This version of the course guide is provisional until the period for editing the new course guides ends.

Logo UAB

Colonial and Postcolonial History

Code: 107228 ECTS Credits: 6
2024/2025
Degree Type Year
1500086 Social and Cultural Anthropology FB 1

Contact

Name:
Bernat Hernandez Hernandez
Email:
bernat.hernandez@uab.cat

Teachers

David Martinez Fiol

Teaching groups languages

You can view this information at the end of this document.


Prerequisites

Knowledge of modern and contemporary history.

Knowledge of world geography (physical, political and historical).


Objectives and Contextualisation

1. Analysis of Western globalization from the 15th century to the present, from a non-Eurocentric perspective in terms of social, cultural, ethnic and gender relations.

2. Examine the ways in which Western colonial rule has affected and continues to affect international relations and people's daily lives.

3. Describe the processes of formation and crisis of the great western and also eastern colonial empires.

4. Analyze the religious, cultural, political and economic factors of the exercise of colonial power.

5. Describe the movements of adaptation and resistance against colonialism in non-Western societies.

6. Assess the importance of intercultural relations in modern and contemporary world history.

7. Develop critical interpretations from various historical sources.


Learning Outcomes

  1. CM01 (Competence) Interpret current and past world events from social and humanities disciplines.
  2. KM01 (Knowledge) Identify the theoretical foundations of the disciplines related to Anthropology and establish their relationships.
  3. KM03 (Knowledge) Interpret current world events incorporating the diversity of geographical, historical, philosophical and sociological perspectives.
  4. KM04 (Knowledge) Identify the interactions between local and global processes studied by related disciplines.
  5. SM02 (Skill) Analyse dynamic principles of the current world incorporating other perspectives of the social sciences and humanities.
  6. SM03 (Skill) Relate the elements and factors involved in the interpretation of local and global contexts studied by related disciplines.
  7. SM04 (Skill) Adequately use the basic language of related sciences in both oral and written expression.

Content

MODERN ERA

1.- The colonial empires in the modern era

2.- Populations, economy and globalization between the 16th and 18th centuries.

3.- Colonial agencies and agendas: dominance and resistance in non-European societies.

4.- Religious and cultural hybridisms.

5.- Ideologies of colonialism: justifications and criticisms.

 

CONTEMPORARY ERA

6.- Imperial national states and the distribution of the world: the idea of empire and imperial nation in the nineteenth century

7.- Against the idea of empire?: the paradoxical imperialist anti-imperialism during the Great War

8.- The SDN, the new division of the world and the construction of revolutionary anti-imperialism culture

9.- The Second World War and the end of the myth "of the superiority of the white man"

10.- Decolonization and the impossible culturally homogeneous independent states: the examples of India, Israel and the Belgian Congo

11.- Cultural decolonization in the Western world: the example of the struggle for the civil rights of blacks in the US and South Africa.

12.- Neocolonialism as a factor in the emergence of Islamic jihadism.

13.- Progressive neocolonialism (the NGO myth) and the construction of a new idea of non-territorial Empire

 

 


Activities and Methodology

Title Hours ECTS Learning Outcomes
Type: Directed      
Reading of texts. Writing of works. Preparation of oral comments and seminars. Search of bibliographic information 30 1.2 CM01, KM01, KM03, KM04, SM02
Seminars and directed practices 6 0.24 KM01, KM04, SM03, SM04
Theoretical classes 39 1.56 CM01, KM01, KM03, KM04, SM02, SM03, SM04
Tutorial learning exercices 7.5 0.3 CM01, KM03, KM04, SM03, SM04
Type: Supervised      
Tutorials 15 0.6 KM01, KM03, KM04, SM02, SM03
Type: Autonomous      
Personal study 45 1.8 KM01, KM04, SM02, SM03

Attendance at theoretical and practical teacher sessions.

Attendance at seminars and practical sessions led by the teaching staff.

Critical reading of historical sources.

Learning information search strategies.

Realization of reviews, works and analytical comments.

Preparation of oral presentations.

Personal study.

Annotation: Within the schedule set by the centre or degree programme, 15 minutes of one class will be reserved for students to evaluate their lecturers and their courses or modules through questionnaires.


Assessment

Continous Assessment Activities

Title Weighting Hours ECTS Learning Outcomes
Attendance and practices at classroom 30% 4.5 0.18 CM01, KM01, KM03, KM04, SM02, SM03, SM04
Delivery of a paper 20% 0 0 CM01, KM01, KM03, KM04, SM02, SM03, SM04
Exams 50% 3 0.12 CM01, KM01, KM03, KM04, SM02, SM03, SM04

Evaluation

Partial written tests 50%

Classroom practices 30%

Coursework 20%

 

Continued avaluation:

50% Two scheduled partial written tests (25% + 25%): may include summary questions, comments on texts and other documents from the moodle classroom (charts, graphs, maps, images...), class or course bibliography .
30% Class exercises (comments on maps, texts, course readings...).
20% Completion of assignments, essays, reviews or summaries, with a specific delivery date.


