Exeter College, Oxford University

At the heart of the course is a consideration of what is the institution of slavery, how it manifested itself across different contexts and the connections across various slave societies. There is a specific, though not exclusive, focus on the transatlantic slave trade and slavery. The first part of this course considers the origins, development, and core characteristics of slavery from the ancient world to the early modern period. The second part of the course explores the dismantling of the slave system beginning with a consideration of forms of enslaved resistance including a specific focus on the only successful slave revolt in the Atlantic World, the Haitian Revolution. From here, the course examines the rise of the abolitionist movement and the emancipation of slavery. The final part of this course considers the short and long-term legacies of slavery. First, it considers what life looked like for formerly enslaved persons in postemancipation societies. Next, it focuses on the transition to other labor systems. The course concludes with a reflection of some of the present-day legacies of slavery and current efforts to address concerns.

This course introduces students to the theoretical and empirical research in behavioral economics and discusses how the use of methods and evidence in behavioral economics has changed both economics as a discipline and policymaking processes in the past few decades.

This course is an introduction to ethics. It is structured around twelve topics, such as: Do you have a moral duty to donate most of your money to charity? Are we unfree and thus not responsible for anything? Is moral virtue a matter of luck? If someone you love dies and you’re not upset, does that mean you never really cared about them? In addition to thinking about particular ethical issues, the course discusses some of the most powerful and persuasive theories in moral philosophy, including utilitarianism (the view that an action is right if it promotes happiness), deontology (the view that an action is right if it is done from duty), and virtue ethics (the view that an action is right if one has the right moral character or virtues).

In this course students learn, for example, that using language in a certain way may result in a more advantageous outcome for the speaker and by contrast, that certain other ways of using language may be considered law-breaking. No prior knowledge of linguistics is required but having some competence in another language in addition to English is an advantage. This course is interdisciplinary and students learn about the ways in which a number of disciplines are related to one another, including linguistics, the law, criminology, and psychology. 

The course examines the relationship between modernity and narrative as explored in the works of ten Modernist writers in the period 1896 -1940. Students explore the principal political, philosophical, and psychological dynamics affecting the development of Anglophone narrative fiction in the period; the literary strategies developed by these novelists in the context of modernity; the extent to which modernist narratives extend and/or contest earlier ideas of realism in literature; the strengths and weaknesses of various theoretical claims to a distinctively modernist novel and of modernism more generally as a distinctive literary phenomenon. The course is multidisciplinary and is suitable for students of all disciplines who have a strong interest in the novel, narrative methods, and the history of modernity.

Crises such as the German Occupation, the Algerian War of Independence, and the strikes and riots of May 1968 sent shock waves through French society that sooner or later found their way into literature and film. This course examines how French writers and filmmakers responded to some of the major upheavals of mid- to late 20th century France. The course explores the following questions: How do writers and filmmakers seek to remember events that many would rather forget? What is the relationship between individual and collective memory? How might writing and film give expression to crises of personal and national identity? Previous experience of literary analysis is not required but is an advantage. All texts are studied in translation.

The course uses the phenomenon of ghosts and haunting as a lens through which develop students’ ability to think about literature, film, and art by employing diverse analytic methods. Hailing from across national, linguistic traditions, genres, and formats, the texts selected for discussion enable students to consider this pervasive theme through several disciplinary angles, from literary studies to art historical analysis. In addition, students consider the ghost’s political and cultural potential, as it appears in diverse texts across histories and territories.