University of Cape Town

The course explores debates and approaches to the study of economic history in Africa, placing South Africa's economic history within the context of the continent as a whole. It examines the economic legacies of colonialism, and the place of institutions in the growth and development of the continent. Using comparisons between different regions and countries, this course investigates why countries which are resource rich have not been able to use these resources to improve living standards and encourage broad-based economic development. It also examines the roles international business and labor have played in the economic history of individual countries. Finally, the course tracks the changing place of Africa in the global economy. Course entry requirements: At least two courses in historical, social science or cultural studies offered by the Faculty of Humanities.

The course develops and promotes skills in the marine sciences in South Africa, focusing on the global marine ecosystem structure and functioning with an emphasis on South African systems. Lectures, tutorials and practicals build upon prior knowledge to further develop interpretative and integrative skills. The course also develops numerical and written skills, as well as providing an introduction to modern research techniques and approaches.

This course introduces students to a range of current ideas and questions within Literary Studies. The course reflects on some of the most important debates and approaches within contemporary literary and cultural studies. The course considers how cultural forms engage with the question of "‘the contemporary" or "the here and now", both within our current South African moment and across other historical periods and places. What new forms and canons are emerging for twenty-first-century readers and writers in an unstable world? The lecture series is complemented by small-group seminars that are closely tied to the wide-ranging research interests and creative work of staff and senior postgraduates

This course provides a critical understanding of a broad range of complex and diverse intellectual traditions in modern African worlds of thought. Its emphasis is on debates and arguments, conversations and contestations, and connections and displacements. In contrast to an essentialized and unitary notion of African thought, this course emphasizes the plural and dynamic worlds of African intellectuality, drawing particular attention to the vibrant histories of critiques and auto-critiques. In doing so, it also provides a basic sense of the various historical contexts of continental and diasporic activism in which these intellectual approaches were formulated and discussed. Among other themes, the course engages the debates on and around decolonization and violence, nationalism and tribalism, afro-communism and afro-feminism, precolonial epistemologies and customary law, aesthetics and materiality, religion and pedagogy, and postcolonial and neoliberal conditions. The study materials used in this course include original texts by African thinkers, visual sources, and musical compositions.