ABPL20034: Urban History

400 word assignment (10%), 1000 word blog post (20%), 2000 word essay (30%) (due final week), Final 2-hour exam (30%), Class attendance (5%) and participation (5%)

This subject gives a somewhat brief yet wide-ranging overview of trends in urban design and planning. It focuses on how both technological advances and social issues influence the shape of a city. Among the topics looked at are ancient cities, medieval cities, cities of the industrial revolution, death and disease in cites, urban renewal, gentrification and surbanisation, the rise of town planning and the garden city movement, and globalisation.

David is quite a good lecturer. He's experienced in the field, it open to questions, but sometimes can get off on tangents and rarely gets through his entire slides within the hour. David himself says the lectures are not compulsory; the reading the essence of the subject, but I found it quite the opposite. Readings tend to be summerised and expanding upon within the lectures.

On a whole the content is quite interesting, but a limited understanding is really all that is required. The assessment is quite easy. The blog post is on one specific week of readings, the final essay gives you over 10 topics to choose from, and the exam includes 2 essays, one being "seen," where you are given the topics in advance, the other being unseen but again has a wide range of topics to choose from.

So, if you know about 2 weeks of material very well, and the rest just a little bit, you will most likely do just as well as if you knew the whole course very well.

Tutes are limited to discussing the week's readings. You can get away with skimming over them for the most part, but some are interesting a worth a read. As long as you try to bring something up at least once each tute, you'll likely get the 5% for participation, and there is another 5% for just turning up. The tutes can be a bit labourious, but they are worth turning up to for both the 5% and they do give you a better understanding of the material.
A tip for the final essay: Use the library. The markers are looking for your ability to research independently and tie themes of the subject together in relation to the subject via this process. The architecture library has a plethora of relevant books for whatever topic you choose. From speaking to others in the subject, it seemed those who had the longest reference lists generally got the best marks.

Yes, with screen capture

David Nichols

Yes, not given but on library website

4 out of 5

None, just a subject reader

2 x 1 Hour Lectures, 1 x 1 Hour Tute (per week)

2013, Sem 1

H1