The Taught MLitt in Renaissance and Early Modern Studies
The one-year taught MLitt in Renaissance and Early Modern Studies consists of a combination of taught courses, training courses, and a dissertation and is taken over one year (or two as a part-time degree), starting in September. The courses — with a choice across the disciplines of literature, history, art history, music and philosophy— enable students to attain a broad grasp of early modern culture, and provide a valuable blend of cross-disciplinary options and specialist training. The MLitt reflects the diverse yet complementary research interests and energies that converge in the Centre. Students can, for example, study the growth of national consciousness and imperial identity in Britain, as reflected both in its literature, its art and its history, or compare the culture of Britain and northern Europe (‘The Idea of North’). They may look at the upheavals in religious faith of the period and its radical changes in political philosophy. We cultivate a particular interest in the History of the Scottish and Irish Enlightenment and its comparison and contextualisation with the continental Enlightenment. Social and anthropological aspects of historical research are represented in courses on witchcraft and confessional processes in early modern European societies, and a focus on early modern history and philosophy of science. Students may also study the impact of the period on the arts: the British and European context of early modern drama, the emergence of professional woman writers in Britain, the European Renaissance in the visual arts and architecture, and the influence of Baroque in Europe and around the world. Another important specialisation is the history of early modern Central and North-eastern Europe. Courses from the early modern programme may also be taken in conjunction with other courses from the participating schools.
The programme offers training and thematic courses as well as specialist supervision for a 15,000 word dissertation of the students’ own choice. It is suited for students seeking to continue with (funded) postgraduate study as well as those simply interested in the early modern era.
Course Menu
- The REMS Core Course (15 credits)
Approaching the Early Modern
Students participate in seminars with staff working in different disciplines within the Schools of History, Divinity & Philosophy and of Literature and Language. In each seminar a member of staff introduces a piece of her/his own work (that has been pre-circulated), explains the way in which it was developed, the theoretical and methodological techniques applied, the kinds of sources used, and its relationship to more general interpretative traditions. The presenter will then invite students to discuss and critique the work as a group. In this way, students gain first-hand experience of the writing of different approaches to the study of the early modern period across the disciplines, with scholars associated with the Centre for Early Modern Studies.
Students have the opportunity to choose their training courses according to their own disciplinary focus.
Literary focus
Investigating Literature (15 or 30 credit versions)
This course aims to provide students with the practical skills and conceptual grounding necessary to undertake literary studies at postgraduate level. It will explore the key debates involved in modern literary study, consider the issues involved in the research process, and facilitate an understanding of the skills required for the development and dissemination of research outcomes. It will also provide a forum that will facilitate students in acquiring a range of transferable skills such as reflective thinking, planning a research project and networking. This course is compulsory for all taught postgraduates who want to do a Literature dissertation.
History focus
Introduction to Historical Research (15 credits)
This course introduces taught level 5 students (both taught MLitt and research students) to the opportunities for historical research in Aberdeen, conventions of historical work, IT, bibliographical tools, text preparation, access to sources, databases and libraries, and prepares them for their own work on their dissertation and archival research. The core of the course is built around contact with historians and archivists, who introduce students to techniques, tools, and approaches which they can then apply to their own special period, subject area and types of history. Several sessions concentrate on interdisciplinary approaches which can be profitably combined with historical work, the use of visual sources, useful hints about weights, measures and calendars, the role of material culture and museums, electronic aids and the art of bibliographic construction. Students will learn from each other in groups sessions with presentations and specialist advice on their topics. The assessment is mainly by essay and a presentation of source work. This course is compulsory for all taught postgraduates who want to do a History dissertation.
- Art History focus
Research Skills for Art Historians (Jane Geddes, 10 credits)
This course is intended to introduce postgraduate students interested in art and architectural history to research techniques; and to bibliographical sources and presentation of bibliographical material. This course is compulsory for all taught postgraduates who want to do dissertation in History of Art.
- Optional Courses (80 credits) - First and second half terms
NB: Not all courses will be on offer every year, depending on staffing, leave of absence and numbers of students (minimum for a course to run is usually 3)
The Scottish and Irish Diaspora, c. 1730 - c. 1930 (15 credits)
Demographic upheaval weaves a bold and consistent thread in the fabric of Scottish and Irish history. Emigrants sojourned and settled in a wide variety of locations, but particularly - from the eighteenth century - in North America and Australasia. This course, which is structured thematically and comparatively, within a broad chronological framework, explores some of the manifestations of a diverse and complex phenomenon. It debates the problems and ambitions that stimulated emigration in different eras, as well as the emigrants’ impact on the communities where they settled. It incorporates a comparative analysis of the Irish and Highland famines, the role of emigration agents, emigrants’ involvement in empire, the experiences of women and children, the impact of the communications revolution, and the construction of ‘ethnic’ communities and identities.
