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Culture, history & humanities

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.

Courses available both in-person and online

Join us in the heart of London for in-person classes. Our modern campus in Covent Garden is easy to reach and buzzing with creativity. With modern purpose-built facilities and state-of-the-art equipment, it’s the perfect space to support your learning journey. Explore our facilities >

Prefer learning online? Our live online courses bring expert teaching to you, wherever you are.

Whether you choose to study in-person or online, all our courses are live, interactive, and taught by expert tutors. Wherever and however you want to learn, we’re here for you.

Courses available both in-person and online

We offer a range of long and short courses allowing you to choose between in-person and online learning.

Learn in the centre of London with our in-person courses. Our purpose-built facilities in Covent Garden mean we are ideally located and easy to get to. 

See our guide to online learning for more information about accessing our live online courses.

All our courses are live, interactive, and taught by expert tutors. No matter how you prefer to learn, we've got the class for you.

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  1. Adoring the Christ Child in art: images of the very generous Magi
    Course start date:  Thu 11 Dec 2025

    Location on this date:  Online

    Tutors:  Emma Rose Barber
    The images of the Adoration of the Magi will be taken from medieval illuminated manuscripts, as well as panel paintings done for churches and chapels and fresco cycles. Artists covered include Italian artists such as Duccio, Giotto, Botticelli, Fra Filippo Lippi, Fra Angelico, Gentile da Fabriano, and northern Renaissance artists including Gossaert and Breughel.
    Full fee £19.00 Senior fee £15.00 Concession £12.00
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  2. Art and environment in Ice Age Europe
    Course start date:  Thu 22 Jan 2026

    Location on this date:  Online

    Tutors:  Simone Chisena
    Discover the artistic treasures of our most remote past, when our ancestors in the Ice Age created beautiful cave paintings and astounding sculpted works.
    Full fee £149.00 Senior fee £119.00 Concession £97.00
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  3. Full fee £129.00 Senior fee £103.00 Concession £84.00
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  4. Cultureplex ciné-club
    Course start date:  Thu 1 May 2025

    Location on this date:  Keeley Street

    Tutors:  Paul Sutton
    Come and join us at the Cultureplex Ciné-Club, where once a week, for 10 weeks, we will watch and discuss film. Taking its cue from the famous Parisian ciné-club set up by the celebrated critic and writer, André Bazin, ‘the single thinker most responsible for bestowing on cinema the prestige both of an artform and of an object of knowledge’, and the man who foresaw the emergence of film studies as a legitimate discipline of academic study, our contemporary incarnation of the film club will offer a curated series of films for detailed study, discussion and debate. Each film will be introduced, placed in both its cinematic, cultural and historic context. In sharing our viewing in City Lit’s premier screening room, the Cultureplex, we will approximate the experience of watching film in the cinema, one that is intense and fully focussed in a way that other modes of viewing often are not. After the screening we will devote the rest of the class to a collective exploration of the film, led by the tutor, but involving everyone in a participatory discussion that will allow all to express their responses, their views, their thoughts on the film screened.
    Full fee £249.00 Senior fee £199.00 Concession £162.00
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  5. Indigenous Australia: the beginnings of the Western Desert art movement
    Course start date:  Thu 8 May 2025

    Location on this date:  Keeley Street

    Tutors:  Arjmand Aziz
    Explore the beginnings of Western Desert painting in 1970s Australia by focussing closely on the cosmopolitan and intercultural worlds of the Indigenous Australian artists at its heart.
    Full fee £79.00 Senior fee £63.00 Concession £51.00
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  6. Full fee £159.00 Senior fee £127.00 Concession £103.00
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  7. An introduction to stained glass at the V&A
    Course start date:  Thu 5 Jun 2025

    Location on this date:  Off Site

    Tutors:  Andreas Petzold
    Stained glass has been described as the most original and important medium in the high Middle Ages. The Victoria and Albert Museum has one of the finest and most comprehensive collections of stained glass in the world, spanning the twelfth century to the modern period. The course will provide an introduction to this medium and the collection of it in the Victoria and Albert Museum.
    Full fee £69.00 Senior fee £55.00 Concession £45.00
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  8. Women with a view: British short fiction of the mid-century
    Course start date:  Thu 12 Jun 2025

    Location on this date:  Keeley Street

    Tutors:  Patricia Sweeney
    Explore and discover extraordinary short stories from renowned women writers of the 1940s and 50s, which present an insight into a time of great change in Britain, when domestic situations were rewritten, social customs challenged and new freedoms embraced. Authors include Elizabeth Bowen, Elizabeth Jane Howard, Penelope Mortimer, Elizabeth Taylor and Daphne du Maurier.
    Full fee £119.00 Senior fee £95.00 Concession £77.00
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  9. Art Deco London walk
    Course start date:  Thu 19 Jun 2025

    Location on this date:  Off Site

    Tutors:  Diane Burstein
    Travel back to the 1930s to explore the Art Deco style that influenced a variety of designs, from radios and cutlery to places related to travel, entertainment and commerce. In addition to looking at the architecture of the period, your guide will tell stories of life in London from the time these buildings were being erected.



    Meeting outside St James’s Park tube station (Broadway exit) and finishing at the coach station. Meeting outside St James’s Park tube station (Broadway exit) and finishing at the coach station.
    Full fee £19.00 Senior fee £15.00 Concession £12.00
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