Key facts

Details for course being taught in current academic year
Level 2  -  18 credits  -  spring and summer terms

E-learning links

Study Direct: V1333 (09/10)

Resources

Timetable Link
Reading list

Course description

Course outline

George Orwell’s 1949 novel 1984 describes a totalitarian government bent on total manipulation. For many on the left, Margaret Thatcher’s government represented elements of an ‘Orwellian state’, in which the social democratic consensus established after the end of World War Two was replaced by a free enterprise economy and a centralised state. For those on the political right, the 1980s Thatcher governments championed the re-assertion of individualism, British nationalism and a retreat from the so-called ‘nanny state’ in which the fight against the ‘enemy within’ was as important as the fight against the enemy without. In cultural terms, most writers point to the 1980s as being marked by creative pessimism, with ‘anti-Thatcherism’ the dominant cultural theme. This course will examine key events of the 1980s and reflect upon whether Margaret Thatcher’s most famous quote, ‘There is no such thing as society’, is a suitable epitaph for the 1980s. Topic studied include: 1982 Falklands War; the 1984 miners’ strike; the re-emergence of mass unemployment, peaking in 1986 at over 3.5 million; privatisation of industry and challenge to trade union power and the violent mass protest against the Community Charge (1990).

Learning outcomes

By the end of the course, a successful student should be able to:
1) understand a historical moment by reference to the particular context in which it occurred;
2) communicate the importance of locality in history, and the specificity of particular historical events;
3) supply evidence of these skills in essays that distil information provided in course lectures and for class discussion;
4) undertake a sustained argument largely based on secondary sources but also using a limited amount of primary material.

Assessments

Resit mode of assessment

Timing

Submission deadlines may vary for different types of assignment/groups of students.

Weighting

Coursework components (if listed) total 100% of the overall coursework weighting value.

Teaching methods

How to read the week pattern

The numbers indicate the weeks of the term and how many events take place each week.

Contact details

Dr Lucy Robinson

Assess convenor, Convenor
http://www.sussex.ac.uk/history/profile22808.html