Cosmopolitan Pasts

Entry requirements

Applicants to the course is accepted for Master in humanities with specialization Archaeology, Classical Archaeology and Ancient History, or Egyptology, or the Master's program in Global Environmental History.

Learning outcomes

After passing examination of the course, students should be able to:

• show an overall knowledge of current debates concerning how the past is interpreted from different global perspectives, and the influence that politics, religion, histories of colonial over-rule and modern sensibilities shape these interpretations
• show a knowledge of specific cases studies on these topics from around the world
• demonstrate an ability to associate contemporary and current debates with historical questions and historical sciences
• frame historical research in contemporary and current debates
• lead and chair seminars and present work orally and know how to prepare a research paper for publication

Content

This course aims to explore how and why our multi-cultural world values ‘the past’, ‘heritage’ and ‘archaeological remains’ in very different ways. Our position within society, our beliefs and cultural background, our politics and even our religion (or agnosticism or atheism) all influence the way we interpret tangible remains from the past and associated written sources, how we present these to different public constituencies and audiences, and also the decisions we make about whether something is worth preserving or not. Scholarship has shown that previous generations of humans around the world have similarly held diverse attitudes toward, and understanding of, material remains.

During the course we examine these different issues, both in terms of how they affect contemporary archaeological and historical practice and scholarly research, and also how they were approached by different societies, from Ancient Egypt to nineteenth century North America, Classical Greece and Rome to prehistoric Polynesia and medieval Africa, in the past. The core goal of the course is to ask ourselves ‘What are cosmopolitan pasts?’, ‘Do they matter?’, ‘And if they do, then what are the implications for a) our interpretations of the archaeology and ancient history of past societies, and b) the way we practice archaeology and ancient history now and in the future?’

Instruction

The course is structured around of a series of lectures, discussion seminars and a museum study visit, all of which are mandatory. You must also personally present a short paper with a Power Point at the end of the course, undertake a critical review of a museum exhibition or gallery, and write up your oral presentation as a trial paper for submission to the journal Public Archaeology as a 4000 word essay.

Assessment

Assessment is ongoing through oral and written presentation of tasks, chairing presentations made by other students, and through a final written examination.

If there are special reasons for doing so, an examiner may make an exception from the method of assessment indicated and allow a student to be assessed by another method. An example of special reasons might be a certificate regarding special pedagogical support from the University's disability coordinator.