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Slow Violence: History and Political Ecology - Semester 1 - HIS00149H

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  • Department: History
  • Module co-ordinator: Dr. Venus Bivar
  • Credit value: 20 credits
  • Credit level: H
  • Academic year of delivery: 2023-24

Module summary

While hurricanes and forest fires serve as spectacular symbols for an ecosystem gone wrong, it is the pervasive slow violence of the unspectacular, the invisible, that seeps into the daily lives of millions across the globe. From toxic waste deposits and cancer clusters to coastal erosion and climate refugees, the environmental consequences of economic growth are inscribed on the bodies of the poor and in the slow and steady devastation of the landscape. Chronologically, this module will focus on the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Geographically, we will roam widely. Case studies may include: glacier melt in the Peruvian Andes; drought-induced famine in colonial India; Monsanto’s manufacturing of toxic chemicals in the United States; and global efforts to mainstream climate science.

This module is a combination of the related fields of political ecology and environmental history. Students will learn how to use the tools of political economy and historical inquiry to understand how environmental change and conflict are informed by political, economic, and social dimensions. Students will also explore how the methods of these two fields of inquiry challenge traditional historical categories. For example: What happens when time is no longer bounded by the written word and is understood in geological terms? How does history play out when the actors driving the action of the story are non-human? And how might historians geographically frame their narratives when the subject matter is rarely bounded by the political borders of human communities? Primary source materials include: newspaper articles, diaries, parliamentary debates, scientific reports, and business records.

Related modules

Students taking this module must also take the second part in Semester 2.

Module will run

Occurrence Teaching period
A Semester 1 2023-24

Module aims

The aims of this module are:

  • To introduce students to in depth study of a specific historical topic using primary and secondary material;
  • To enable students to explore the topic through discussion and writing; and
  • To enable students to evaluate and analyse primary sources.

Module learning outcomes

Students who complete this module successfully will:

  • Grasp key themes, issues and debates relevant to the topic being studied;
  • Have acquired knowledge and understanding about that topic;
  • Be able to comment on and analyse original sources;
  • Be able to relate the primary and secondary material to one another; and
  • Have acquired skills and confidence in close reading and discussion of texts and debates.

Module content

Students will attend a 1-hour briefing in week 1 and a 3-hour seminar in weeks 2-4, 6-8 and 10-11 of semester 1. Weeks 5 & 9 are Reading and Writing Weeks (RAW). Students prepare for and participate in eight three-hour seminars in all.

Seminar topics are subject to variation, but are likely to include the following:

  1. Slow Violence
  2. Cheap Nature
  3. The Anthropocene
  4. In the Shadow of Melting Glaciers
  5. How do we Narrate the Invisible?
  6. El Nino and the Making of the Third World
  7. The Unknown History of Environmental Awareness
  8. The Plastics Revolution

Assessment

Task Length % of module mark
Essay/coursework
Text Commentaries and Essay		 N/A 100

Special assessment rules

None

Additional assessment information

For formative assessment, students will be given the opportunity to produce text commentaries in seminar, including a written commentary.

For the summative assessment students build a portfolio of two parts, to be submitted together:
a) Two text commentaries of 500-750 words; and
b) One 1,500-word essay which reflects on the significance of the chosen texts in light of scholarship and sources from across the module.
The commentaries comprise 50% and the essay 50% of the overall mark for this module. Summative assessments will be due in the assessment period.

Reassessment

None

Module feedback

Formative work will be live marked in seminar and supplemented by the tutor giving oral feedback to the whole group. All students are encouraged, if they wish, to discuss the feedback on their formative work during their tutor’s student hours. For more information, see the Statement on Feedback.

For summative assessment tasks, students will receive their provisional mark and written feedback within 25 working days of the submission deadline. The tutor will then be available during student hours for follow-up guidance if required. For more information, see the Statement of Assessment.

Indicative reading

For semester time reading, please refer to the module VLE site. Before the course starts, we encourage you to look at the following items of preliminary reading:

  • Chatterjee, Elizabeth. “The Asian Anthropocene: Electricity and Fossil Developmentalism”. The Journal of Asian Studies 79, no. 1 (February 2020): 3-24.
  • Demuth, Bathsheba. Floating Coast: An Environmental History of the Bering Strait. New York: W.W. Norton, 2019.
  • Ghosh, Amitav. The Great Derangement: Climate Change and the Unthinkable. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2016.


The information on this page is indicative of the module that is currently on offer. The University is constantly exploring ways to enhance and improve its degree programmes and therefore reserves the right to make variations to the content and method of delivery of modules, and to discontinue modules, if such action is reasonably considered to be necessary by the University. Where appropriate, the University will notify and consult with affected students in advance about any changes that are required in line with the University's policy on the Approval of Modifications to Existing Taught Programmes of Study.