Sociology and Criminology

Temporalities - Histories - Hauntologies (Aut)

Module code: L2905A
Level 6
15 credits in autumn semester
Teaching method: Workshop
Assessment modes: Portfolio

This module utilises a variety of arts-based methodologies for you to encounter different ways of knowing and being in the capitalocene. Through high-theory, citizen science, the archive and artivism, we critique modernity’s metaphysics of presence, especially as it manifests in social science’s fetishisation of empiricism.

Through a variety of phenomenological registers (weird, eerie, sublime etc), you’ll trouble our epistemic infrastructures so you may re-think our past, present and future. Topics may include:

  • thinking phenomenologically across Temporalities – Histories – Hauntologies
  • hauntology
  • time is out of joint
  • capitalist sorcery
  • haunted intimacies (policy, archives)
  • glitch (databases)
  • The Matrix (film)
  • soundscapes (audio)
  • landscapes (photography)
  • map-making (AI).

Module learning outcomes

  • Assimilate and apply material from recent academic research (and where relevant, personal experience), to illustrate the theoretical approaches covered in the module
  • Demonstrate an ability to research independently, exercise critical judgement, and write cogently and persuasively
  • Create a portfolio of learning utilising a range of multi-media methods introduced throughout this module
  • Critically evaluate the strengths, weaknesses and limitations of works that address social science’s fetishization of empiricism.