Cityscape of Oxford. Oxfordshire, England, UK
Oxford Scholars Program Seminars
Students select one seminar to dive into for the three-week program. Mornings at Oxford are spent in 12-person seminars taught by British university scholars—tutors, as they are known in Oxford—who are experts in their field. These gifted and experienced instructors are passionate about sharing their knowledge.
2025 Seminars
1,000 Years of the English Garden | Richard Bisgrove
Course Description: We will look at the evolution of the garden from 1066 to the 21 st century, at social, artistic, scientific and political influences on its development, and why Americans have gardens in their yards while the English have yards in their gardens.
In 1629 Frances Bacon famously declared that “when Ages grow to Civility and Elegancie, Men come to Build Stately sooner than to Garden Finely: As if Gardening were the Greater Perfection”. A century later Horace Walpole identified ‘poetry, painting and gard’ning’ as ‘the three new graces that dress and adorn nature’ and William Hogarth published his ‘Analysis of Beauty’ to guide the makers of the new landscape garden along the appropriate ‘serpentine’ path.
The English garden has evolved over a thousand years in response to changes in society, from the paradise garden of the medieval monastery through the status symbol of the 17th century, the 18th century landscape garden of Lancelot ‘Capability’ Brown and the 19th century technological masterpieces of Victorian horticulture, the early 20th century reaction of the Arts and Crafts garden to the modern search for a new paradise. As such the garden is a fascinating barometer of human aspirations and achievement in the realms of art, science, technology, politics and philosophy. It marks the change in society from the gardens of kings to the rising power of the aristocracy, the gentry and the industrial elite to the modern garden of a democratic age. The course will chart the evolution of the garden and explore the multifarious factors contributing to its development.
About the Tutor: Richard studied horticulture at the University of Reading and landscape architecture at the University of Michigan before returning to lecture in Landscape Management at Reading. He has been a member of the Gardens Panel of the National Trust and the Council of the Garden History Society, and has been involved with the Oxford Berkeley Summer School for many years. He has been awarded the Veitch Memorial Medal by the Royal Horticultural Society and the Peter Youngman Award by the Landscape Institute, and is an Honorary Life Member of the Kew Guild.
Reading List:
Roger Phillips & Nick Fey. Photographic garden history (Macmillan 1995)
Penelope Hobhouse and Ambra Edwards. The Story of Gardening (Pavilion 2019)
Field Trips and Associated Cost: Field trips may include visits to Cliveden, Greys Court, Hidcote Manor, Sezincote, Broughton Grange, and Rousham. Additional seminar and field trip fee is $380.
In 1629 Frances Bacon famously declared that “when Ages grow to Civility and Elegancie, Men come to Build Stately sooner than to Garden Finely: As if Gardening were the Greater Perfection”. A century later Horace Walpole identified ‘poetry, painting and gard’ning’ as ‘the three new graces that dress and adorn nature’ and William Hogarth published his ‘Analysis of Beauty’ to guide the makers of the new landscape garden along the appropriate ‘serpentine’ path.
The English garden has evolved over a thousand years in response to changes in society, from the paradise garden of the medieval monastery through the status symbol of the 17th century, the 18th century landscape garden of Lancelot ‘Capability’ Brown and the 19th century technological masterpieces of Victorian horticulture, the early 20th century reaction of the Arts and Crafts garden to the modern search for a new paradise. As such the garden is a fascinating barometer of human aspirations and achievement in the realms of art, science, technology, politics and philosophy. It marks the change in society from the gardens of kings to the rising power of the aristocracy, the gentry and the industrial elite to the modern garden of a democratic age. The course will chart the evolution of the garden and explore the multifarious factors contributing to its development.
About the Tutor: Richard studied horticulture at the University of Reading and landscape architecture at the University of Michigan before returning to lecture in Landscape Management at Reading. He has been a member of the Gardens Panel of the National Trust and the Council of the Garden History Society, and has been involved with the Oxford Berkeley Summer School for many years. He has been awarded the Veitch Memorial Medal by the Royal Horticultural Society and the Peter Youngman Award by the Landscape Institute, and is an Honorary Life Member of the Kew Guild.
