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77988-01 - Practical course: Everyday Violence. Historical & Socio-Cultural Approaches (3 CP)
| Semester | spring semester 2026 |
| Course frequency | Once only |
| Lecturers | Marie Muschalek (marie.muschalek@unibas.ch, Assessor) |
| Content | Whether extreme and belligerent or more diffuse and mundane in nature, violence is, and has been, present in all societies. It seems to be a fundamentally human fact. This course offers an introduction into the study of the complex and vexing issue of violence. Yet, not war and mass murder, but everyday, that is, “normal” or normalized forms of violence will be the object of interest: the physical confrontations, abuses, and harms of daily life in peacetime societies. In this class, we will account for different perspectives – be it of the victim, the bystander, or the perpetrator, but also of the witness, the reporter, or the researcher. And we will touch upon the multiple ways in which people deal with and behave within violent situations – the range of their emotions, their lines of reasoning, their bodily movements, etc. However, violence always also has a context (social, cultural, and historical). We will therefore engage with a number of concrete case studies from disparate areas of the world and different time periods that will help us carve out further the specificities of cultures of violence and their broader (ethical and political) implications. Throughout the course, we will look at various types or “problems” of violence. We will deal with different violent actors: criminal organizations or the state, for instance, but also individuals. We will inquire into different sites of violence: family homes, workplaces, the streets, and others. And we will ask about different dynamics and functions of violent practices: their ritualized, productive, disruptive, or performative character, for example. Attempting to understand violence and telling stories or drawing images about violence are closely related endeavors. Both are tightly linked to making sense of violence, and thus to questions of ethics and politics, to the critique or justification, sometimes glorification of violence. We will thus discuss violence also in connection with its representation. What are the accounts and images on which we draw in order to study violence? What do the various kinds of representation and narration tell us about the ways in which individuals relate to and attempt to rationalize violence? |
| Bibliography | Dwyer, Philip, and Joy Damousi. “Theorizing Histories of Violence.” History & Theory 56, no. 4 (2017): 3–6. Edwards, Louise, Nigel Penn, and Jay Winter (eds.). The Cambridge World History of Violence. Cambridge University Press, 2020. Fitzpatrick, Matthew P., and Catherine Kevin. “Theorising the History of Violence after Pinker.” Rethinking History 24, nos. 3–4 (2020): 332–50. Lawrence, Bruce B. (ed.). On Violence: A Reader. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2007. Scheper-Hughes, Nancy, and Philippe Bourgois (eds.). Violence in War and Peace: An Anthology. Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishers, 2004. |
| Admission requirements | Studierende der Geschichte aller Studienstufen sowie Studierende anderer Studienfächer, in deren Module die Übung verknüpft ist. Bei Überbelegung werden Studierende der Geschichte bevorzugt zugelassen. |
| Language of instruction | English |
| Use of digital media | No specific media used |
| Interval | Weekday | Time | Room |
|---|---|---|---|
| wöchentlich | Tuesday | 12.15-14.00 | Departement Geschichte, Seminarraum 4 |
Dates
| Modules |
Modul: Archive / Medien / Theorien (Bachelor's degree subject: History) Modul: Reflexion, Methodik, Praxis (Master's degree program: European History in Global Perspective) Modul: Sachthemen der Ethnologie (Bachelor's degree subject: Anthropology) Modul: Theorie (Master's degree subject: History) Module: Europeanization and Globalization (Master's Studies: European Global Studies) Module: Fields: Knowledge Production and Transfer (Master's degree program: African Studies) Module: Research Skills (Master's degree program: African Studies) Specialization Module Global Europe: Statehood, Development and Globalization (Master's Studies: European Global Studies) |
| Assessment format | continuous assessment |
| Assessment registration/deregistration | Reg.: course registration; dereg.: not required |
| Repeat examination | no repeat examination |
| Scale | Pass / Fail |
| Repeated registration | no repetition |
| Responsible faculty | Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, studadmin-philhist@unibas.ch |
| Offered by | Departement Geschichte |