King's College London

The course offers a broad introduction to some of the main areas of music humanities study that students encounter later in their studies. These include 1) an introduction to a key selection of music and music history from the Middle Ages to the 21st century; and 2) an introduction to contemporary topics and methodologies, such as jazz studies, ethnomusicology, or sound studies.

This course studies how the internal structure of operating systems is designed and implemented for management of resources and provision of services. Topics include process and thread creation and management; communication in processes and threads; process synchronization and deadlocks; memory-management strategies; and protection and security. 

The course provides theoretical foundations for key concepts appearing in analysis: open sets, closed sets, compact sets, connected sets, continuous maps. This is done in the context of metric and topological spaces.  

This course prepares students to use simple quantitative methods in their dissertations, and provides the conceptual tools needed to produce, commission, evaluate, and interpret statistical information in professional contexts. It provides a brief but systematic introduction to three forms of data collection: sample surveys, experiments, and content analysis. It explains the theory behind these techniques, the form that they would ideally take, the compromises that are made in order to conduct them in the real world, and the consequences which those compromises have for the reliability of findings. Students create proposals for quantitative research projects, analyze pre-prepared datasets, and receive an introduction to the practicalities of data collection by jointly designing and conducting a piece of survey research. 

Neoplatonism is the last great ancient Greek philosophical tradition, founded in the 3rd century by Plotinus, who is arguably the most important ancient Greek thinker after Plato and Aristotle. Neoplatonism had a tremendous historical influence on subsequent philosophy, in both the European and Islamic worlds. Above all, however, the Neoplatonists are distinctive for their own philosophical interest and value, developing fascinating positions on issues such as the structure of reality, the soul and its happiness, the nature of evil, and the meaning of freedom. The Neoplatonic tradition also devoted considerable attention to the interpretation and harmonization of Plato and Aristotle. Anyone interested in the work of these two thinkers is likely to find Neoplatonism of interest too.

This course is broadly equivalent to A1 Basic User, Breakthrough Level of the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages.

The Iberian Peninsula was home to the first ventures of global empire. Drawing on key medieval and early modern texts in Portuguese and Spanish from the peninsula and its colonies this course examines the literary representation of frontiers and colonization. Students learn about the emergence of the modern states we now call Spain and Portugal and how they were not only the initiators of worldwide transformations, but also the products of a complex process of colonization. Through the literary representation of the relations between Christians, Iberian Muslims, and the indigenous peoples of Africa and the New World, key concepts of frontier, conquest, reconquest, conversion and coexistence are examined as part of global movements and dynamic cultural (ex)change.

This course examines how British Prime Ministers have governed in the period 1979-2015, and the role of the Prime Minister in the British system. The first half of the course focuses on key themes relating to the office of Prime Minister and the machinery of government, with the second half providing specific historical case studies, onto which the frameworks and theories discussed in the first half of the course can be applied and used for analysis and evaluation. Special attention is given to the memoirs and diaries of the prime ministers, cabinet ministers, and senior officials involved in managing the central machinery of government. The use of historical sources, and debate around the historiography of the subjects being discussed are interwoven into each week’s teaching. 

Queer history is both a subject and a practice, and this course provides an introduction to both. It is, first, an introductory global history of sexuality, demonstrating the vast range of approaches different societies have taken to regulating and experiencing the body and desire. It also aims to introduce students to the method of queer history, one of many approaches to the past which illuminate how Historical Grand Narratives are produced, and how they might change. 

The course provides a broad overview of this diverse critical discourse over the past generation, while also paying close attention to some of the most pressing debates currently animating the field. Topics include identities, sexualities, temporalities, homophobia, activism, deviance, performance and transgression.