Witchcraft, Traditional Practices and the Rise of a Protestant Culture in Early Modern Scotland (15 credits)
This course will examine the attempts by Scotland's newly Protestant clergy and magistracy to implement a thorough-going reform of customs and practices amongst the people of Scotland in the century after the Reformation of the 1560s. It will largely use the prism to access the success or failure of these efforts. The course will also consider other traditional practices often labelled ‘superstitious’ and seen as closely associated either with latent Catholicism or the demonic. These will include: traditional rites associated with baptisms, marriages and funerals; annual festivals such as Yuletide and May Day; healing rituals and places such as holy wells.
Shakespeare and Renaissance Culture (30 credits)
Since the eighteenth century the plays of Shakespeare have been celebrated as the high-water mark of English Literature; the gold in the golden age of English Renaissance culture. But what impact did Shakespeare’s drama have on the audiences of the seventeenth century? Hamlet spoke of actors as the “brief chronicles of the time”, underlining the central importance of theatre to the culture and debates of the period. And within theatrical culture, Shakespeare’s success was beyond question, his contemporary and fellow playwright Ben Jonson, labelled him “the soul of our age”. In this course, taught by a team of specialists in renaissance literature, we respond to the plays as literature brimming with the energies and enthusiasms of its time. Close study of a broad range of Shakespeare texts forms a central part of the course within a detailed investigation of their relationship with contemporary culture, informed by recent research in the field. Areas of study will be selected from the following: Shakespeare and the Reformation; Shakespeare and Popular Culture; Shakespeare and the Text; Shakespeare and the Uses of History; Shakespeare, Gender and Class, and Shakespeare and the Restoration Stage.
Peacemaking and Bloodfeud in Scotland, c. 1390-1513 (15 credits)
This course examines violent feuding among the late medieval Scottish nobility, and the relationship between the crown and its magnates in the governance of the realm, themes which have been fundamental to a generation of scholarship, and about which there is little agreement among historians. Focusing especially on the fifteenth century, this course explores the nature and exercise of lordship (of which kindred and clan were important features), changes in and uses of the judicial system, and diverse mechanisms of conflict management, all of which shaped how Scotland was ruled. It draws on scholarship concerned with conflict as a theme in different times and places, allowing the Scottish experience to be seen in its wider European context. Evaluating evidence such as bonds of man rent, arbitration and marriage contracts, court and parliamentary records, and chronicles, the course will investigate the roles of law, violence and peacemaking in structuring society. Students will be encouraged to assess the strengths and limits of the existing framework of historical analysis.
The Image of the ‘North’ (15 credits)
The main aim for this course is to study the diversity of how the North has been (and is) viewed. The main method of study is to read a sample of key texts which display not only a variety in themes, but also a diversity regarding time and spatial perspective. The amount of texts we are able to read and discuss during this course is just a scratch on the surface, but it should, nonetheless, be a sufficient initiation to the fascinating theme of imagology and the North. The eight lessons compile a total of twelve texts, some in their totality (poems and articles) and others as extracts of larger works. This course is offered in conjunction with the Nordic Study Programme of the University of Helsinki (http://www.helsinki.fi/hum/renvall/norden/teaching/2008-09/norden08onlineimagesnorth.html).
European Nobilities (15 credits)
This course will examine a social group long condemned as declining and decaying in the modern age but which recent research has increasingly revealed as a dynamic force in Europe throughout the early modern period and long after the French Revolution. The landed elites of Europe faced new challenges in the early modern period, from above in the shape of the state, and from below in the shape of challenges from new and larger urban elites, and from an increasingly diversified rural society. Yet across the continent, nobilities and nobles adjusted with some success to the challenges of the period, and the eighteenth century was something of a golden age. This course will examine concepts of nobility and the social position of the British and European landowning elites of the early modern period, beginning with the refinement of the nature of nobility in the Renaissance, and ending with the fundamental changes unleashed by the Enlightenment and French Revolution. It looks at an order which, across the continent, differed widely in composition and juridical position, and is conceived as thematic and comparative. It will explore the great diversity of the landed and noble elites of Europe, looking at their economic base, their corporate identity and self-image, their ideology and political activity, their cultural life and their interaction with other social groups.
