King's College London

This course examines language, discourse, and communication across different contexts within medicine, illness, and health. It explores some of the dominant policy and media discourses of health, focusing on issues such as mental health, relationships of power between patients and health professionals, the framing of personal risk and responsibility in health promotion, and the representations of emerging diseases. Students examine the discursive negotiation of personal experiences of health problems, for example through narrative reconstructions of illness experiences, positioning of "sick" and "healthy" people, doctor-patient interactions, and the use of online forums for advice and support. The course covers a range of approaches and methods that are used in health discourse analysis, such as illness narratives, discursive psychology, conversation analysis, discourse metaphors, and critical discourse analysis.

This course examines contemporary approaches to the past through a critical examination of current literature, case studies – mainly British, European, and imperial/colonial – and fieldwork excursions in and around London. History and Memory I and II are designed to explore the complex relationships between past and present, promote an understanding of the nature of history as a discipline, and investigate the social and public functions of historical research. The emphasis is on the often controversial relationship between professional historians and other groups with an interest in the past: politicians and states, cultural institutions, the media, and the general public. 

This course investigates how concepts of childhood and youth came about (and are constantly reinvented) in the context of particular social and economic conditions. This course considers how the lives of children and young people today have been shaped by historical and global contexts, and by different national, cultural, religious, social, and economic circumstances. It explores the histories of children and young people at work, at play, and in education, and how these histories shape childhood and youth in different global contexts today.

This is a course on the economics of money, banking, and financial markets. It provides students with an introduction to the role of money, financial markets, financial institutions, and monetary policy in the economy, thus providing a solid foundation for further study or employment in the financial services industry. There are three main components of the course. First, the role of financial markets in the economy is considered with a particular emphasis on bond markets and interest rate determination. The course then covers the main aspects of banks and other financial institutions before turning to an investigation of the role of money, central banking, and monetary policy.