University College London

The course provides an in-depth introduction to the neurobiology of social behavior with a focus on model systems. Following a refresher on the general principles of what it means to be social, why it is useful, and how social drives lead to specific behaviors, the topics covered include a description of different animal models used to examine social behavior from invertebrates up to mammals. Emphasis is placed on understanding the brain areas and circuits involved, including the effects that key players, such as specific genes, environmental situations, neurotransmitters, and peptides, have on the circuits underlying social behavior. Finally, the course gives an overview of both well-established and novel assays used to measure different social behaviors.

Fashion and textiles operate at the intersection of persons and society, and are the primary cultural signifiers of what sorts of people, individuals consider themselves to be. Fashion goods are the primary points of debates about unfolding values, aspirations, hierarchies, objections, new technologies, and ways of socializing. The course in equips students to understand the societal impact of emerging new technologies and new materials in the production and retailing of textile and fashion with an emphasis on modelling societal take-up via the unique method of anthropology, which provides a depth of focus on the human life cycle and unfolding biographical relations across many cultures.

This course examines the nature and value of democracy, and the various roles played by citizens and constitutions in sustaining it. The first part of the course examines different justifications for democracy and different understandings of the nature of the democratic process. The second part of the course focuses on issues of democratic citizenship, such as who should be viewed as a citizen, and whether democratic citizens have duties to obey the law and to vote. The final part of the course studies some of the ways law and politics interact with a particular focus on the relationships between constitutions, judicial review, and democracy.

This course is an introduction to Psycholinguistics, an interdisciplinary field of study which aims to understand how humans learn, represent, comprehend, and produce language. It begins by asking what it means to know a language and explore the nature of our linguistic competence. Students examine core properties of mental representations and processes involved in acquiring and understanding language, and how linguistic processes unfold in real time. Finally, students explore issues in perception, production, and acquisition in three core domains: speech sounds, words, and sentences.