Entry requirements

A Bachelor's degree, equivalent to a Swedish Kandidatexamen, from an internationally recognised university

Learning outcomes

After passing the course students should be able to:

• give an account of the general cultural-historical development of the Baltic Sea Area from the colonisation at the end of the last Ice Age to the Bronze Age,
• discuss and problematise local and nationalistic archaeological interpretations from a wider perspective on the general cultural development in the Baltic Sea Area,
• reflect on and question how concepts such as “culture”, “identity” and “ethnicity” are used in prehistoric archaeology,
• describe how nature changes affected the cultural expressions in a long term perspective and how cultural expressions and interactions influenced the development of the Baltic Sea Area prehistoric settlements.

Content

The course presents different local archaeological perspectives from the states around the Baltic Sea in relation to the prehistoric time frame (older Stone Age to the Bronze Age end). Aspects of economic strategies and prehistoric settlements development are discussed in order to identify cultural expressions that are rooted in actual conditions based on the archaeological material that cannot be limited by, or dependent on contemporary political and national boundaries. The entire Baltic Sea region cultural development is therefore the focus and studied as a common area of research.

Instruction

The teaching consists of lectures and seminars with written and oral presentation tasks. The course concludes with a student conference with individual presentations of self-selected topics.

Assessment

The examination consists of a written exam which is also presented as a paper on a student conference, and through participation in exercises and seminars. A Pass (G) requires the participation in exercises, seminars and the student conference. For Pass with distinction (VG) requires VG on the written exam assignment, and participation in all seminars.

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.