Globalisation: History, Politics, Culture BA(Hons)

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Top reasons to choose this course

• Expert staff: your teaching team includes academics who develop leading research as part of the Centre for Applied Philosophy, Politics and Ethics.
• Small group assessed seminars: a distinctive feature of this course is its focus on verbal communication, helping to ensure you develop your capacity to discuss and debate ideas and to speak confidently and clearly in public. Group and individual presentations feature prominently in seminar work and our final year project includes an oral presentation.
• Placement opportunities: these give you the chance to make industry connections and gain valuable experience.

• An interdisciplinary approach: drawing on, and combining, various disciplines to understand topics and ideas, you will develop a deep and multilayered approach to contemporary issues.

• An engaging curriculum: you will benefit from a curriculum designed to be both challenging and stimulating, with a mix of lectures, seminars, debates and collaborative projects. 
• Real-world application: this course encourages you to apply theoretical approaches to real-world issues, preparing you to address contemporary global challenges.
• Join a vibrant community: our programme offers visiting researchers and practitioners, reading groups, public lectures and workshops.

Course structure 

You will be taught in small, participatory seminar groups to foster skills in oral presentation, debating and listening. Every seminar is supported by a preceding lecture.

Your academic work will be supported by workshops that develop your academic and independent research skills.

Year 1
All degrees within the humanities programme area share a first year. You will take six modules that develop the skills central to your course. These include topics such as global ethics, culture and communication and politics of the past.

Year 2 
In year 2 of the Globalisation: History, Politics, Culture degree you will follow the Globalisation option pathway and choose a further option pathway from the wider humanities subject area, alongside two core modules. Pathways are sets of modules in a specialised area that enable a deep, critical engagement with the subject. 

Final year
You will complete your year 2 option pathways, core modules and undertake a dissertation project. Project findings are presented in an oral exam that tests your skills of presentation, communication, discussion and debate. 

Our courses are reviewed and enhanced on an ongoing basis in order to make sure that what you learn with us is relevant and that your course enables you to develop appropriate skills. When you apply to study with us, we will inform you of any new developments in your chosen programme through .

Year 1

In year 1 you take six modules that help develop the skills central to your course.

Modules

• Culture and Communication

  This module introduces you to the study of representation in the context of globalisation. It explores how different narratives and viewpoints emerge, and how they shape particular visions of our world. Drawing on ideas about ideology, language and semiotics, you will examine a range of textual and visual forms to understand the challenges and opportunities of a complex, interconnected and unequal world shaped by technology and other global forces.

• Politics of the Past

  Why is history political? Why are contested ideas about the past central to today’s culture wars? And how should historians intervene in these debates? In this module, you’ll explore how historical narratives influence national identity, political conflict and public debate. Through case studies such as debates about statues and wartime myths, you will learn how to analyse online material and create a social media campaign that scrutinises a popular representation of the past.

• Foundations in World Politics

  You will examine critical historical perspectives on the modern international political system. You’ll examine how the peoples and governments of the world came to be linked through an imperial system by exploring major world events and processes of global history. Key topics include the origins of the international political system, slavery, imperial and colonial expansion, anti-colonial resistance and liberation, global governance, controversy and historiography.

• Introduction to the Global Challenges Lab

  You will be supported to design and carry out a group research project that addresses one of the global challenges identified by the Sustainable Development Goals. You’ll learn how to create blogs and podcasts to share your research with a non-academic audience, and you will develop skills in self and peer evaluation. This module is genuinely student led. Rather than following prescribed academic content, tutors provide structured support to help you find relevant research and resources, building your independent research skills.

• Globalisation, Conflict and the Environment

  This module introduces key concepts, theories and questions in international relations and global studies. You will examine and evaluate the political implications of different approaches to understanding important aspects of our contemporary world. You will also explore how these concepts and theories are applied to contested global issues, such as environmental sustainability and war and conflict.

• Global Ethics

  Are some things right and wrong across cultures? How should humans relate to animals, nature and technology? How are sex and gender understood in different places. In this module you will examine questions in global ethics using frameworks of thinking from around the world, such as Islamic traditions, Confucianism and Jainism as well as Indigenous perspectives from Latin America, Africa and the South Pacific. You will explore the ethical perspectives that interest you and apply them to real-world moral dilemmas.

