• Inactive for Year: 2025/26

• Module Leader(s): Dr Chloe Duckworth

• Owning School: History, Classics and Archaeology
• Teaching Location: Newcastle City Campus

Semesters

Your programme is made up of credits, the total differs on programme to programme.

Aims

Look around you. We live in a world in which almost everything has been made, modified, and adapted by humans. From the chair you are sitting on, to the window you look out of, to the field that you see in the distance: all were constructed thanks to a web of knowledge and skill that is known as technology. Almost all were constructed from materials that have made multiple long-distance journeys in shipping containers, thanks to globalisation.

But what would happen if all that were to end tomorrow? Would you know how to find and cook food? How to modify materials to make tools, or to construct a shelter? And if you did know any of these things in theory, would you be able to carry them out in practice?

This is not your typical lecture and seminar format. In this module, you will work together to reconstruct a complex object completely from scratch, using a wide range of raw materials that were available to our ancient ancestors. You may find yourself processing raw wool and dying it with wild plants in one week, smelting metals from their ores in the next, and making glass beads in another. Every year the particular activities will differ depending on what object we choose to reconstruct, but there will always be a focus on multiple different materials and processes.

Each session will include a series of short lectures and/or group discussions scattered between the making activities. We will explore sustainability, innovation, experimental archaeology, and more, as well as looking at some exciting case studies from the ancient and modern worlds.

You will never see the world in the same way again ... and if there IS an apocalypse, you might just be the one to re-build it.

Outline Of Syllabus

Each week we will meet for a long session. This will involve a mixture of lecture materials, discussion, practical activities and, of course, breaks!

A wide range of subjects will be covered each year, including several of the following:
- The history of technology
- Making stone tools
- Making tools with antler and bone
- Fire-setting
- Foraging
- Woodworking
- Working with fibres and textiles
- Making things from clay
- Mining and panning for metals
- Building a shelter
- Building ovens and kilns from scratch
- Smelting metals from their ores
- Metalworking
- Making glass from sand
- Making glass beads
- Electricity

Teaching Methods

Teaching Activities

Jointly Taught With

Teaching Rationale And Relationship

Lectures will provide students with the key theoretical concepts and the structured knowledge base required for this subject.

A minimum of two guided readings will be given in advance of each seminar, increasing the depth of knowledge gained from the lecture subject given in that week, and preparing students for an in-depth discussion in the seminar itself.

Practical classes will provide students with experience of experimental design, the formulation of a scientific research project, problem-solving, group work, interpersonal communication, and adaptability. They will also provide the skills required for the experimental design part of the module assessment (experimental design and creation of academic poster).

PLEASE NOTE: The contact hours for this module are higher than the PGT standard, because: (i) it is co-taught with ARA3129 (a Stage 3 UG module); (ii) the practical nature of much of the learning requires a higher-than-usual amount of contact.

Assessment Methods

The format of resits will be determined by the Board of Examiners

Other Assessment

Formative Assessments

Formative Assessment is an assessment which develops your skills in being assessed, allows for you to receive feedback, and prepares you for being assessed. However, it does not count to your final mark.

Assessment Rationale And Relationship

1. Video logs. Students will produce three five-minute video logs, each of which should focus on a particular class from the module. Students will be encouraged to critically and personally reflect upon their experience of the activities undertaken. They will have to be creative in their consideration of how to edit the video so that it strikes a balance between providing detail and maintaining audience interest.

2. At the end of the course, each individual student will provide an illustrated report of the group project, detailing the processes undertaken, reflecting upon the outcome, and situating their learning within the wider academic literature. They will be expected to draw links between practice and theory, and to reflect upon the relationship between traditional craft, technology, and innovation. Students will have to design an attractive and well-structured template for their report.

3. Formative assessment: students will be required to work together to undertake different challenges each week, developing skills in team-work and problem-solving that will be invaluable on the job market.

Reading Lists

• ARA8119's Reading List

Timetable

• Timetable Website: www.ncl.ac.uk/timetable/
• ARA8119's Timetable