- Department: History
- Credit value: 20 credits
- Credit level: H
- Academic year of delivery: 2023-24
At the end of the twelfth century, religion took to the streets. Monks and nuns had long sought salvation by abandoning the world, but a new generation headed into city streets to forge lives among the destitute and despised. Theirs was a period of huge social change. Urbanization created new riches, and new social problems. Victims of the profit economy became objects of concern, and poverty a religious preoccupation. From the streets came voices of dissent, and heresy, proclaiming the corruptions of wealth. Radicals, including Francis of Assisi, became beggars and preachers. And women led new calls, as mystics and beguines, embracing lives of service to the poor and diseased, outside church structures. These voices were inspiring, but also dangerous; the more extreme became objects of wonder, attracting biographers whose writings survive.
This module explores this era of religious ferment, of social change and social challenge, 1170–1250. It focuses on the city streets of England, Flanders, and France, but also looks to Italy and Germany. It uncovers the upheaval of the profit economy through the social responses, religious zeal and controversies that were produced by the clash between urban wealth and poverty. It looks at the new forms of religious life -- the preachers, mendicants, and beguines – as well as the leprosaria and hospitals, and the sick and paupers they served. At its heart is the new public space of the marketplace, and the radical voices it enabled. To do this, we deploy a range of source material, including saints’ lives, chronicles, law, exempla, charters, regulations and court inquests, all provided in English.
Students taking this module must also take the first part in Semester 1.
Occurrence | Teaching period |
---|---|
A | Semester 2 2023-24 |
The aims of this module are:
Students who complete this module successfully will:
Students will attend a 3-hour seminar in weeks 2-4, 6-8 and 10-11 of semester 2. Weeks 5 & 9 are Reading and Writing Weeks (RAW). Students prepare for and participate in eight three-hour seminars in all. A one-to-one meeting between tutor and students will also be held to discuss assessments.
Seminar topics are subject to variation, but are likely to include the following:
Task | % of module mark |
---|---|
Essay/coursework | 100 |
None
For formative assessment, students submit an essay draft of 2000-words.
For summative assessment, students complete a 4000-word essay relating to the themes and issues of the module. This comprises 100% of the overall module mark. Summative assessments will be due in the assessment period.
Task | % of module mark |
---|---|
Essay/coursework | 100 |
Following their formative assessment task, students will receive a one-to-one meeting with the tutor to discuss the essay and their plans for the assessed essay.
Work will be returned to students with written comments in their tutorial and may be supplemented by the tutor giving some oral feedback to the whole group. All students are encouraged, if they wish, to make use of 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. For more information, see the Statement of Assessment.
During the module, please refer to the module VLE site. Before the course starts, we encourage you to look at the following items of preliminary reading: