Unit information: Urban Geography - a focus on Africa in 2022/23

Unit name	Urban Geography - a focus on Africa
Unit code	GEOG30022
Credit points	20
Level of study	H/6
Teaching block(s)	Teaching Block 2 (weeks 13 - 24)
Unit director	Professor. Parnell
Open unit status	Not open
Units you must take before you take this one (pre-requisite units)	None
Units you must take alongside this one (co-requisite units)	None
Units you may not take alongside this one	None
School/department	School of Geographical Sciences
Faculty	Faculty of Science

Unit Information

Course description:

Continuing population growth and urbanisation will add 2.5 billion more people to the world’s cities by 2050, with nearly 90 per cent of the increase concentrated in Asia and Africa. Today, around 40 per cent of Africans are urban dwellers, about 500 million people. In the next few decades this number will swell to over 1.4 billion. Urban Geographers have until recently virtually overlooked the dramatic expansion of African cities. A recent surge of writing from geography and urban studies provides the platform from which the course explores the challenges faced in African cities, assessing the durability and relevance of traditional scholarship to contemporary urban change.

The core material is covered in lectures and seminars and further developed via independent reading and essay preparation.

Course aims:

• To provide students with an overview of scope, significance and variation across Africa’s urban transition.
• To develop critical skills, grounded in the traditions of urban geography, to describe, analyse and explain the drivers of urban growth in contemporary Africa.

Your learning on this unit

On completion of this Unit students should be able to:

1. Identify and explain the past and present factors that have shaped the varied urban trajectories across Africa.
2. Use key concepts in urban geography to illuminate African urbanisation patterns, dynamics and politics.
3. Reflect from African cases on the relevance and universal traction of traditional urban geographical ideas.
4. Critically evaluate contemporary policy approaches to key urban questions in Africa.
5. Design, undertake and write up research addressing urban development in an African city from a critical perspective.

The following transferable skills are developed in this Unit:

• Written and verbal communication
• Library searches for published and unpublished material
• Team working
• Problem solving
• Analytical skills
• Planning

How you will learn

The unit will be taught through a blended combination of online and, if possible, in-person teaching, including

• online resources
• synchronous group workshops, seminars, tutorials and/or office hours
• asynchronous individual activities and guided reading for students to work through at their own pace

How you will be assessed

3000-word essay (100%)

Resources

If this unit has a Resource List, you will normally find a link to it in the Blackboard area for the unit. Sometimes there will be a separate link for each weekly topic.

If you are unable to access a list through Blackboard, you can also find it via the Resource Lists homepage. Search for the list by the unit name or code (e.g. GEOG30022).

How much time the unit requires
Each credit equates to 10 hours of total student input. For example a 20 credit unit will take you 200 hours of study to complete. Your total learning time is made up of contact time, directed learning tasks, independent learning and assessment activity.

See the Faculty workload statement relating to this unit for more information.

Assessment
The Board of Examiners will consider all cases where students have failed or not completed the assessments required for credit. The Board considers each student's outcomes across all the units which contribute to each year's programme of study. If you have self-certificated your absence from an assessment, you will normally be required to complete it the next time it runs (this is usually in the next assessment period).
The Board of Examiners will take into account any extenuating circumstances and operates within the Regulations and Code of Practice for Taught Programmes.