Reading List:
Field Trips and Associated Cost: Field trips may include visits to Cliveden, Greys Court, Hidcote Manor, Sezincote, Broughton Grange, and Rousham. Additional seminar and field trip fee is $380.
Tolkien: Life, Times, and The Lord of the Rings | John Garth
Course Description: Tolkien filled his epic Middle-earth fantasies with elves, dragons and other legendary beings, infused it with his expertise in medieval language and legend, but famously denied all topical or allegorical intent. So why does it matter as literature?
This course relocates The Lord of the Rings as a unique response to the experience of cataclysm and change from the 1890s to the 1950s. Its three volumes, begun in 1937 and published in 1954–5, provide vital entry-points to explore Tolkien’s lifelong creation of Middle-earth against the backdrop of his own era.
Tolkien’s debt to older lore and traditions is undeniable. We will learn how and why he hammered them into new literary forms that speak to his own era and ours. We will learn about the beginnings of his ‘Silmarillion’ mythology in the First World War, when he fought in the Battle of the Somme. How did that shape his imaginative world and his concepts of despair and hope, fear and courage, power and sacrifice? How do those youthful experiences echo in his mature epic, The Lord of the Rings?
We explore what his supposedly English mythology has to do with cultural and political movements of his time, and discuss the hazardous ambiguities of the enterprise.
Scrutinising the timeline of writing, we will also gauge the imaginative impact of specific moments in the Second World War.
Hot topics covered will include Tolkien’s religious faith and race in his writings.
About the Tutor: John Garth’s work on Tolkien’s life and creativity, published in 18 languages, includes The Worlds of J.R.R. Tolkien (Princeton University Press) and Tolkien and the Great War (Mythopoeic Award for Scholarship). He edited 2024’s Tolkien on Chaucer (OUP) and contributed to the Blackwell Companion to J.R.R. Tolkien, the Bodleian’s Maker of Middle-earth, and The Great Tales Never End: Essays in Memory of Christopher Tolkien. An Oxford English graduate, he has been a London newspaper journalist, fellow of Nevada’s Black Mountain Institute, and Corpus Christi College SCR member. He has taught for the Oxford Department for Continuing Education for a decade.
Recommended Reading:
Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings (required)
Tolkien, The Silmarillion
Tolkien, The Hobbit
Humphrey Carpenter, J.R.R. Tolkien: A Biography
Field Trips and Associated Cost: Field trips may include visits to the haunts of Tolkien’s childhood and youth in and around Birmingham; Warwick Castle; the British Museum and Imperial War Museum; Exeter College and other Oxford sites; and the prehistoric Wayland’s Smithy and White Horse of Uffington. Additional seminar and field trip fee is $315.
This course relocates The Lord of the Rings as a unique response to the experience of cataclysm and change from the 1890s to the 1950s. Its three volumes, begun in 1937 and published in 1954–5, provide vital entry-points to explore Tolkien’s lifelong creation of Middle-earth against the backdrop of his own era.
Tolkien’s debt to older lore and traditions is undeniable. We will learn how and why he hammered them into new literary forms that speak to his own era and ours. We will learn about the beginnings of his ‘Silmarillion’ mythology in the First World War, when he fought in the Battle of the Somme. How did that shape his imaginative world and his concepts of despair and hope, fear and courage, power and sacrifice? How do those youthful experiences echo in his mature epic, The Lord of the Rings?
We explore what his supposedly English mythology has to do with cultural and political movements of his time, and discuss the hazardous ambiguities of the enterprise.
Scrutinising the timeline of writing, we will also gauge the imaginative impact of specific moments in the Second World War.
Hot topics covered will include Tolkien’s religious faith and race in his writings.
