Information for Prospective Undergraduates

History Degrees at Aberystwyth University

History Degree - 3 year Degree Scheme (V100)

History Degree

The single honours History degree is the department’s most popular course. Whereas the other Aberystwyth history degrees are somewhat more specialised. This general History degree aims to develop your interests in the sweep of history, broadening and deepening your knowledge and understanding of the subject. The programme is designed to be extremely flexible, allowing you to tailor the history degree to your own particular interests.

History Degree Year 1

The purpose of the first year as a history degree student is to introduce you to problems of historical analysis and interpretation, and it has four distinctive features:

1. No prior study of history is assumed, so a core module has been designed to ease you into your undergraduate history degree study. It identifies new concepts and historical skills, new methods and periods, and some of the most exciting recent historical works.
2. Choose your history degree modules. You'll have the opportunity to choose five history modules from 16 on offer to you. These modules could include:
   • Barbarian Europe
   • Soldiers, Saints and Serfs: England, 1042-1154
   • Age of Discovery: The Conquest of the Americas, 1492-1620
   • Stuart England: War, Political Crisis and Social Change, 1629-1714
   • The Making of the American Nation, 1783-2000
3. Historical analysis is immediately introduced by teaching the major historical issues to you in depth.
4. Emphasis on seminar teaching. Each module will involve small seminar groups (c.10-12 students), alongside larger lectures. They also incorporate individual tutorials covering assessed work. Studying history at Aberystwyth means you'll always get the attention from the lecturers you deserve.

History Degree Years 2 and 3

During your 2nd and 3rd year History Degree you’ll have the opportunity to take a mixture of different types of modules, these modules cover four different categories:

1. Survey Modules: These are broad, lecture-based introductions to a period or theme. Current survey modules include:
   • The Making of Western Christendom, 800-1200
   • War and Society in History
   • Early Modernity in Europe
   • Mass Politics in Modern Europe, 1789-1945
2. Skills Modules: These offer the opportunity to become directly involved in the study of historical sources or improve specific research skills. Current skills modules include:
   • History in Cartoons: Studying Georgian Satirical Prints
   • Images of Stalinism
   • Studying Cuban History through Film
3. Option Modules: These focus specifically on the character of historical change in particular countries. Current option modules include:
   • An Introduction to the Archaeology of the British Isles
   • Weimar Germany
   • The Social and Economic History of Early Modern Europe
   • Media and Society in 20th Century Britain
4. Special Subjects: These modules offer a close, in-depth study of particular period or theme focusing on the primary sources. You will become familiar with the problems of evidence, control of sources, and presentation of argument that are crucial to the historian. Current Special Subjects include:
   • Roman Britain
   • Richard II
   • The Third Reich
   • Britain at War, 1939-1945
   • The Russian Revolution
5. Dissertation: The history degree culminates in a dissertation researched and written over the two semesters in the 3rd year. It provides the opportunity to study a topic of your choice in detail under the close supervision of a member of staff. In many ways, this can be the most rewarding aspect of the degree scheme. Recent dissertations include:
   • German Occupation of the Netherlands, 1940-1945
   • Why didn’t Wales experience a Witch-hunt in the seventeenth century?
   • We all want to change the world: The 1960’s as counter-culture and revolution

For a full list of current modules at all levels, please refer to the department’s web page.