University of Bristol

This course explores theory, history, and debates on current U.S. foreign policy issues, providing students with a basis for understanding the transformations and continuities in U.S. Foreign policy as a means to pressing foreign policy issues. Students discuss the international significance of the economic, military, political, and cultural reach of the United States. This course also discusses how history, institutions, practices, people, objects, and ideas shape the decision-making processes that underlie U.S. foreign policy.

This course examines social, cultural, and political patterns in the East Asian societies of Greater China, Japan, and Korea. Emphasis is on the shared traditions that define East Asia as a region, and its component societies with the forces associated with cultural, social, and political “globalization” historically and during recent decades, and on the particular characteristics of each society. The study of East Asian society provides a unique opportunity to explore differences in the construction and articulation of key social divisions between countries and regions, as well as compare and critically examine existing conceptualizations of them. Going beyond dichotomies of East and West, traditional and modern, this course examines sociological issues from a theoretically informed and comparative perspective among East Asia and between East Asia and Europe.

This course explores a range of performance texts and contexts from the 16th and 17th centuries and emphasizes modes of staging and early modern performative practices. Students explore indoors and outdoors performances including commercial amphitheaters such as The Globe, private playhouses such as The Blackfriars, as well as aristocratic forms of theater such as dining hall drama, pageants, royal entries, and court masques. In the second half of the unit students focus on texts and performance skills, including early modern rehearsal and acting techniques; uses of space in the early modern drama; and the production of gender, race, and, class on the stage. The course examines the historical and cultural contexts of early modern theater, as well as a detailed knowledge of early modern practices of playing including verse-speaking, stagecraft, costume, make-up, music, and clowning.

This course builds upon the principles introduced in Pharmacology 1A, with a focus on more applied/systematic aspects of pharmacology. It covers the processes involved in drug design and development, from molecules to the clinical evaluation of new therapeutic agents. The pharmacology of autonomic and endocrine systems are described, and drug selectivity is explored through the study of antimicrobial and cancer chemotherapy, with a focus on selective toxicity. Students undertake a group-based pharmacological literature review.

This course examines the labor theory of value, the Law of Markets, gender in economics, and detailed studies of selected authors (e.g. Hume, Say, Malthus, Keynes). The course is largely based on reading extracts from primary texts although some attention is also paid to the secondary literature, the contemporary reception of the works and the historical situations in which they were written. The course provides an overview of the development of economics since the Ancient Greeks although the main focus is from the mercantilist period to Keynes. It explores the major writings in the history of economic thinking and sets these in the context of the development of capitalist economies. Emphasis is placed on accounts of value, distribution, and accumulation.

This course teaches contemporary British cinema through the study of a range of films by British directors produced over the last twenty years. The course opens on the technical aspects of cinematic production and the basic principles of film theory and criticism. The films are studied in the chronological order of their production. In the study of individual films, students examine the stylistic features of particular directors' work, the national and cultural climate in which each film appeared, and the degree to which economic factors influenced the representation of national identity. Students also study other aspects of film production including casting, language, genre, narrative, and ideas of realism and comedy. Assessment is by an essay and a class presentation.

This course explores the relationship between theater and politics, focusing on theater and performance events that are rooted in the explicit exploration of political issues. Case studies span historical periods and include suffrage parades, Brecht and political play-writing, workers theater, agitprop, Welfare State International, sit-ins, the Occupy movement, and contemporary approaches to political theater. This course considers these examples in detailed social and historical context, with focus on political, national, local, and cultural identities.

This course provides the essential base of organic chemistry required for advanced study at Levels 6 and 7 (Years 3 and 4). It covers the main areas of chemistry of carbanions, carbocations and radicals, monofunctional and difunctional carbonyl compounds, aromatic, homocyclic and heterocyclic compounds, amino derivatives, and modern aspects of synthesis. Workshops are integral to the unit.

This course explores the origin of quantization of molecular energies and demonstrates that wavefunctions are solutions to the Schrödinger equation for any 1-D problem; for particle in the 2-D box and for the hydrogen atom. It also examines the linearity of operators and identifes eigenvalues. Students explore the quantum mechanics of particle-in-a-box and its relationship to simple properties of ideal gases, as well as the quantum mechanics of the rigid rotor and its relationship to microwave spectroscopy. Students are able to deduce structural parameters from microwave spectra. The course also examines the relationship between the quantum mechanics of the harmonic oscillator and its relationship to IR spectroscopy.

In this course, students undertake a primary source-based project linked to a special topic in history. The project is supervised by the Special Topic Tutor and is assessed through a 4000-word project produced at the conclusion of the course. The assessment of this course is based entirely on the final paper. Students receive guidance from their supervisors in individual meetings, including initial discussions about their prospective topics, guidance meetings, email advice, and feedback following the completion of the project.