Postgraduate Course: Culture and Society in Early Modern Britain: Edinburgh Archives and Sources (PGHC11164)
Course Outline
| School | School of History, Classics and Archaeology |
College | College of Humanities and Social Science |
| Credit level (Normal year taken) | SCQF Level 11 (Postgraduate) |
Availability | Available to all students |
| SCQF Credits | 20 |
ECTS Credits | 10 |
| Summary | This course aims to introduce Masters students to some of the principal categories of source material utilised by historians of culture and society in early modern Britain. Each week of the course will focus upon a different class of document or type of record and will be concerned to explore its characteristics and nature, as well as its potential and limitations for researchers. The sessions are especially designed to acquaint students with the extensive library and archival resources available in Edinburgh and to introduce some of their rich manuscript holdings. Each class will be based upon a particular research collection in a different repository. |
| Course description |
The sources and repositories consulted in the course include: cheap print (National Library of Scotland); travel accounts (University of Edinburgh Special Collections); kirk session records (National Records of Scotland); burgh Records (Edinburgh City Archives); prints and drawings (Prints and Drawings Study Room, National Gallery of Scotland; medical records (Royal College of Surgeons, Edinburgh); artefacts and material culture (National Museum of Scotland). The course aims to familiarise graduate students with some of the many different types of primary source material regularly consulted by social and cultural historians of early modern Britain and the kinds of archives, record office or libraries in which they may be found. Each session examines the provenance, authorial intent, dissemination, reception and preservation of the source under consideration. It explores its strengths and possibilities for historical research and writing, as well as its weaknesses and limitations. The course aims to develop skills of source criticism and draw on the wealth of resources that the city of Edinburgh and its national institutions has to offer.
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Entry Requirements (not applicable to Visiting Students)
| Pre-requisites |
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Co-requisites | |
| Prohibited Combinations | |
Other requirements | None |
Information for Visiting Students
| Pre-requisites | None |
| High Demand Course? |
Yes |
Course Delivery Information
| Not being delivered |
Learning Outcomes
On completion of this course, the student will be able to:
- Demonstrate an understanding of the range of primary sources used by social and cultural historians of early modern Britain and the kinds of repository in which they may be found
- Demonstrate an ability to investigate these sources and the navigate the repositories in which they are held
- Demonstrate the skills of primary source criticism, evaluation and use
- Demonstrate the ability to develop and sustain original scholarly arguments in oral and written form [through seminar discussions and written assignment], by independently formulating appropriate questions and utilising relevant evidence considered in the course
- Demonstrate [through seminar discussions and written assignment] originality and independence of mind and initiative; intellectual integrity and maturity; an ability to evaluate the work of others, including peers; and a considerable degree of autonomy.
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Reading List
Baker, Christopher, English Drawings and Watercolours, 1600-1900: National Gallery of Scotland (2011)
Euing Collection of English Broadside Ballads (1971)
Forbes Leith, William (ed.), Narratives of Scottish Catholics under Mary Stuart and James VI (1889)
Fyfe, J. G. (ed.), Scottish Diaries and Memoirs 1550-1746 (1928)
Guide to the National Archives of Scotland (Stair Society, 3, 1996)
Hind, A. M., Engraving in England in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries. A Descriptive Catalogue with Introductions (3 vols., 1952-64)
Hume Brown, Peter (ed.), Early Travellers in Scotland (1891)
Mitchell, Arthur, List of Travels and Tours in Scotland, 1296 to 1900 (1902)
National Library of Scotland: Summary Catalogue of the Advocates¿ Manuscripts (1971)
Rayner, Patrick, Lenman, Bruce and Parker, Geoffrey, Handlist of Records for the Study of Crime in Early Modern Scotland (to 1747) (List and Index Society, 16, 1982)
Todd, Margot (ed.), Perth Kirk Session Books, 1577-1590 (Scottish History Society, 6th ser., 2, 2012)
Wood, Marguerite (ed.), Extracts from the Records of the Burgh of Edinburgh 1665-1680 (1950) |
Additional Information
| Graduate Attributes and Skills |
Not entered |
| Keywords | C&SinEarlyModBritain Culture Society Early Modern Britain |
Contacts
| Course organiser | Dr Adam Fox
Tel: (0131 6)50 3835
Email: |
Course secretary | Mrs Lindsay Scott
Tel: (0131 6)50 9948
Email: |
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