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American Political Culture (T7059E)

15 credits, Level 4

Autumn teaching

American political culture is rooted in a shared set of ideals, including liberty, equality, social justice, democracy, and individualism. These are not always realised in practice.

You will explore how electoral politics and the democratic process have been promoted and challenged in American culture. Drawing on a wide range of American Studies methodologies and theories, and taking a cultural-historical approach, you will focus on the subjective side of American politics.

You will examine debates around memory, militarism, race, gender, religion, nativism, populism and identity, and how they have been expressed in beliefs, attitudes and cultural practice from the 1750s to the age of Trump.

Contact hours and workload

This module is approximately 150 hours of work. This breaks down into about 22 hours of contact time and about 128 hours of independent study. The University may make minor variations to the contact hours for operational reasons, including timetabling requirements.

We regularly review our modules to incorporate student feedback, staff expertise, as well as the latest research and teaching methodology. We’re planning to run these modules in the academic year 2024/25. However, there may be changes to these modules in response to feedback, staff availability, student demand or updates to our curriculum.

We’ll make sure to let you know of any material changes to modules at the earliest opportunity.