Course Description and Aims

This module provides an introductory survey of the history of urban development from the ancient period to the end of the twentieth century. It focuses on the forces that have led to the development of cities in the past, and achieves this through the lens of a multi-disciplinary perspective and the utilisation of various methodologies. Such a standpoint is adopted in order to allow for the exploration of the impacts of matters like politics, economics, culture and identity, art and architecture, intellectual thought, law, transportation, and military technology upon urban society at different times in history, and to recognise how they influenced the design and shape of the built environment, and so city living. Central to the programme is the use of comparative analyses which assist in identifying and contrasting patterns of urban change. As such differences in urban design that became evident in the past will be made clear. Furthermore such an approach helps illuminate and clarify the imprint upon urban space and the urban mind of agents affecting the urban development process, including visions and concepts (built and unbuilt) that have swayed social development. Importantly too in utilising this analytical perspective students are granted opportunities to test hypotheses under the guidance of their teacher about the causes and effects of urban transition, in so doing helping explicitly comprehend the narrative of historical urban development in both factual and conceptual terms.

Week 1. Introduction Class: The First Cities (Friday, September 9^th 2016)

Week 2. NO CLASS! PUBLIC HOLIDAY! (Friday, September 16^th 2016)

Week 3. Greeks and Romans (Friday, September 23^rd 2016)

Week 4. The Medieval Era, Cathedrals and Urban Places (Friday, September 30^th 2016)

Week 5. The Renaissance and Baroque City: Humanism to Autocracy (Friday, October 7^th 2016)

Week 6. The London Terraced House and Square (Friday, October 14^th 2016)

Week 7. Coping with Change (i) Coketowns: Dirt, Disease, Death, Deprivation (Friday, October 21^st 2016)

Week 8. Coping with Change (ii) London and Paris in the mid-19^th Century (Friday, October 28^th 2016)

Week 9. The City Beautiful: The North American City (Friday, November 4^th 2016)

Week 10. Architects and Utopia: New Directions to National Development (Friday, November 11^th 2016)

Week 11. Colonial and Post-Colonial Urban Statements: New Delhi and Canberra (Friday, November 18^th 2016)

Week 12. City Faces. Identities and Nationalism: Antoni Gaudi and Barcelona (Friday, November 25^th 2016)

Week 13. Abstracting the Contemporary Chinese Metropolis (December 2^nd 2016)

Fieldtrip

Grading

1. Participation – 30% of total term score. This grade is given in relation to

(i)     Attendance of lectures and tutorials

(ii)   Participation (leading a short tutorial discussion of about 5 minutes in length, the asking of questions in classes, and engagement with online discussions on the HIST5539A Facebook group)

(iii)  Introductory composition (400-500 words) relating to your understanding of the video to be watched as preparation for tutorial 1.

• Short paper (1500-2000 words) – 30% of term grade.
• Take-home examination (2000-2500 words) – 40% of term grade.

Please note: (i) All assignments submitted will be returned in PDF format via email. All work to be returned includes the assignments plus a grade sheet designed by Prof. Morley that breaks down the score of your work. This informs you of not only your grade but exactly how you achieved it. Detailed comments about your work will be given by your Tutor.

(ii) Amended versions of any assignment cannot be submitted at a later date.

Assignment Assistance

Juggling the demands of an academic course with other requirements is never easy. Doing so in a language such as English, maybe a second or a third language, can often compound this situation. Frequently it can lead to much anxiety. Therefore to provide as much assistance as possible Prof. Morley at the end of lectures shall provide time to speak one-to-one about anything to do with the course, e.g. assignments, and to answer any questions relating to matters raised by the lecture. Additionally he will ask as assignment deadlines approach for assignment plans to be created so that they can be checked to ensure work is on ‘the right track’. Plus, as noted earlier, academic writing files to assist students about the writing process are provided on Blackboard, as are assignment planning documents. Prof. Morley, as a former language teacher who has worked in Spain, France and Taiwan, is happy though to discuss any aspect of the writing process with you if you require any other kind of help.

Assignment Preparation Sheets

As noted previously students will be asked during the term to formally submit written work. For HIST5592 students submit two essays: a short paper assignment, and the take-home examination. For each piece of work a list of questions shall be given many weeks ahead of the hand-in date along with guidelines for this particular written task. Students then answer one question from the list distributed by Prof. Morley.

As previously mentioned all students will have access to assignment planning documents immediately after the assignment question sheet is handed out. The planning sheets offer assistance in appreciating the true meaning of the question, the context of the subject involved, grasping which reading materials are most useful to composing the assignment, and the best way to then use source materials.