Class practices do not require scheduling or advance notice. Internships not completed due to lack of student attendance cannot be made up. Students who do not pass the grade of 3.5 points in the weighting of all continuous assessment activities scheduled throughout the course will be graded with a Not Assessable, and will not be able to present themselves for recovery.

 

Single assessment:

It will consist of a written test (40% of the grade); oral test (30% of the mark); and a course work (30% of the grade). The written test and the oral exam will be held in the same session. The recovery of the single assessment will be carried out in the same way as the continued one (same test, same day and time and classroom). Students who do not pass the grade of 3.5 points in the weighting of all assessment activities scheduled will be graded with a Not Assessable, and will not be able to present themselves for recovery.

 

Generally:

 In the event that the student commits any irregularity (plagiarism, copying, unreferenced use of ia...) that may affect the grading of an assessment act, the specific assessment activity will be graded with 0. In in the event that two irregularities occur in the assessment activities of the subject, the final grade of the subject will be 0 (Suspended), regardless of the disciplinary procedure that may beinstituted.

The recovery will consist of a globalexamination of the subject matter and will be held on the official dates established by the Faculty. Under no circumstances can recovery be considered as a means of improving the grade of students who have already passed the subject in the normal continuous assessment process. The maximum grade that can be obtained in the recovery is 5.0 (Passed).

A regulation on spelling and syntax correction applies to the written tests and coursework of the subject. The penalty will be 0.2 points for each fault committed on the final grade, up to a maximum of three points deducted. Repeated fouls may result in a discount.

At the time of completion/delivery of each assessment activity, the teaching staff will inform (moodle classroom, institutional email) of the procedure and date of review of the qualifications.

Particular cases of follow-up of the subject will be taken into account and will receive specific treatment, especially students included in the PIUNE program.

Our University does not accept any discrimination against teachers or students based on criteria of ethnicity, language, nationality, religion, sex, age or functional diversity. In the class we will try to maintain an atmosphere of shared respect for all differences.


Bibliography

MODERN ERA

Sebastian Conrad, Historia global. Una nueva visión para el mundo actual (Planeta, Barcelona, 2017).

Serge Gruzinski, El águila y el dragón. Desmesura europea y mundialización en el siglo xvi (fce, México, 2018).

Carlos Martínez Shaw; Marina Alfonso Mola, Historia moderna: Europa, África, Asia y América (uned, Madrid, 2015).

Mary L. Pratt, Ojos imperiales. Literatura de viajes y transculturación (Madrid, fce, 2010).

Colin Samson, The colonialism of human rights (Polity Press, Cambridge, 2020).

Sanjay Subrahmanyam, L'éléphant, le canon et le pinceau. Histoires connectées des cours d'Europe et d'Asie, 1500-1750 (París, Nuvis, 2023).

 

CONTEMPORARY ERA

Jean Bricmont, Imperialismo humanitario. El uso de los Derechos Humanos para vender la guerra, prologo de Noah Chomsky, Barcelona, El Viejo Topo, 2005.

William EASTERLY, The White man’s burden: why the West’s efforts to aid the rest have done so much ill and so little good, Penguin Books, 2006 (BIBLIOTECA DE CIÈNCIES SOCIALS, UAB).

Niall Ferguson, Civilización. Occidente y el resto, Barcelona, Ramdom House Mondadori, 2012.

Josep M. Fradera, La Nación Imperial (1750-1918), Barcelona, Edhasa, 2015, 2 vols. (BIBLIOTECA D’HUMANITATS UAB).

Josep M. Fradera, Antes del antiimperialismo. Genealogía y límites de una tradición humanitària, Barcelona, Editorial Anagrama, 2022 (BIBLIOTECA D’HUMANITATS UAB).

Michael Hardt i Antonio Negri, Imperio, Barcelona, Ediciones Paidos, 2015.

Jürgen Osterhammel i Jan C. Jansen, Colonialismo. Historia, formas, efectos, Madrid, Siglo XXI de España Editores S.A., 2019.

Edward W. Said, Cultura e imperialismo, Barcelona, Penguin Random House Grupo Editorial, 2018.


Software

*

 

Language list

Name Group Language Semester Turn
(PAUL) Classroom practices 1 Catalan first semester morning-mixed
(TE) Theory 1 Catalan first semester morning-mixed