King's College London

This course introduces students to the social dimensions of climate and climate change. The course takes a critical analysis of the dominant international process to mitigate climate change emissions, comprising of the IPCC, UNFCCC process and the Paris Accord. We will explore the different ways in which climate knowledge is constructed and how climate is represented and articulated in society. Existing discourses of climate change are placed in an historical perspective, and alternative aims for climate change mitigation explored. The course begins with a history of the discovery of climate change and an outline of the global governance regime for climate mitigation, as manifested through the Paris Agreement, UNFCCC process, and the IPCC reports. We will then critically analyse this process, by discussing the assumptions that underpin it, the unintended consequences of action to fight climate change, and alternative measures and outcomes that are not covered within the UNFCCC process.

This course explores the viability of the Afro-Gothic as a distinctive sub-genre of the postcolonial Gothic. It seeks to answer the question "What is the Afro-Gothic?" through a historicization of the concept Gothic in relation to narratives about, and by, continental and diasporic Africans. In the postcolonial Gothic, the classic tropes of the Gothic—incarceration within labyrinthine structures, tyrannical patriarchs, histories of hidden brutalities, suppressed and deadly secrets, haunting by the past oppressed and abused, and appearances of ghosts and other un-dead figures—are appropriated to exposes legacies of colonial trauma. Our more focused inquiry stems from the peculiar racialization of the Gothic during the 19th century, when Gothic darkness became increasingly associated with African blackness. 

Contemporary science fiction offers a compelling means of interrogating the current challenges of global governance and political economy. As Brad Torgersen (2013) says, “much of the Science Fiction being written in the 21st century concerns itself strictly with materialistic concerns: climate change, global warming, the decay of governments and the onset of dystopian hegemony, or anarchy”. This course provides students with an exploration of the nexus between science fiction and political economy. It uses science fiction literature as a means of understanding, exploring and critiquing concepts and theories from across Political Economy, including international relations, economics and politics. Through this, students apply the knowledge gained in other courses within political economy, applying key theories and techniques of analysis in novel areas in an engaging but rigorous way. The proposed course directly relates to a growing area of cutting-edge research, namely the interplay between popular culture and politics.

This course gives an overview of political geography's historical and contemporary treatment of the questions of territoriality, state, and nation. Topics include nations and nationalism, and boundaries and territorial disputes, and students explore how territoriality, nation, and sovereignty are viewed in developing regions of the world. 

This course has been developed through an exciting international collaboration with seven institutions across the UK and Europe. Teaching content has been designed by international experts in various fields of cultural competence, linguistics, and translation/interpreting. Each week, the course tackles a theoretical and practical aspect of multilingualism and multiculturalism, in the context of topical issues, such as generative AI, climate change, democracy, global health, equality and diversity, and civic responsibilities. Having a second or third language can be an advantage, but the course does not require students to be multilingual. The course develops cultural competency in the context of multiculturalism and multilingualism (M&M), particularly through learning from translation and interpreting studies in the age of artificial intelligence to provide students with an essential understanding of the topic and the skills to learn to effectively navigate the complexity of M&M in real-world situations. to challenge students to go beyond the recognition of the coexistence of cultures and languages, by actively engaging them in discussions centered around democracy, climate change, and global health.

Experimental writing is often counterposed to writing that emphasizes voice, experience, and identity. Exploring the relationships between literary form and subjectivity, between abstract systemic forces and our concrete lived experiences of the world, the course considers how contemporary writers have turned to experimental techniques to channel modes of solidarity, joy and refusal, and to make legible forms of gendered and racial violence. In this way, literary experimentalisms have also provided crucial tools for anti-racist and feminist critique. But what makes a literary text experimental? What does experimental writing have to say about class? And what does it mean to ‘queer’ a text? Asking these and other questions, the course will considers what the literary critic Anthony Reed calls "literature’s means of expanding the domain of the intelligible and thinkable."

This course provides a critical understanding of the discipline of Forensic Science as it applies to the scientific underpinning of the processes from crime scene to courtroom.

This course looks at definition of a curve, arc length, curvature, and torsion of a curve, Frenet-Serret equations. It also looks at definition of a surface patch, first and second fundamental forms, isometries, conformal maps, area, Gaussian curvature, mean curvature, principal curvatures, Gauss map, geodesics, and Theorema Egregium.

The course enables students to gain a broad understanding of ten important environmental issues that have emerged during the Anthropocene, the science that underlies them, the various management and mitigation options and technologies, and how this links to policy. Topics include (as representative samples, which may change): deforestation, desertification and agricultural intensification, biodiversity loss, urbanization, pollution, ocean acidification, loss of polar environments, maintaining sustainability and ecosystem services, and understanding ecological systems and resilience.

Terror expands the soul, said Ann Radcliffe. Does it? Why did Gothic begin in the 18th century? How does it work as a powerful, disturbing, dangerous genre? How did it challenge philosophers and aesthetic thinkers? What can we learn from parodies and satires of Gothic? What questions does it stage and why do they continue to compel and fascinate? Could there be a "Female Gothic"? This course explores a selection of Gothic texts – poems and novels - to investigate the genre's variety of forms and its appeal to readers.