Veriguide

CUHK’s History Department uses an online system through which students submit their written work. As part of HIST5592 students will be asked to submit their assignments onto the Veriguide system. For more information on Veriguide please refer to the following website: https://academic.veriguide.org/academic/login_CUHK.jspx

Tutorials

The tutorials, 4 in total – each approximately 60 minutes in length, grant students the chance to discuss the topics introduced in the lectures, and opportunities to help sort out any problems in understanding that the students may have.

To prepare for the tutorials materials are placed onto Blackboard but during the term students might be asked to take responsibility for a small part of a tutorial. This is to be accomplished by giving a short presentation, for instance. The purpose of this exercise is that it will give everyone the chance to grasp part of the course in greater depth, and so will help everyone better prepare for the written assignments. To provoke discourse outside the classroom, and so to ensure student involvement, active learning and where possible deeper learning and thinking, students are encouraged to create their own threads within the course’s Facebook group. 

At the start of each tutorial a detailed answer sheet designed by Prof. Morley will be distributed by the Tutor. This will act as a reference point for the class discussions, and shall expand upon many themes raised initially in the lectures. It will also help with work for the assignments.

Tutorial Dates and Themes

As part of your undertaking of HIST5592 you are required to attend four tutorials. These shall take place immediately after the lecture. Each tutorial offers an opportunity to discuss, evaluate and note aspects of the urban past raised within the lectures so as to clarify and elucidate your knowledge of cities and their development. Where possible particular skill-building activities will be introduced. Provisionally, the following dates and topics are set for the tutorials:

1. Friday, September 30^th 2016 – Week 4 – Introduction, and city development debate.
2. Friday, October 21^st – Weeks 7 – Comparing pre-industrial cities, map reading.
3. Friday, November 4^th – Weeks 9 – Cities/buildings, identity, and nationhood.
4. Friday, December 2^nd – Week 13 – Cities, national development, and urban history.

Core Texts and Journals

The key texts for course HIST5592 are:

Shane Ewan, What is Urban History?  UL HT113.E94 2016

John Reader, Cities  UL HT111. R43 2004

Lewis Mumford, The City in History  UL HT111.M8/ARL HT111.M8

However other texts of relevance to parts of the course are:

Edmund Bacon, The Design of Cities   CC Res NA9050.B22 1974

Peter Hall, Cities in Civilisation  CC Res HT 111. H345 1998

Paul Hohenberg and Lynn Hollen Lees, The Making of Urban Europe 1000-1994   UL HT131.H658 1995

Spiro Kostof, The City Shaped and The City Assembled   CC Res HT111.K63

A.E.J. Morris, History of Urban Form   CC Res /ARL HT166.M59 1993

Donald Olsen, The City as a Work of Art   CC Res NA970.O47 1986

Jan de Vries, European Urbanization 1500-1800   CC Res/UL HT131.D4

For primary sources relating to aspects of the course tied to modern cities (between about 1700 and 1900), please refer to http://www.library.cornell.edu/Reps/DOCS/homepage.htm.

Students will be expected to make use of other materials listed within this document as the course unfolds to prepare for both classes and assignments. At the same time many journals will be of use to this preparation process. In particular publications such as Urban History, Social History, Town Planning Review, Planning Perspectives, Journal of Urban History, The Economic History Review, Journal of Urban History, and the Journal of Social Medicine will have relevance to particular lectures and assignment questions.

请注意大学有关学术著作诚信的政策和规则，及适用于犯规事例的纪律指引和程序。详情可浏览此处。

学生递交作业时，必须连同已签署的声明一并提交，表示他们知道有关政策、规则、指引及程序。

• 如属小组习作，则所有组员均须签署声明；所有组员 (不论有否签署声明及不论有否直接或间接撰写有问题的内容) 均须负上集体责任及受到惩处。
• 如作业以电脑制作、内容以文字为主，并经由大学「维诚」系统 (VeriGuide) 提交者，学生将作业的电子档案上载到系统后，便会获得收据，收据上已列明有关声明。
• 学生充分知悉到他们的作业可能会被人工智能内容检测软件审查，以确定其原创性。
• 学生充分知悉科目中采用人工智能工具的做法。在经允许下使用某些人工智能工具的情况下，学生已按照科目老师的指示明确注明出处和引文。

未有夹附签署妥当的声明的作业，老师将不予批阅。

学生只须提交作业的最终版本。

学生将作业或作业的一部份用于超过一个用途 (例如：同时符合两科的要求) 而没有作出声明会被视为未有声明重复使用作业。 学生重复使用其著作的措辞或某一、二句句子很常见，并可以接受，惟重复使用全部内容则构成问题。在任何情况下，须先获得相关老师同意方可提交作业。

由大学职员/老师制作的教学材料，包括课堂笔记、作业及考试题目等，其版权属香港中文大学拥有；学生可从大学采用的网上教学系统 (例如Blackboard) 下载由大学职员/老师制作的教学材料供其学习使用；惟未经相关职员/老师事先同意下，不得分发/分享/复制这些材料予第三者。