1. Concepts and Methods in History
Clio, the ancient Muse of History; detail from Jan Vermeer’s The Art of Painting, c.1666
Introduction to the course

2. Jan Vermeer, The Art of Painting, c.1666

3. Left: Clio (bottom right among six different Muses), the Greek Muse of History, in a 1698 edition of Cesare Ripa’s Iconologia (a sixteenth-century work on symbolism)
Right: another depiction of Clio

4. Introduction to Concepts and Methods
Organization (staff, seminar groups, VLE, assessment, PAL)
Overview of course: (1) study skills; (2) historiographical themes and debates

5. Staff
Dr Stephen Pigney (course convenor, lecturer, seminar
Cheryl Deedman (lecturer, seminar
Dr John Price (lecturer, seminar
(Other teaching staff on the course: Professor Richard Grayson, Dr Rebekah Lee, Paul Stocks, Dr Elizabeth Williams, Dr Vivienne Richmond)

6. Lectures and seminar groups
Wednesday (WB IGLT)
SEMINARS
Group 1a (Dr John Price): Wednesday 12-1 (EB 109)
Group 1b (Dr Stephen Pigney): Wednesday (RHB 140)
Group 1c (Cheryl Deedman): Wednesday (RHB 250)
Group 2a (Dr John Price): Wednesday 1-2 (EB 109)
Group 2b (Dr Stephen Pigney): Wednesday 12-1 (RHB 140)
Group 2c (Cheryl Deedman): Wednesday 12-1 (RHB 250) 

7. Assessment
Formative assessment (short practice exercise) due by Monday, 21 October 2013, by 1 p.m.
Formative essay (2,000 words; formative assessment), due by Monday, 13 January 2014, by 1 p.m.
Short summative essay (2,000 words; summative assessment, worth 25% of your final course grade), due by Monday, 17 February 2014, by 1 p.m.
Group presentation on visual/material culture in week 18 of the course (Wednesday, 12 March 2014)
Long summative essay (4,000 words; summative assessment, worth 75% of your final course grade), due by Thursday, 1 May 2014, by 1 p.m.

8. Aims of the course
To equip you with the skills and methods required for the study of history at university level, and to reflect on these as transferable skills
To introduce you to different historiographical approaches and to a number of important concepts and theories that have influenced the work of historians
To encourage you to reflect on your learning and your development as students and historians

9. Study skills Differences between secondary and tertiary education
Evaluation of evidence and distinction between primary and secondary sources
Management and organization of time and information
Referencing and bibliographies
Academic writing
Using academic libraries and online resources
Think about how the skills you will acquire are transferable, i.e. can be applied beyond the study of history.

10. History: skills and experience
Understanding of different societies and cultures
Independent learning and research, and the ability to navigate effectively through vast quantities of information
Analysis, evaluation and interpretation of evidence (textual, visual, material, statistical, digital, oral)
Critical engagement with problems and debates
Presentation of informed argument in written and verbal form—the ability to communicate clearly, effectively and convincingly
The ability to undertake and complete complex projects, both independently and with others

11. Historiography
‘The history of historical writing’ (Peter Burke), from the entry on ‘Historiography’ in The New Fontana Dictionary of Modern Thought, 3rd edn (London: HarperCollins, 1999), p. 396.
The writing and practice of history; the study of this writing and practice.
Lancelot du Voisin de La Popelinière, L’Histoire des histoires (1599)

12. Primary and secondary sources
Left: images of page from the Magna Carta (1215) and online English edition of the Magna Carta at Project Gutenberg, both examples of primary sources; above, J. C. Holt’s Magna Carta (Cambridge, 1992), an example of a secondary source

13. Some theories and methods considered on the course
Marxist theory
Gender theory
Postcolonial theory
Postmodernism
Annales approaches and methods
Social and cultural anthropological approaches
Rankean approaches
Oral historical theory and practice

14. 1961
1967
1991
1997

15. Title-page to the first volume of Gilbert Burnet’s Historie of the Reformation of the Church of England (1679)

16. From Anglican triumph, the Reformation as state politics, to the Reformation as a popular movement…

17. …to ‘revisionist’ histories of the Reformation

18. Some final questions to consider
How has the expansion of universities since the 1960s (involving greater access to higher education for women, ethnic minorities, the working class) changed the study of history?
How has the changing place of Britain in the world, and the impact of globalization, affected the study of history?
To what extent is history about preserving the memory of the past? Should history be a process of memorialization?
“Who controls the past controls the future; who controls the present controls the past”—George Orwell, party slogan from Nineteen Eighty-Four (1948). What do you think Orwell meant by this?
Can we ever know the past?