About the Tutor: John Garth’s work on Tolkien’s life and creativity, published in 18 languages, includes The Worlds of J.R.R. Tolkien (Princeton University Press) and Tolkien and the Great War (Mythopoeic Award for Scholarship). He edited 2024’s Tolkien on Chaucer (OUP) and contributed to the Blackwell Companion to J.R.R. Tolkien, the Bodleian’s Maker of Middle-earth, and The Great Tales Never End: Essays in Memory of Christopher Tolkien. An Oxford English graduate, he has been a London newspaper journalist, fellow of Nevada’s Black Mountain Institute, and Corpus Christi College SCR member. He has taught for the Oxford Department for Continuing Education for a decade.
Recommended Reading:
Field Trips and Associated Cost: Field trips may include visits to the haunts of Tolkien’s childhood and youth in and around Birmingham; Warwick Castle; the British Museum and Imperial War Museum; Exeter College and other Oxford sites; and the prehistoric Wayland’s Smithy and White Horse of Uffington. Additional seminar and field trip fee is $315.
The Brontës: Lives, Literature, Legend | Dr. Emma Plaskitt
Course Description: This course examines the short lives, acclaimed novels, and enduring legend of three sisters from a small village in Yorkshire: Charlotte (1816–56), Emily (1818–48), and Anne Brontë (1820–49). To begin, participants will be introduced to the Victorian period with its notions of “separate spheres” for men and women and the “Angel in the House” ideal of femininity. In their re-invention of the Gothic romance and treatment of the Byronic hero, the Brontës produced pioneering, radical novels that challenged conventional views of gender and religion as well as featuring other Victorian female archetypes: the fallen woman, the governess, and the madwoman. We will examine the novels in detail, placing each in biographical and historical context, beginning with Charlotte’s controversial “autobiography”, Jane Eyre, which divided critics with its unabashed treatment of female passion. The Atlas described it as “one of the most powerful domestic romances which have been published for many years” while The Quarterly Review condemned the “unregenerate and undisciplined spirit” of its heroine and declared that the novel was “pre-eminently an anti-Christian composition.” Following discussion of The Professor, Shirley, and Villette, we will move onto Emily’s astonishing work of fiction, Wuthering Heights—described by one Victorian critic as “strange sort of book,—baffling all regular criticism…impossible to begin and not finish…”, and conclude with the works of Anne: Agnes Grey and The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, the latter dismissed by her sister Charlotte as “a mistake”. Studying the novels in depth and assessing various cinematic adaptations, we will consider themes such as race, gender, class, education, female relationships, and imperialism. What makes these narratives so enduring? Is it down to the literary merit of the novels themselves? The allure of their inclusion of the so-called Byronic hero? The wild beauty of the Yorkshire moors? The endless interest in the so-called Brontë myth, which begins with anonymous publication and is firmly established with the controversial biography of Charlotte written by friend and fellow novelist, Elizabeth Gaskell? Charlotte’s own attempts to safeguard and control the posthumous reputations of her sisters and a wealth of television and cinematic adaptations of the novels have only added to their mystique, with scholars and admirers continuing to make pilgrimages to Haworth village and the Brontë parsonage to this day. What does our ongoing fascination with these sisters and their writing tell us about them, and about ourselves? These are some of the many questions we will consider.
About the Tutor: Dr. Emma Plaskitt is a graduate of Merton College, Oxford, where she wrote her doctoral thesis on eighteenth-century fiction. She has taught English literature 1640–1901 for various Oxford colleges as well as OUDCE programmes The Oxford Experience, MSSU, Berkeley, MSU, and Duke/UNC. Having worked for the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, where she was responsible for writing many articles on eighteenth- and nineteenth-century women writers, she now focuses on teaching for the SCIO Study Abroad Programme based at Wycliffe Hall in Oxford and for Stanford University, for whom she is an Overseas Lecturer. Though a specialist in the literature of the long eighteenth century, her research interests include the Victorian novel — particularly the gothic novel and novel of sensation.
Reading List:
Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre
Charlotte Brontë, Shirley
Charlotte Brontë, Villette
Charlotte Brontë, The Professor
Emily Brontë, Wuthering Heights
Anne Brontë, Agnes Grey
Anne Brontë, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall
The tutor requires these books to be brought to Oxford for further discussion and analysis.