Rituals of Death (15 credits)
This course will consider the social construction of death as well as the myriad ways that ideas of death have shaped literary, historical, philosophical, anthropological, sociological and theological production. Key issues for the course will include the social construction of death, how death came to be seen as “natural”, and the uses of such things as grief in personal as well as cultural life. Working with specialists in the field, students will study thinking about death from the points of view of a wide range of disciplinary backgrounds: literary, philosophical, anthropological, sociological, religious and historical.
North European Art and Scotland (15 credits)
Through a study of Northern European art and artefacts in Scotland, the art historical relationship between these areas will be examined. Case studies will be drawn from major works in Scottish collections, such as Hugo van der Goes, Lucas Cranach, Durer, Rembrandt and Rubens. Students will visit major Scottish collections to view these works.
Baroque Art and Architecture (15 credits)
This course provides an introduction in the advanced study of Baroque art.
Thomas Middleton and Jacobean dramatic culture (30 credits)
Few writers made so significant a contribution to the dramatic culture of the early modern period as Thomas Middleton but Middleton’s hand in the Jacobean theatre has been difficult to assess until recently. Best known today as the author a number of city comedies, the full extent of his output was much broader and more significant. Unlike Shakespeare and Jonson, however, no collection of Middleton’s plays was published during the period so that masterpieces like A Revenger’s Tragedy and The Maiden’s/Lady Tragedy have only recently been acknowledged as his work. He was author of A Game At Chess, a scandalous satire on the religious politics of Europe that enjoyed the longest run of any play of the English Renaissance theatre. But the play was shut down by the censors and never appeared in print. This course takes advantage of recent scholarship that has at last helped to establish the canon and chronology of Middleton’s works. Middleton’s working practices are illustrative of the full range of dramatic output in the period. As well as writing alone Middleton also worked closely in collaboration with other leading dramatists including Shakespeare with whom he co-authored Timon of Athens, as well as revising Measure for Measure and Macbeth to give us the texts we have today. He wrote for public and private playhouses, for boy’s companies and for adult actors. He was a key innovator in the drama of contemporary London life, responsible for a range of plays that investigate the religion and morality of urban society. For the City he produced a number of pageants and masques becoming London’s de facto poet laureate by the end of his life. The career and works of Thomas Middleton thus offer many opportunities for researching the theatrical culture of the Jacobean period. The course opens by exploring Middleton’s relationship to dramatic culture through an investigation of textuality, collaboration, and the stage. From here we move to a detailed consideration of how Middleton’s work engages with the cultural politics of their moment. The course culminates in an extended case study of A Game At Chess.
Early Modern Women Writers: the Age of Aphra Behn (30 credits)
The principal writer to be studied will be Aphra Behn (1640-89), the first British woman to earn her living as a creative writer and the greatest British woman writer before Jane Austen. The course will look at her outstanding contribution to the Restoration theatre, and her innovative work in the novel and short fiction. It will examine her responses to the political crises and innovations of the Stuart period, her interaction with the work of her male contemporaries, and her relationship to the culture of materialistic free thought that gathered strength in the late Seventeenth Century. It will also look at works by women writers of the generation after her death, such as Delarivier Manley and Susanna Centlivre.
City Politics: City Comedy and Political Tragedy in the Reign of Charles II (30 credits)
The restoration of the monarchy in 1660 immediately brought about the restoration of the theatre, which had been outlawed since the outbreak of the Civil War in 1642. This immediate connection between the theatre and the king initiated a period in which drama was heavily politicized. The first performance of Orrery’s History of King Henry the Fifth, for example, used the actual coronation robes of the King and the Duke of York. The theme of restored authority dominated drama for the first decade of Charles’s rule, but thereafter serious plays increasingly reflected the political fears and divisions of the period. This was especially so in the Exclusion Crisis (1678‑1681), when fabricated allegations about a planned Catholic insurrection led to prolonged attempts to exclude Charles’s Catholic brother James from the succession, and replace him by Charles eldest illegitimate son, the Duke of Monmouth. The economic concerns of Jacobean city comedy largely disappear from Restoration comedy, though they do survive in the work of Aphra Behn, who indeed adapted A Mad World My Masters (in The City Heiress) and The Dutch Curtezan (in The Revenge). The social geography of London, however, is a constant theme, its impact aided by the advent of changeable scenery, which enabled recognizable representation of such modish areas as The Mall, the New Exchange, and St James’s Park. Playwrights at first explored the social divisions between London and the country and—within London ‑‑ between the Court, the fashionable Town, and the mercantile City. The social geography, however, became politicized when the City became the power base of the Opposition during the Exclusion Crisis. The course will examine the representation of politics and of London in drama of the reign of Charles II. It will principally do so by either by examining adaptations of plays from the age of Shakespeare or plays which work within genres used by Shakespeare: the history play and the Roman play, for example. It is well known that playwrights of the Restoration started the practice of radically rewriting Shakespeare: Nahum Tate’s happy ending version of King Lear is notorious. It is less well known that adaptation of Shakespeare was not a steady preoccupation throughout the period, but was largely confined to moments of particular political intensity. The early Restoration witnessed the adaptation of plays about restored rulers: Macbeth, Measure for Measure, The Tempest. There is then a lull of over ten years before the Exclusion Crisis called forth another clutch of politically partisan rewritings, three of which are represented here.