Year 2

In year 2 you will take Colonialism in the Contemporary Global Era and Development and Sustainability, the first two modules of the Globalisation option pathway that you will follow for the rest of your degree. As well as that pathway, you’ll take core modules and a second option pathway from the humanities subject group, and start the research for your final-year dissertation project.

You can choose to follow the second option pathway for all of year 2 or opt to take the Humanities Placement: Active Citizenship module and study the option pathway for a semester.

Core modules

• Critical Traditions in Western Thought 1
• Critical Traditions in Western Thought 2

Globalisation option pathway modules

• Colonialism in the Contemporary Global Order
  This module enables you to develop understanding of anti-colonial, post-colonial and decolonial theory. By engaging with authors who have links to the Global South, you’ll explore the continuing presence of power relations that are associated with colonialism, illustrated by case studies. You’ll consider this in relation to global issues including the climate crisis, global militarism, international economic inequalities and international institutions.
• Development and Sustainability
  Sustainability and development are two important areas within global politics. On this module you’ll examine the politics of global development. You will develop a deep understanding of international action on hunger, poverty and gender equality amongst other issues, alongside exploring the links between sustainability and development.

Option pathways

Choose a second option pathway from:

• Philosophy and Literature
• Self and Society
• Morality, Politics and the Good Life
• Race and Resistance
• Politics, History, Ideology
• Radical Histories.

Placements

Spend a year on placement

Gain valuable experience and earn money during an optional placement year following year 2. You’ll return to the final year of your degree with added confidence, real-world experience and valuable contacts. 

A placement year significantly improves your CV, giving you a distinct advantage over others when applying for jobs and starting your career. It will also help you to develop the softer skills such as communication and teamwork.

For the assessed part of your placement, you will create a reflective piece of work on professional practice and skills. 

The university has links with a wide range of organisations including in health, culture and heritage, housing, councils, the police, the probation service, policy think tanks and charities.

Our dedicated Placements and Employability team will support you in getting a placement that meets with your interests and career ambitions. They can help with CVs and cover letter writing, applications, online testing and more. Plus, they’ll provide support and guidance when you’re on placement and make sure that everything is going well.

Other placement opportunities

During your second year you can choose to take the Active Citizenship module. This is a 50-hour professional work placement at a not-for-profit organisation.

Your placement could be at a local charity, a non-governmental organisation or a community organisation. Students have taken roles at organisations including Art in Mind, Pathways to Independence and Screen Archive South East.

The university’s Active Student service will help you find the right placement opportunity, and you will be offered support in putting together your application and your CV and cover letter.

You will have fortnightly academic seminars where you reflect on the links between academic theory and practice, and on the skills you have developed on placement.

Final year

In your final year, you continue studying your option pathways, developing and extending the work started in year 2 and inviting deeper engaged reflection through seminar discussion and coursework essays on the broader themes you have examined.

Globalisation option pathway modules

• Transatlantic Enslavement and the Making of Race
  In this module, you will explore the colonial and post-colonial connections between Africa, Britain and the Caribbean, examining how histories, cultures and identities were shaped and reshaped. Critical issues such as history-making and cultural representation will be discussed, particularly in the context of Atlantic enslavement’s impact on societies in terms of race, Empire, nation, migration, hybridity, identity and diaspora. Focusing on the concept of the ‘Black Atlantic’, you’ll examine the development of slave societies and their relationship with European colonial projects in the Caribbean. You will also consider identity formation, resistance and power dynamics from the eighteenth century to the present.
• Human Rights and Humanitarian Intervention
  In this module, you will analyse human rights and humanitarian intervention, examining the role of the international community in causing, preventing and responding to human rights violation. You’ll focus on human rights issues in the context of military intervention and the prevention of war crimes, ethnic cleansing, genocide and crimes against humanities, considering whether and how human rights are being protected in a changing international order.

• Final Project for Humanities Subject Area

As part of the Globalisation: History, Politics, Culture degree you will also complete and submit a final project, drawing on your subject knowledge and research method skills as you develop your own extended critical response to your chosen topic. You’ll also take part in an oral exam: drawing from a theme in your dissertation, you will prepare and deliver a presentation and take questions. In doing so, you’ll demonstrate your presentation, communication, discussion and debate skills.

Lab facilities

Mithras House has a series of lab rooms which can be used for teaching on your course or in your independent research work.