Recommended Reading List:
Juliet Barker, The Brontës (1994)
Juliet Barker, The Brontës: A Life in Letters (2006) (recommended reading, does not need to be brought to class)
The tutor does not require these books to be brought to Oxford.
Field Trips and Associated Cost: Field trips may include visits to Newstead Abbey in Nottinghamshire, The National Portrait Gallery and Apsley House, and Chapterhouse Open Air Theatre in Worcestershire for the performance of Jane Eyre. Additional seminar and field trip fee is $330.
About the Tutor: Dr. Emma Plaskitt is a graduate of Merton College, Oxford, where she wrote her doctoral thesis on eighteenth-century fiction. She has taught English literature 1640–1901 for various Oxford colleges as well as OUDCE programmes The Oxford Experience, MSSU, Berkeley, MSU, and Duke/UNC. Having worked for the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, where she was responsible for writing many articles on eighteenth- and nineteenth-century women writers, she now focuses on teaching for the SCIO Study Abroad Programme based at Wycliffe Hall in Oxford and for Stanford University, for whom she is an Overseas Lecturer. Though a specialist in the literature of the long eighteenth century, her research interests include the Victorian novel — particularly the gothic novel and novel of sensation.
Reading List:
The tutor requires these books to be brought to Oxford for further discussion and analysis.
Recommended Reading List:
The tutor does not require these books to be brought to Oxford.
Field Trips and Associated Cost: Field trips may include visits to Newstead Abbey in Nottinghamshire, The National Portrait Gallery and Apsley House, and Chapterhouse Open Air Theatre in Worcestershire for the performance of Jane Eyre. Additional seminar and field trip fee is $330.
Shakespeare: Larger than Life | Dr. Lynn Robson
Course Description: This course will focus on three of Shakespeare’s characters whose reputations transcend the plays they’re in: Falstaff (‘the Fat Knight’), Katherina/Kate (the Shrew’) and Shylock (‘the Jew’). It will also examine Shakespeare’s own ‘larger than life’ reputation.
Shakespeare’s characters, stories and themes still entrance and challenge today’s audiences and readers. Focusing on 5 plays: Henry IV Part 1, Henry IV Part 2, and The Merry Wives of Windsor; The Taming of the Shrew, and The Merchant of Venice, this course will explore the joys and sorrows of larger-than-life performances, bodies that don’t fit, the language of those who are alienated and ostracized, and themes of hypocrisy and greed, damaging stereotypes, community, and love.
Shakespeare’s plays will be studied within the cultural, political, and social worlds he inhabited in his own lifetime. Stage and screen adaptations will be used to think about the continuing relevance of these plays and their unforgettable characters, and the forging of Shakespeare’s own reputation as a storyteller ‘for all time.’
About the Tutor: Dr. Lynn Robson is Tutorial Fellow in English Literature at Regent’s Park College, Oxford, teaching early modern literature (1550-1760) to full-time undergraduates studying for BA (Hons) in English Language and Literature, Classics and English, and History and English, as well as part-time students studying at Oxford University’s Department for Continuing Education. She also teaches and supervises graduates on the part-time, interdisciplinary MSt in Literature and Arts, and Doctor in Literature and Arts, run by the Department for Continuing Education. She is Tutor for Admissions for English and allied Joint Schools and joint Director of Studies for BA (Hons) in Classics and English. She directs Regent’s Visiting Student Programme, organizing and coordinating academic programmes for students from North America, China and Europe. Her awards include Most Acclaimed Lecturer in the Humanities and University of Oxford Teaching Excellence Award.
Reading List:
William Shakespeare, The Taming of the Shrew. Folger Shakespeare Library.
William Shakespeare. The Merchant of Venice. Folger Shakespeare Library.
William Shakespeare. King Henry IV Part 1. Folger Shakespeare Library.
William Shakespeare. King Henry IV Part 2. Folger Shakespeare Library.
William Shakespeare. The Merry Wives of Windsor. Folger Shakespeare Library.
Note: These titles should be brought to Oxford with participants. The Folger Library editions are particularly accessible, with plenty of clear, explanatory notes and usually available on Kindle.
