University of Edinburgh

Linear Algebra is one of the most widely used topics in the mathematical sciences. At lower levels students are taught standard techniques for basic linear algebra tasks including the solution of linear systems, finding eigenvalues/eigenvectors, and orthogonalization of bases. However, these techniques are usually computationally too intensive to be used for the large matrices encountered in practical applications. This course introduces students to these practical issues, and presents, analyzes, and applies algorithms for these tasks which are reliable and computationally efficient. The course includes significant lab work using an advanced programming language. The course studies three main topics: the solution of linear systems of equations, the solution of least squares problems and finding the eigenvectors and/or eigenvalues of a matrix.

This course covers a range of issues and activity associated with mechanical engineering practice. These include legal issues and knowledge of real world activity through engineering applications, guest lectures, and study of engineering companies.

How can we understand gender in the contemporary world? How is gender constructed in different contexts and what are the material consequences? How can gender analyses empower us to act as agents of personal and social change? This inter-disciplinary course provides an overview of the major issues at stake in the study of gender relations from a broadly social science perspective. It introduces students to gender studies as a theoretical field of investigation, examining key concepts and debates in the field. Students will explore issues of power, inequality, intersectionality, change and resistance through contemporary examples of 'doing gender' around the world. In doing so, this course equips students - as 21st Century graduates - with awareness and understanding of global inequalities based on gender, race, class, and sexuality, as well as basic tools to undertake gender analysis.

This first-semester course introduces students to the history of literature in Scotland in English and Scots, covering two periods of its great flourishing: at the Stuart court of the late 14th and 15th centuries, and in the Romantic period of the late 18th and early 19th centuries. The focus is on how questions of literary form relate to the social and intellectual context in which the text was written and read; that is, on how the text's formal achievement reflects the institutions which made it possible and the ideas which made it meaningful. The course encourages students to extend their essay writing skills through engagement with critical material.