Emblematic Mentality: Word and Image in Early Modern France (30 credits)
The emblem phenomenon was an important socio-cultural force in Europe throughout the early modern period. Printed emblem books, exploiting the combination of word and image, were in themselves effective educational tools, but they were also a source of iconographic inspiration for artists and craftsmen working in other domains, including wall and ceiling painting, tapestry, embroidery, woodcarving etc. In the development of emblematic materials France was several decades ahead of the rest of Europe. The course examines a number of French emblem books, noting the diversity of approach and interpretation which can be adopted, and analysing the ways in which emblematic materials can be used for moral, satirical or informative purposes, but also for religious and political propaganda. Throughout the course there will be an emphasis on the use of primary sources and students will be encouraged to think comparatively. A reading knowledge of French is a prerequisite.
Reformation in Scotland (20 credits)
This course examines radical changes and continuities in Scottish religious life and thought between c1450 and the revolutions of the 17th century. Students will be introduced to a range of primary sources relating to the following topics: Scottish religious life and thought on the eve of the Reformation, Christian Humanism in Scotland, martyrdom and the privy kirks, poetry and drama in the service of reform, Catholic reformers and controversialists, the Reformed confessions of faith, fasting and communion seasons, discipline and repentance, recusancy and exile, Episcopacy and Presbyterianism, theologies of resistance and obedience, the National Covenant and the Covenanting revolution, the ‘Sectaries’ (e.g. Society of Friends). The aim of the course is to equip students with a thorough understanding of the Reformation in Scotland and its place in the history and theology of Early Modern Europe, and to familiarize students with historical sources and methodologies appropriate to further research at the postgraduate level.
The Enlightenment in Comparison: Scotland, Ireland and Central Europe (15 credits)
There was not one Enlightenment, but many European varieties of it. This course focuses on Enlightenment thinking in Scotland and Central Europe, with particular emphasis on the German and East Central European Enlightenment, to which the Scottish Enlightenment had strong historical links. It questions the traditional assumption that the Enlightenment was exclusively 'located' in France. It looks at the definition and the shaping of Enlightenment thought and practice (learned societies, reading clubs, social reform movements, education, freemasonry etc) at the 'peripheries' of an allegedly French-dominated Enlightenment culture (recently re-affirmed by Robert Darnton) by comparing and contrasting various theoretical and practical strands. It invites students to think critically about historiographical debates and to develop skills in using, speaking and writing about theoretical concepts in a clear, comprehensible manner. Seminar topics will focus on major figures and personalities of the Scottish and European Enlightenment, on 'The Catholic Enlightenment', on Enlightenment in practice, 'Enlightenment as Secularisation?', and other themes.
Images of Poverty in Early Modern Europe (15 credits)
Poverty emerged as a major social problem in the early modern period across much of Europe. Social and economic historians have attempted to explain this as a product of war, famine and disease, or in terms of the rise of a capitalist economy, with its acts of land enclosure and the attendant creation of a restless unattached mass of surplus wage labourers. This course focuses instead on the burgeoning traditions of visual imagery depicting the poor and outcast from the sixteenth and seventeenth century. We will examine material produced in a wide range of visual types and media from playing cards to church altarpieces, in countries such as Germany, the Netherlands, Britain, France, Italy and Spain. Moving beyond the usual purview of traditional art history, we will engage contemporary perspectives from sociology, anthropology and literary theory in moving towards an interpretation of this diverse and influential body of imagery. But we will also notice its specifically visual properties, paying attention to patterns of expression, translation and development that do not simply repeat those of social and economic history. The first part of the course will identify imagery devoted to the image of the idle and deceitful vagrant. This analysis will provide a platform for consideration of the opposed, though complimentary, tradition depicting the "deserving poor". The second part of the course will be concerned primarily with art of the seventeenth century, focussing on the way in which the visual didactics of the previous century, defined through the moralisation of the poor as 'bad' or 'good', were challenged by imagery that increasingly problematised this division.