Note: It is not recommended to use No Fear Shakespeare. If the plays are unfamiliar to you, then watch them first (see below), and turn on the subtitles.
Recommended Multimedia and Additional Resources:
The Royal Shakespeare Company’s website is full of useful information, including detailed plot summaries. See the About Shakespeare section.
Another place with great resources is the Folger Shakespeare Library’s website. Go to their ‘Explore’ section.
Available on Globe Player:
The Merry Wives of Windsor (2010)
The Taming of the Shrew (2012)
Henry IV Part 1 (2010)
Henry IV Part 2 (2010)
Available on YouTube: The Merchant of Venice (2004): film starring Al Pacino, Jeremy Irons and Joseph Fiennes
Field Trips and Associated Cost: Field trips may include visits to Stratford-upon-Avon and the Royal Shakespeare Company. Additional seminar and field trip fee is $395.
Shakespeare’s characters, stories and themes still entrance and challenge today’s audiences and readers. Focusing on 5 plays: Henry IV Part 1, Henry IV Part 2, and The Merry Wives of Windsor; The Taming of the Shrew, and The Merchant of Venice, this course will explore the joys and sorrows of larger-than-life performances, bodies that don’t fit, the language of those who are alienated and ostracized, and themes of hypocrisy and greed, damaging stereotypes, community, and love.
Shakespeare’s plays will be studied within the cultural, political, and social worlds he inhabited in his own lifetime. Stage and screen adaptations will be used to think about the continuing relevance of these plays and their unforgettable characters, and the forging of Shakespeare’s own reputation as a storyteller ‘for all time.’
About the Tutor: Dr. Lynn Robson is Tutorial Fellow in English Literature at Regent’s Park College, Oxford, teaching early modern literature (1550-1760) to full-time undergraduates studying for BA (Hons) in English Language and Literature, Classics and English, and History and English, as well as part-time students studying at Oxford University’s Department for Continuing Education. She also teaches and supervises graduates on the part-time, interdisciplinary MSt in Literature and Arts, and Doctor in Literature and Arts, run by the Department for Continuing Education. She is Tutor for Admissions for English and allied Joint Schools and joint Director of Studies for BA (Hons) in Classics and English. She directs Regent’s Visiting Student Programme, organizing and coordinating academic programmes for students from North America, China and Europe. Her awards include Most Acclaimed Lecturer in the Humanities and University of Oxford Teaching Excellence Award.
Reading List:
Note: These titles should be brought to Oxford with participants. The Folger Library editions are particularly accessible, with plenty of clear, explanatory notes and usually available on Kindle.
Note: It is not recommended to use No Fear Shakespeare. If the plays are unfamiliar to you, then watch them first (see below), and turn on the subtitles.
Recommended Multimedia and Additional Resources:
The Royal Shakespeare Company’s website is full of useful information, including detailed plot summaries. See the About Shakespeare section.
Another place with great resources is the Folger Shakespeare Library’s website. Go to their ‘Explore’ section.
Available on Globe Player:
The Merry Wives of Windsor (2010)
The Taming of the Shrew (2012)
Henry IV Part 1 (2010)
Henry IV Part 2 (2010)
Available on YouTube: The Merchant of Venice (2004): film starring Al Pacino, Jeremy Irons and Joseph Fiennes
Field Trips and Associated Cost: Field trips may include visits to Stratford-upon-Avon and the Royal Shakespeare Company. Additional seminar and field trip fee is $395.
Criminal Psychology for Crime Fans & Crime Writers | John Dean O’Keefe
Course Description: Unlock the secrets behind criminal and psychological behaviors in crime thrillers, as we delve into the minds of psychopaths, serial killers, sex offenders and stalkers and then ask the question, what would you authentically write?
Delve into the psychology of violent offenders, including serial killers, psychopaths, and mass murderers. What drives them? How do they choose their victims? This course gives you a front-row seat to the science behind these dark minds. Get inside the world of forensic psychologists who assist law enforcement by evaluating suspects' mental states, motives, and capacity for rehabilitation. Perfect for writers who want their detective stories to be accurate and thrilling. Analyze real-world crime cases and famous criminal minds. You’ll study both solved and unsolved mysteries, using criminal psychology theories to piece together the puzzle of their behavior. For crime writers or those who hope to, you'll learn how to create more believable and compelling criminal characters, from their psychological traits to their motivations and actions. You’ll also discover how detectives and law enforcement professionals use psychological insights to solve the case.
