultural currents.Full fee £69.00 Senior fee £55.00 Concession £45.00 - Modern art in America, 1900-1930: the Ashcan School to PrecisionismCourse start date: Sat 10 May 2025
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Rachel SandersStudy American art, including paintings, illustrations and cartoons from late-nineteenth century Impressionism and Realism to Precisionism, analysing movements and styles, social and political context, materials, and art theory.Full fee £69.00 Senior fee £55.00 Concession £45.00 - Dickens' LondonCourse start date: Sat 10 May 2025 (and 1 other date)
Location on this date: Keeley Street
Tutors: Molly Rumbelow'It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.' Enjoy this introduction to Dickens' work and the London of his time. Morning lecture at City Lit followed by a walk in the area of the city connected to his work.Full fee £69.00 Senior fee £55.00 Concession £45.00
Can't see a course you want?
Add this category to your waiting list to set up alerts and we will update you when new courses are released online.
Add me to waiting list