University of Galway

This course provides an introduction to the mythology and religious beliefs and customs of the ancient and medieval Celts, on the continent and in the Isles, and to the later reflexes of these beliefs in modern folklore. It examines evidence for the religious beliefs of the pre-Christian Celts and explore some of the essential elements of Celtic mythology. Material and archaeological evidence from Continental Europe, Britain, and Ireland are consulted, as well as written evidence, from classical writers of the late centuries BC to the Christian writers of the middle ages in Ireland. This section of the course includes study of some major Irish mythological texts (read in English translation) and consideration of the place and function of mythology in early Irish society. Students are also introduced to folk-beliefs and customs of Ireland, including traditions and stories concerning the fairies, saints, and holy wells; death customs and rituals; and traditions concerning the calendar and seasons. 
 

The course involves an exploration of early historic and medieval Ireland in its European context. Topics include an examination of Roman influences, the archaeology of the Christian church, the exciting developments associated with the Viking Age in Scandinavia and the North Atlantic, the impact of the Norse on Ireland, and the transforming influence of the Anglo-Normans in castle building, town development, and rural villages in the Irish landscape.

The focus of this course is a selection of the Sherlock Holmes stories by Arthur Conan Doyle. The critical tools used in class include structuralist, post-colonial, and gender studies. Through this course, the students appraise each text individually and look at the global issues pervading the Sherlock Holmes corpus. The proposed method of study is comparative analysis.

Efforts to support child health, including those made by health professionals and services, humanitarian organizations, interventions, and policymakers, are often hindered by common sense or ageist assumptions about who children are and should be. This course unpacks and contrasts those assumptions with evidence from actual children in their lived contexts. Questions will include: Can and should children be responsible for their health, health management, or medications? How do children cope with and care for illness? Who should decide whether a child receives medical treatment? What do and should children know about issues like sexuality, death, and bodily functions? Should we tell a child if they are dying? What happens when health interventions forget children are people? How can health policy perpetuate or address child health inequities? What’s wrong with saying “children are resilient”? Students learn how to think about child health from four perspectives: constructionist, child-centered, critical (structural), and biosocial.

Ireland’s symbolic and gendered construction as a musical nation offers a starting point for discussions of music, gender, and Ireland. Following that, the course surveys a range of genres, performers, and performance platforms from the 19th century onwards to explore the relationship between gender and music in the Irish context. Particular emphasis is given to traditional and popular music examples. 

This course explores key texts and themes in developing an understanding and appreciation of European film practices from 1940 to the present day. Using a series of case studies, students learn to situate a range of film texts according to historical, cultural, and social contexts, in addition to relevant theoretical debates.

Using an “ecocritical” approach, this course examines how literary texts have represented the relation of humans to “nature” and to environmental change from early mythological writings to present-day fiction. Among the texts to be studied are the Epic of Gilgamesh, Greek and Roman pastoral poems, Romantic landscape poetry, American environmental writing, Irish nature poetry, and contemporary ecological dystopic fiction.

This course looks at how the experience of migration is represented in 20th-century Irish writing. While the central focus is on literary representations of the Irish diaspora, contemporary representations of the immigrant experience within Ireland is also examined. English language and Irish language texts (in translation) are considered.

This course provides students with an overview of the major developments in the depiction of sport in film. Considering fiction, documentary, and newsreels, the course explore the diverse ways different cultures have depicted sport in film.