Whether you're writing the next best-selling thriller, or just fascinated by the human mind's darker corners, this course will equip you with the knowledge and skills to understand (and create) the most compelling criminal stories.
About the Tutor: John Deane-O’Keeffe is a Criminologist, Lecturer in Forensic Psychology and Prison Chaplain. He is also a Theologian and Minister in the Reformed Church. John sat as a Magistrate in Northumbria and lectures in Criminal Law to Bar final students. He completed his undergraduate studies in English Lit., Theology, Law and History at University College Dublin, UWE Bristol and Oxford and took post-graduate degrees in Law, Theology and Forensic Criminology at London Met., Trinity College Dublin and Cambridge. He is also a radio broadcaster and journalist and presents a weekly criminal law programme. John has three theological books for publication in 2025 with Wipf & Stock Publishers.
Reading List:
Waltke, S. (2016). Criminology: The Basics.London & New York, Routledge.
Bull, Ray. et al (2006). Criminal Psychology: A Beginners Guide.Oxford, Oneworld Publications.
Field Trip and Associated Costs: Field trips may include Midsomer Murders Location Tour in Buckinghamshire, Oxford Castle Tour and Inspector Morse Walking Tour in Oxford, and Jack the Ripper Walking Tour and museum visit in London. Additional seminar and field trip fee is $270.
Delve into the psychology of violent offenders, including serial killers, psychopaths, and mass murderers. What drives them? How do they choose their victims? This course gives you a front-row seat to the science behind these dark minds. Get inside the world of forensic psychologists who assist law enforcement by evaluating suspects' mental states, motives, and capacity for rehabilitation. Perfect for writers who want their detective stories to be accurate and thrilling. Analyze real-world crime cases and famous criminal minds. You’ll study both solved and unsolved mysteries, using criminal psychology theories to piece together the puzzle of their behavior. For crime writers or those who hope to, you'll learn how to create more believable and compelling criminal characters, from their psychological traits to their motivations and actions. You’ll also discover how detectives and law enforcement professionals use psychological insights to solve the case.
Whether you're writing the next best-selling thriller, or just fascinated by the human mind's darker corners, this course will equip you with the knowledge and skills to understand (and create) the most compelling criminal stories.
About the Tutor: John Deane-O’Keeffe is a Criminologist, Lecturer in Forensic Psychology and Prison Chaplain. He is also a Theologian and Minister in the Reformed Church. John sat as a Magistrate in Northumbria and lectures in Criminal Law to Bar final students. He completed his undergraduate studies in English Lit., Theology, Law and History at University College Dublin, UWE Bristol and Oxford and took post-graduate degrees in Law, Theology and Forensic Criminology at London Met., Trinity College Dublin and Cambridge. He is also a radio broadcaster and journalist and presents a weekly criminal law programme. John has three theological books for publication in 2025 with Wipf & Stock Publishers.
Reading List:
Field Trip and Associated Costs: Field trips may include Midsomer Murders Location Tour in Buckinghamshire, Oxford Castle Tour and Inspector Morse Walking Tour in Oxford, and Jack the Ripper Walking Tour and museum visit in London. Additional seminar and field trip fee is $270.
Shaping the Modern World: Two Centuries of British Science and Invention | Dr. Tim Barrett
Course Description: A nation’s future is bound closely to the work of its scientists and inventors, and nowhere is this clearer than in British history. Beginning in the nineteenth century, science and engineering not only helped build and maintain Britain as a global superpower, but also shaped much of the modern world. Experimentalists and theoreticians such as Faraday and Maxwell uncovered chemical, optical and electromagnetic processes which transformed the everyday and extended the technology on which the British empire depended. Moreover, they were to inspire later breakthroughs in physics such as the Special and General theories of relativity. Such revelations and breakthroughs are the subject of this course, along with many others in biology, cosmology, photography, transport, television, radar and weaponry. We shall explore the historical context of each, meeting a fascinating cast of characters from Stephen Hawking to June Lindsey, from Jocelyn Bell-Burnell to Alan Turing, from Barnes Wallis to Arthur Eddington.
