King's College London

This course is a study of the complexity of our body, and it provides students with an introduction to the key concepts and issues that are central to modern developmental biology. 

This course introduces students to the Greek and Latin literary tradition. It is for students without any background knowledge of ancient literature and offers a chronologically laid out, broad survey of periods, genres, and best known authors of Greek and Roman literature. Although the broad conceptual categories of “socio-cultural context” and generic expectations define the overall intellectual tone of this course, judiciously chosen extracts from the texts themselves (all in English translation) are strategically woven into lectures. Major thematic stops of this course include early Greek epic and lyric poetry; fifth-century Athenian drama; classical historiography; fourth century oratory; Plato and Aristotle; Hellenistic poetry; imperial Greek literature; the literature of early and late Republican Rome; highlights from Augustan literature; Stoicism and Epicureanism in Roman literature and thought; early imperial literature and historiography; the Roman satirical tradition; and the literature of the Late Empire.

In this course, students study two classic Victorian novels alongside poetry, drama, essays, scientific writing, and paintings and visual material. The course demonstrates the extraordinary range of experimentation in Victorian literary writing and art in this period. For example, students read Dickens's DOMBEY AND SON to think about modernity and machines in the 1840s, but also to think about the sea and the maritime nature of the British empire. Other seminars are spent finding out what the Victorians thought and felt about nature, gardens, animals, science, sexual pleasure and pain, religion, the violence of British imperialism, environmental exploitation, a growing commodity culture, capitalism, and the changing status of women. 

The course covers the history of Europe from the late 18th century through to 1991 – from the French Revolution to the fall of the Soviet Union. Attention is given to social, cultural, economic, and political history, and the way these components have interacted. Lectures and seminars approach European history from a variety of angles. In chronological terms, the course highlights key moments in European history (wars, revolutions) that had continent-side repercussions. In geographical terms, it explores the uses, as well as the limits, of dividing European history into histories of discrete nations and states. In thematic terms, it looks at the formation and evolution of various collective actors—religious communities, classes, sexes, professions, generations - and consider how these groups have shaped and been shaped by historical change.

This course provides knowledge of key topics in cell biology with a strong emphasis on molecular and biochemical aspects, to equip students for more detailed studies of cell biology in advanced courses, to give students experience of some experimental techniques that are used to research cell structure and function, and to develop students’ skills in accessing and understanding primary scientific literature, analysis of data, and scientific writing.