Life lab
A skills-based lab for practice-based teaching, social work, psychotherapy and counselling, and employability. The Life lab is fitted with lounge furniture to provide a comfortable space for conducting qualitative research with larger groups. The lab can be used to conduct research activities with children of all ages and can be used for meetings and events. The room also contains a dedicated space to conduct assessed role play or interviews with children.

City lab
This is a qualitative research methods and creative methods resource for all students, staff and researchers, as well as research participants, including children, community groups and the general public. It can also be used for meetings and events. The City lab contains a kitchen, a teaching/meeting room with enhanced acoustic isolation and two meeting spaces that can be separated with a screen or combined to accommodate larger groups.

Design lab
Housing our extensive collection of historic dress and textiles, which are used in some teaching on our History of Art and Design courses, this has the space and equipment for you to work on textile projects. Displays created by students on these programmes are on view in the social spaces of the building.

Community lab
The Community Lab is a flexible teaching space designed for collaborative student learning and for working on qualitative research projects with a range of participants. 

Stats lab
The Stats Lab is a specialist workspace for carrying out statistical analysis, and video and audio editing projects. The Stats Lab is also used for workshops, demonstrations and seminars and can be used by students as a study space.

Applied cognition lab
A dedicated research space for psychological research involving measures such as electrodermal activity (EDA) and electroencephalography (EEG). The space is designed to allow the participant and researcher to sit at separate desks whilst psychophysiological data is being collected. 

VR and eye tracking lab
The VR and Eye-Tracking Lab is used for psychological research using equipment, such as eye-trackers and virtual reality headsets. The space has adjustable lighting and a blackout blind for maintaining consistent lighting conditions during eye-tracking research, as well as sensors set up in the room to allow individuals to move freely around the room during virtual reality research.

Take a video tour of the labs with technicians Andrea and Grace 

Meet the team

Our staff are widely published experts in global politics, history and cultural studies. You will be designated a personal tutor (normally the same person throughout your degree) with whom you will meet regularly to discuss your academic progress.

Dr Heba Youssef is the course leader. Heba’s research interests are in the fields of colonial, post-colonial and decolonial studies. Recent research projects have focused on the intersections between nationalism, colonialism and empire and the racial capitalist configurations of nation-building projects in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. 

Dr Christian Hogsbjerg’s teaching relates the history of the African diaspora with respect to how ‘slave-powered globalisation’ shaped the Caribbean region. He has specialist research interests in the resulting struggles against racism, slavery and colonialism (including the Haitian Revolution) and ideas of ‘black internationalism’. .

Dr Zoe Sutherland works on philosophy, critical theory, the history of capitalism, feminist theory and radical and revolutionary movements. Her current research focuses on disability theory and politics, reproductive politics and eugenics. She has also written on the politics and aesthetics of contemporary artistic practice. .

Dr Vicky Margree works across cultural studies, cultural history, philosophy and literature. She has particular interests in feminist history, the Victorian period and the role of literature in contributing to social and political transformation (for example, in apartheid South Africa). .

Dr Anthony Leaker teaches on philosophy and literature, cultural politics and the representation of conflict and violence, as well as the politics of work and labour. His recent research and teaching has been focused on contemporary culture wars and the politics of ‘free speech’. .

Dr Toby Lovat has research interests in Kantian epistemology and metaphysics, German idealism, Neo-Kantianism, the Frankfurt School, critical realism, speculative realism, Marxist political economy and social theory, structuralism and post-structuralism, and the historical and ideological roots of liberalism and conservatism. .

Course fees

The course fees shown here are what you will pay for the first year of your course if you start in the academic year 2026–27 and you are studying full-time (fee amount is subject to parliamentary approval). You pay fees in each year of your course. The fees you pay may increase each year.

Regulated fees

Fees for UK students on undergraduate and some postgraduate courses are set by the UK government. These are known as regulated fees. From academic year 2026–27, regulated fees will increase annually in line with forecast inflation.

Student Finance England loans for tuition fees and maintenance will also rise in line with inflation.

If you are studying part-time your fee will usually be calculated based on the number of modules that you take.

Unregulated fees

Course fees for international students taking undergraduate courses and for most postgraduate courses are not regulated by the UK government. Unregulated fees may increase each year by up to 5% or the forecast Consumer Price Index (CPI) inflation (whichever is higher).

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• Fees, bursaries, scholarships and government funding info for UK and international undergraduate students
• Student finance and budgeting while studying
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