About the Tutor: Dr. Tim Barrett lectures in political history and the history of science and has been a tutor for Oxford University’s Department for Continuing Education for almost twenty years. Tim is also an Honorary Research Fellow at Keele University, Staffordshire.
Reading List:
Natalie Angier, The Canon - The Beautiful Basics of Science, Houghton Mifflin 2008.
Bill Bryson. A Short History of Nearly Everything, Black Swan, 2004.
Field Trips and Associated Cost: Field trips may include a trip to Didcot Railway Center, Cavendish Laboratory in Cambridge, and Lacock Abbey in Wiltshire. Additional seminar and field trip fee is $330.
About the Tutor: Dr. Tim Barrett lectures in political history and the history of science and has been a tutor for Oxford University’s Department for Continuing Education for almost twenty years. Tim is also an Honorary Research Fellow at Keele University, Staffordshire.
Reading List:
Field Trips and Associated Cost: Field trips may include a trip to Didcot Railway Center, Cavendish Laboratory in Cambridge, and Lacock Abbey in Wiltshire. Additional seminar and field trip fee is $330.
Greek Mythology | Dr. Steve Kershaw [sold out, waitlist only]
Course Description: What are Greek myths? How can we interpret them? Why are they still so powerful? How much history do they contain? How do they differ from legends and fairy tales? Who told them and why? Did the Trojan War really happen? What might lie behind the tales of Odysseus and the Cyclops, Prometheus, Perseus and Medusa, or the myth of Atlantis? Are these tales damaged history, allegories, or reflections of the inner workings of our minds? By going back to the original texts (in translation), and through the analysis of ancient works of art (enhanced by field trips to The British museum, the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge, and the National Gallery), Dr. Kershaw will explore some of these fascinating tales from the past and evaluate various ways in which scholars have tried to make sense of them from antiquity to the present day.
About the Tutor: As a Classics Tutor for Oxford University Department for Continuing Education, Professor of History of Art for Rhodes College and The University of the South, and a lecturer for the V&A, Dr. Steve Kershaw has spent much of the last 35 years traveling extensively in the world of the Greeks both physically, intellectually, and mythologically. He has been an expert contributor to the History Channel’s Barbarians Rising series and Atlantis: The Discovery with Dan Snow on Channel 5, appeared as a featured guest on BBC Radio 4’s You’re Dead to Me, and his mythological publications include: The Penguin Dictionary of Classical Mythology; A Brief Guide to the Greek Myths; Ancient Myths, Legends and Superheroes; and Mythologica – a children’s book on Greek mythology which was Amazon.com’s Best Children’s Non-Fiction Book of 2019. Steve is also an internationally renowned jazz double-bass player.
Reading List:
Kershaw, S. P., A Brief Guide to the Greek Myths. New York: Carroll & Graff, 2007.
Homer. The Odyssey, A Norton Critical Edition by Homer (author), Emily Wilson (translator). New York: Norton, 2020.
Richmond Lattimore (translator), Richard Martin (author of introduction). The Iliad of Homer. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2011.
Field Trips and Associated Cost: Field trips may include the British Museum, the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge, and the National Gallery in London. Additional seminar and field trip fee is $265.
About the Tutor: As a Classics Tutor for Oxford University Department for Continuing Education, Professor of History of Art for Rhodes College and The University of the South, and a lecturer for the V&A, Dr. Steve Kershaw has spent much of the last 35 years traveling extensively in the world of the Greeks both physically, intellectually, and mythologically. He has been an expert contributor to the History Channel’s Barbarians Rising series and Atlantis: The Discovery with Dan Snow on Channel 5, appeared as a featured guest on BBC Radio 4’s You’re Dead to Me, and his mythological publications include: The Penguin Dictionary of Classical Mythology; A Brief Guide to the Greek Myths; Ancient Myths, Legends and Superheroes; and Mythologica – a children’s book on Greek mythology which was Amazon.com’s Best Children’s Non-Fiction Book of 2019. Steve is also an internationally renowned jazz double-bass player.
