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World History: Science, Environment and Sustainability

Module description

This module introduces you to one of the most important themes in human and earth history: the transformation of the global environment. It examines relations between humanity and the natural world in the period from approximately 1500 to the present, and asks you to consider how humans have seen nature culturally, and changed it materially. It also looks at the ways in which the domination of nature contributed to the making of an unequal global order and the contemporary environmental crisis. Much of this work will involve discussion of secondary sources in environmental history and environmentalism, as well as the use of primary sources to critically assess arguments developed by historians and others.

No scientific knowledge beyond GCSE will be assumed. Owing to diverse range of source materials examined, this module is highly recommended for interdisciplinary pathways.

Module aims - intentions of the module

This module aims to give you a deeper understanding of global history since approximately 1500 via three major interrelated themes: the environment, science and sustainability. It adopts chronological and comparative cultural/geographical perspectives on a range of specific issues such as the representation of nature, industrialisation, pollution and environmental politics. It aims to develop your skills in fundamental aspects of historical enquiry, including the location, critical understanding and evaluation of primary and secondary source materials, and the written and oral presentation of scholarly arguments.

Intended Learning Outcomes (ILOs)

ILO: Module-specific skills

On successfully completing the module you will be able to...

• 1. Understand some of the key topics in the global history of the environment, science and sustainability
• 2. Evaluate key arguments in environmental history, and use primary and secondary sources to achieve this
• 3. Demonstrate how an understanding of global historical change can inform a more micro-historical approach and vice-versa

ILO: Discipline-specific skills

On successfully completing the module you will be able to...

• 4. Deploy the basic rules of evidence in historical enquiry
• 5. Compare and contrast differing historical approaches
• 6. With guidance, indicate how people have lived, acted and thought in a range of contexts at different times and in a number of locations
• 7. Indicate some of the complexities of historical change at global scales

ILO: Personal and key skills

On successfully completing the module you will be able to...

• 8. With guidance, select and digest academic literature relevant to the topic under study
• 9. Organise material to produce, to a deadline, a coherent and cogent argument
• 10. Communicate ideas orally and respond to the arguments of others in an appropriate manner

Syllabus plan

Whilst the content may vary from year to year, it is envisioned that it will cover some or all of the following topics:

• Introduction
• Changing attitudes towards nature
• The mechanisation and ‘death’ of nature
• Ecological exchange
• Industrialisation
• Pollution and control
• Metabolic rift
• Contemporary environmentalism
• Conclusions

Learning activities and teaching methods (given in hours of study time)

Details of learning activities and teaching methods

Formative assessment

Summative assessment (% of credit)

Details of summative assessment

Details of re-assessment (where required by referral or deferral)

Re-assessment notes

Deferral – if you miss an assessment for certificated reasons judged acceptable by the Mitigation Committee, you will normally be either deferred in the assessment or an extension may be granted. The mark given for a re-assessment taken as a result of deferral will not be capped and will be treated as it would be if it were your first attempt at the assessment.

Referral – if you have failed the module overall (i.e. a final overall module mark of less than 40%) you will be required to re-submit an essay from the same list of questions set during term-time as necessary. The mark given for a re-assessment taken as a result of referral will be capped at 40%.

Indicative learning resources - Basic reading

• David Arnold, The  Problem of Nature: Environment, Culture and European Expansion  (Oxford, 1996)
• Edmund Burke and Kenneth Pomeranz (eds),  The Environment and World History  (Berkeley, 2009) 
  Peter Coates,  Nature: Western Attitudes Since Ancient Times  (Cambridge, 1998)
• Peter Dickens, Society and Nature: Changing our Environment, Changing Ourselves (Cambridge, 2004) 
  J. Donald Hughes, What is Environmental History?  (Cambridge, 2006)
• Todd LeVasseur and Anna Peterson (eds), Religion and Ecological Crisis: The Lynn White Thesis at Fifty (London, 2016)
• J. R. McNeill and Erin Stewart Mauldin (eds), A Companion to Global Environmental History (New York, 2015)
• Carolyn Merchant, The Death of Nature: Women, Ecology and the Scientific Revolution (New York, 1983)
• Raj Patel and Jason W. Moore, A History of the World in Seven Cheap Things (London, 2018)
• Donald Worster (ed.),  The Ends of the Earth: Perspectives on Modern Environmental History  (Cambridge, 1988)

Indicative learning resources - Web based and electronic resources

• ELE page: https://vle.exeter.ac.uk/course/view.php?id=2170
• http://nature.berkeley.edu/departments/espm/env-hist/eh-internet.html
• http://www.eh-resources.org/index.html
• http://www.environmentandsociety.org/arcadia

Key words search

History, environment, science, globalisation, sustainability, economics, politics, religion, gender, cartography