Monsters, animals and the boundary of the human in European imperial thought, c 1700-1850

Code

HIST3116

School

History

Level

3

Credits

40

Semesters

Full Year UK

Summary

What is a human? What characteristics and qualities divide human and non-human animal? What accounts for human variation? Is the orang-utan a human or an animal? Do mermaids exist? Can humans possess both sexes in one body? To what extent do parrots possess intelligence?  

During the eighteenth century, these kinds of questions were at the forefront of the minds of Enlightenment philosophers, natural historians, and physicians across Europe. They also played a role in popular interest in ‘curiosities’ and ‘wonders’ that were served by freak shows and reports of the monstrous and aberrant. Although societies across the world have posed similar questions for centuries, in eighteenth-century Europe the answers were directly informed by colonial conquest. European imperial encounter with non-European peoples, animals and environments opened-up new questions and ideas about what it meant to be human and where the boundary between human and non-human lay.  

This special subject explores European-imperial debates over the meaning of ‘the human’ and the relationship between humans and their environments in the period of the Enlightenment. The focus is largely on Britain but integrates study of networks of ideas that spanned European and imperial geographies. The module is based on a series of case studies including (but not limited to): mermaids, rhinos, troglodytes, ‘wild’ children, orangutans, intersex people who were displayed as ‘hermaphrodites’, dwarves, and parrots. In many instances, these and other human and non-human spectacles of difference were enslaved, transported, exhibited in freak shows, examined by physicians, and dissected after death. As a history of the entanglement between colonialism and science, this module is as much about violence and power as it is about ideas. By exploring how ideas of the ‘human’ were constituted through colonial encounter, this module draws on studies of race and racism, gender, sexuality and disability. The aim is to consider how the reframing of the boundaries of human during this period of European imperial expansion has impacted our modern relationships to each other, as humans, to non-human animals, and to the environment.

This module includes topics relating to racial and sexual violence. Texts and images will be carefully selected, and content notes will be used to indicate particularly sensitive material. Students will not be able to opt-out of engaging with topics but discussion will be carefully facilitated to ensure that emotionally difficult issues are discussed in a respectful and sensitive manner by all participants. 

Target Students

Available to level 3 or 4 single or joint honours History students and Liberal Arts students.

Classes

• One 1-hour seminar each week for 20 weeks
• One 2-hour seminar each week for 20 weeks

Assessment

• 30% Coursework 1: 3,000 word Source-based assessment
• 30% Presentation: Group presentation with 1000 word individual report
• 40% Coursework 2: 3,500 word synoptic essay

Assessed in both autumn & spring semest

Educational Aims

Learning Outcomes

Intellectual skills: understand how ideas of the human have been constituted in relationship to European colonial conquest and ideas of gender, sexuality, race, and disability.

An understanding of the myriad ways that the meaning of ‘the human’ is historically and geographically constituted.

Ability to offer close, analytical reading across a wide range of intersecting historiographies covering, Enlightenment, imperial expansion, histories of science, environmental history, intellectual history, histories of gender, sexuality, race and disability.

Ability to offer close, analytical reading across a wide range of eighteenth-century primary sources, including letters, handbills, newspaper reports, natural history and images. (All sources will be in English or will be available in translation).

Ability to communicate complex historical and historiographical arguments clearly.

Ability to offer coherent arguments in oral and written forms.

Conveners

• Dr Onni Gust