Reading List:
Field Trips and Associated Cost: Field trips may include the British Museum, the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge, and the National Gallery in London. Additional seminar and field trip fee is $265.
The Eighteenth-Century Country House | Dr. Gillian White
Course Description: The eighteenth century is the great age of the English country house. It is the age of Robert Adam, of Thomas Chippendale, of Capability Brown. It is also the age of the Grand Tour, of collecting, and of manufacturing and trading revolutions. It is the age that brought us so many of England’s great surviving country houses, like Chatsworth, Blenheim, Harewood, Houghton and Kedleston, as well as lost extravagances like Fonthill Abbey.
This course focuses on the visual world of the country house in the extended eighteenth century. We’ll survey changing architectural styles and developments in furnishings and interior decoration. We will also explore some of the art that adorned the rooms of the country house and view the gardens and landscapes that extended from them. Along the way, we’ll discover a fine cast of characters, including owners, architects, designers and craftsmen, all of whom have fascinating stories to tell. The course brings together a range of sources that shed light on the country house, its design, its people and its purpose. Our work in the seminar room will be accompanied by visits to sites chosen to complement the key themes of the course. These will be Blenheim Palace, Syon House, Stowe Gardens and Rousham Gardens.
This is a course about style and elegance – with some splendid English eccentrics thrown in
along the way!
About the Tutor: Dr. Gillian White began her career at the Warwickshire Museum and then worked for the National Trust as Curator/Collections Manager at Hardwick Hall, Derbyshire, about which she wrote her PhD. She taught at Leicester University for several years in the Centre for the Study of the Country House, and continues to teach History of Art in the Department of Continuing Education at Oxford University, as well as freelance lecturing. This is her tenth course for the Oxford Scholars summer program.
Reading List:
Michael Snodin and John Styles, Design and the Decorative Arts: Georgian Britain 1714-1837 (2004) (available used) (highly recommended)
Peter Ackroyd, Revolution: The History of England, vol. IV (2016)
Dana Arnold, The Georgian Country House: Architecture, Landscape and Society (2003)
Field Trips and Associated Cost: Field trips may include visits to Blenheim Palace, Syon House, Stowe Gardens, and Rousham Gardens. Additional seminar and field trip fee is $365.
This course focuses on the visual world of the country house in the extended eighteenth century. We’ll survey changing architectural styles and developments in furnishings and interior decoration. We will also explore some of the art that adorned the rooms of the country house and view the gardens and landscapes that extended from them. Along the way, we’ll discover a fine cast of characters, including owners, architects, designers and craftsmen, all of whom have fascinating stories to tell. The course brings together a range of sources that shed light on the country house, its design, its people and its purpose. Our work in the seminar room will be accompanied by visits to sites chosen to complement the key themes of the course. These will be Blenheim Palace, Syon House, Stowe Gardens and Rousham Gardens.
This is a course about style and elegance – with some splendid English eccentrics thrown in
along the way!
About the Tutor: Dr. Gillian White began her career at the Warwickshire Museum and then worked for the National Trust as Curator/Collections Manager at Hardwick Hall, Derbyshire, about which she wrote her PhD. She taught at Leicester University for several years in the Centre for the Study of the Country House, and continues to teach History of Art in the Department of Continuing Education at Oxford University, as well as freelance lecturing. This is her tenth course for the Oxford Scholars summer program.
Reading List:
Field Trips and Associated Cost: Field trips may include visits to Blenheim Palace, Syon House, Stowe Gardens, and Rousham Gardens. Additional seminar and field trip fee is $365.
Cal Discoveries Travel
Why Eureka?
eu·re·ka: a cry of joy or satisfaction when one finds or discovers something. Experience trips built with you in mind — handcrafted itineraries created by UC Berkeley travel experts.
