Module Directory

This module is an introduction to urban history, focusing on urbanisation processes and urban life in Europe. It considers cities in interaction with each other, in a network of cities, and with their hinterland as well as within their specific environmental context. After an introductory session on urbanisation, the module focused on three central and interlinked topics (sustainability, citizens, and citizenship). These topics will be examined with a focus on an urban historical crisis/ challenge followed by responses/ reactions/ solutions to these challenges. The (recorded and timetabled) lectures will be collaborations between experts from the University of Antwerp and one or two more YUFE colleagues. Essex will contribute to the lecture block that examines urban architecture, planning reforms and modernist cities. The goal of the module is to showcase the diversity of historical urban crises and responses, and the ways in which history can contribute to contemporary debates on cities and sustainability.

In addition to the collaborative lectures scheduled for this module, there will be face to face seminar teaching at the University of Essex for this module. Part of the seminar teaching will be a field trip to the local city (Colchester for Essex) asking the students to engage with their local urban environment through the setting a practical task.

The aims of this module are:

• To introduce students to urbanisation processes, sustainability and urban life in Europe across time periods.


• To provide students with an understanding of how urban challenges and solutions to these challenges can work.


• To enable students to see continuities between historical processes and contemporary debates.

At the end of the module, students will be expected to be able to: 

1. Describe urbanization processes, in the long-term, with examples of European cities. 

1. Understand key topics such as inequality, migration, citizenship, transport, consumption, urban governance, and environment in European history.


2. Understand urban development in relation to other socio-spatial dimensions such as countryside, state, and overseas territories.


3. Critically relate current issues like migration, environmental crisis, and territorial integration, to the history of cities and citizens in Europe.


4. Compare urban development between different cities and regions. 

Transferable skills: Students will be introduced to the different teaching styles and approaches of European experts on the topic which allows them to experience not only a different approach to the topic but also varying styles of delivery which will prepare them well for the workplace. Students will engage with their fellow students across the YUFE partners which will enhance their communication skills.

Lecture Schedule

1. Introductory session Greet De Block & Jasper Segerink (UA)


2. Urbanisation in the long run Ilja Van Damme (UA)


3. Citizens I - Demographic crisis: migration & health (each block is circa 90-120 minutes long with three different lecturers)
   
   
   
   1. Migration & population in the long run Hilde Greefs (UA)
   
   
   2. Health transition, demographic transition and urbanisation, 19th century; with focus on Hungarian-Croatian region Dubravka Boži"á Bogovi"á (UNIRI)
   
   
   3. Temporary migrations and their urban infrastructures, 16^th-20^th centuries Jasper Segerink (UA)
   
   
   
   

4. Citizens II - Response: infrastructure & planning
   
   
   
   1. Urban planning in the long run Greet De Block (UA)
   
   
   2. Educating citizens & social housing in German cities, late 19th early 20th C Nadine Rossol (UE)
   
   
   3. The Socialist Soviet City and visions of Modernity, Brigitte Lenormand (Maastricht)
   
   
   
   

5. Citizenship I - Social crisis: inequality & segregation
   
   
   
   1. Inequality in the long run Sam Geens (UA)
   
   
   2. Layers of Division: Urban Form and Social Inequality (20th-21st century) Charalambous (UCY)
   
   
   3. TBC
   
   
   
   

6. Citizenship II - Response: governance & welfare
   
   
   
   1. Welfare in the long run Bert De Munck (UA)
   
   
   2. Social housing in the UK and its local governance David Fée (SNU)
   
   
   3. Governance and citizenship in a medieval city - between the ideal and the pragmatics in Prussia Anna Maleszka (NCU)
   
   
   
   

7. Sustainability I - Ecological crisis: city-hinterland relations and production-consumption dynamics
   
   
   
   1. Ecological crises in the long run Tim Soens (UA)
   
   
   2. Urban sprawl, solution and problem Jani Karhu (UEF)
   
   
   3. Medieval city, country and trade - between cooperation and exploitation Cezary Kardasz (NCU)
   
   
   
   

8. Sustainability II - Response: Urban commons & sustainability practices
   
   
   
   1. Commons & sustainability in the long run Wout Saelens (UA)
   
   
   2. Responses to ecological constraints of city development in pre-modern Europe Roman Czaja (NCU)
   
   
   3. The social logic of Roman urban neighbourhoods Jesús Bermejo Tirado (U3M)
   
   
   
   

Module Cap Criteria

Students will have to take this module when they are on the YUFE Urban Sustainability Studies degree scheme. Essex students who are not on this course can take the module too and would need to sign up through OPEN YUFE and the Virtual Campus. As this is an unusual way for Essex students to register for a module, maybe it is possible to include a link to the YUFE Virtual Campus with the module information. We suggest a cap of 20 Essex students as part of the organising of this module is carried out by the university of Antwerp for all YUFE partners (10) and this means we need to ensure that the numbers remain manageable.

This module will be delivered via:

• Eight 2-hour lectures
• Four 1-hour seminars
• One field trip to Colchester
• Online mini conference, 2 hours (organised by Antwerp) at the end of the module in which students talk about the photograph of their local city that they have taken and linked to a theme of the module

Students are expected to undertake the reading before the seminars classes and be prepared to engage in discussion. The readings will be available online.

Assessment: 100% coursework

Photo assignment: Students will ask to take a photo of something in their local city that relates to one of the module’s themes of urban crisis/ intervention/ solution. The photo should be accompanied by a short essay

(800-1000 words) on the choice of the photo, what theme it relates to and how this can be linked to what the student has learnt based on the lectures and the readings.

Mini conference (online): Students will present their photo assignment to fellow students across the YUFE partners. This is done on a pass/fail basis (but attendance of the conference is mandatory).

Essay: This is a short essay (1,500 words) on the themes/readings of the module. Essay questions will be set for the students