Scotland and India (15 credits)
Using printed and manuscript primary sources (East India Company records, personal correspondence, government records and literary sources), this course examines from a predominately Scottish perspective (but including Irish comparisons) the development of British imperialism in the East. Starting in 1695, with the last effort by an independent Scotland to establish a colonial trade with the East, the course surveys the role of the Scots and Irish in the commercial and territorial expansion of the English East India Company until the Indian Mutiny of 1857. Key themes include; how ‘provincial’ regions of the British Isles accessed an area of English imperial monopoly; how the Scottish ‘Enlightenment’ reconfigured British perceptions of the East; the social and economic backgrounds of Scots and Irish in Company service; the difference between ‘Asiatic’ and ‘Atlantic’ imperialism; and the impact of Eastern imperialism upon the politics, economy and society of Scotland and Ireland.
The Invention of Irish Nationalism (15 credits)
This course examines the origins of Irish nationalism culminating in the Young Irelanders of the 1840s. It uncovers how the Enlightenment relates to the age of ideologies, and how nationalist movements in the nineteenth century emerged. It provides a case study of emergent European nationalist ideologies and interrogates the validity of theoretical models for nationalism. It invites students to think critically about historiographical debates and concepts. Seminar topics include ‘Colonial nationalism’, Jonathan Swift, the antiquarian movement, and the 1798 Rebellion. Underpinning these are current theoretical debates, conducted by Benedict Anderson, Ernst Gellner, Adrian Hastings and Anthony D. Smith among others
Italian Art and Scotland (15 credits)
The course will analyse are, artefacts and collections of Italian art in Scotland, and art historical relationships between Italy and Scotland. Case studies of Orcagna, Botticelli, Raphael, Titian, Giorgione, Domenichino and Canaletto. Students will visit major Scottish collections to view these works.
Advanced Topics in Practical Philosophy: Kant’s Ethics (15 credits)
This course is a study of Kant’s moral philosophy and the positive and negative reactions to it in the last and this century. We will attempt to formulate an appreciation of Kant that is balanced and neither prematurely dismissive, nor overly worshipful.
Spinoza’s Ethics (Books I and II) (15 credits)
This course will be dedicated to the close reading of Spinoza’s Ethics (1677), Parts I and II. The objective of the seminar is to identify and articulate the basis of Spinoza’s metaphysical system. We will discuss in some detail what has been called “the enduring questions”, i.e. problems in Spinoza’s philosophy which have puzzled commentators for over three hundred years and still do, such as the coherence of Spinoza’s concept of God, the meaning of his doctrine of the attributes, and the nature of the substance-mode relation.
Approaching the University Collections (15 credits)
This course offers a wide range of hands-on discovery relating to the university collections. It allows students to explore a variety of media and gain an understanding of the research potential within the university archive and museum
Modern Language I (30 credits)
From this list: French, German, Italian, Scots Gaelic, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish
This course is intended for students with little or no knowledge of a modern foreign language for whom a basic proficiency or knowledge of a major European language will be important for their research. The course will be tailored to suit individual student interests.
Basic Latin (15 credits)
This course is intended for students with little or no knowledge of Latin, introducing students to basic grammar and vocabulary.
Intermediate Latin for Postgraduates (15 credits)
This course is intended for students with a reading knowledge of Latin, and will focus on the use of Latin in documents from the medieval and early modern period. Pass in Basic Latin for Postgraduates, or a reading knowledge of Latin, is a prerequisite.
Palaeography I/ II (15 credits)
The postgraduate student of medieval and early modern history needs to be able to access unedited literary and archival sources in the original and to check the completeness and accuracy of earlier editions. Not infrequently, students of medieval history need to access material available only in late copies, extracts and antiquarian notes; consequently they should not restrict their palaeographical studies to the period of their academic study. This course is designed to give students the confidence to go directly to their sources.
Modern Language II (30 credits)
From this list: French, German, Italian, Scots Gaelic, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish
This course is intended for students with little or no knowledge of a modern foreign language for whom m a basic proficiency or knowledge of a major European language will be important for their research. The course will be tailored to suit individual student interests.
Latin Palaeography (15 credits)
Students will be introduced to different styles of handwriting used in the writing of different types of later medieval and early modern documents. They will be trained to identify commonly used abbreviations and contractions. Throughout an emphasis will be placed on practical exercises in transcription. Documents considered will be written in Latin. Pass in Basic Latin for Postgraduates, or reading knowledge of Latin, is a prerequisite.
Submission in September:
Early Modern Dissertation (60 Credits)
The deadline for the dissertation is the first Tuesday of September no later than 4 pm. The course co-ordinator will collect the dissertation and contact dissertation supervisors as well as second-markers and collect marks. Any queries about the dissertation please to k.friedrich@abdn.ac.uk