Subjects

Students on the Visiting Student Programme study a wide range of subjects. 

On this page is the list of courses available to Visiting Students in the 2020-21 academic year. 

Please note that the provision of some course options depend on the availability of specialist teaching, and therefore may be subject to change. 

Visiting students may choose courses from the following subject areas:

English, History, Philosophy, Theology and Religion, Politics, Economics, Geography, Human Sciences, Oriental Studies, Statistics.

Course Catalogue

For Statistics, please write to  for a list of tutorial options.

If you have a particular interest in an area of study which you do not see here, please contact us at , and we will ask our tutors for advice and guidance for you. You may also find it helpful to go to the subject website for the Oxford course you are interested in, to read about the range of options which are offered on the undergraduate degree at Oxford.

Before confirming your choice of topics we will look at your past qualifications and statement of interests to make sure we are providing the most suitable courses for you. These documents will be regularly updated as more information on courses becomes available.

Teaching at Oxford is primarily in tutorials, usually with one or two students working with one tutor, and writing an essay for each tutorial. Each student will take one primary (eight tutorials) and one secondary tutorial (four tutorials) a term. There may also be additional classes as part of a term's course, and most courses will be supported by lectures in the faculties and departments. We try to give you the same experience as our second and third year undergraduates, and as far as possible you will follow the same course of study as they do, except that you will not take examinations. You have the opportunity to follow a course of study in one subject, progressing through courses to more difficult and specialised work, or to pick from a range of disciplines. 

Credits
Students on the Mansfield Visiting Student Programme study one primary course and one secondary course each term.  The courses are equivalent to those taken by matriculated second and third year undergraduates, but are assessed by tutorial essay and participation rather than examination.  A primary course is awarded 8 tutorial credits and secondary course is awarded 4 tutorial credits.  Visiting Students study 36 tutorial credits in total during a full year of study, which is equivalent to 60 credits in the European Credit Transfer Scheme (ECTS). 

Courses that are starred with a '*' have pre-requisites.  Please check the course catalogue linked above for more information.

Course Listing

Economics
Note: available only as primary tutorials

ECO001: Introduction to Microeconomics

ECO002: Introduction to Macroeconomics

ECO003:  Development of the World Economy since 1800*

ECO004: Economics of Developing Countries*

ECO005: Labour Economics and Industrial Relations*

ECO006: Public Economics*

ECO007: Economics of Industry*

ECO08: Game Theory*

ECO09: International Economics*

ECO010: Money and Banking*

ECO011: Econometrics*

ECO012: Microeconomic Analysis

ECO013: Finance*

English

ENG001: Old and Early Middle English 650-1350

ENG002: Literature in English 1350-1550

ENG003: Literature in English 1550-1660

ENG004: Literature in English 1660-1760

ENG005: Literature in English 1760-1830 

ENG006: Literature in English 1830-1910 

ENG007: Literature in English 1910-present day

ENG008: Shakespeare 

ENG009: Special Authors
E.g.Beowulf Poet; Chaucer; Spenser; Milton; Ben Jonson; Marvell; Dryden; Eliza Haywood; Wordsworth;Jane Austen; Byron; Tennyson; Dickens; Wilde; Conrad; Yeats; Woolf ; Walcott; Joyce; Roth; Friel; Emerson; Dickinson; Faulkner

ENG010: Special Topics
The ode from Wordsworth to Hopkins; The Avant-Garde; Children's Literature; Comparative Literature; Early Modern Criminality; Fairytale, Fantasy and Myth; Hit & Myth: Reinventing the Medieval for the Modern Age; The Icelandic Saga; The Literary Essay; Literature and Science; Literature and the Mind; The Long Fin de siècle; Postcolonial Literature; Post-war American Fiction; Post-War British Drama; Styles of Political Criticism since 2000; Texts in motion: literary and material forms, 1550-1800; Tragedy; Writers and the Cinema; Writing feminisms/feminist writing; Writing War

Geography

GEO001: Climate Change

GEO002: Human Geography

GEO003: Earth Systems Processes

GEO004: Geographical Controversies

GEO005: Space, Place and Society

GEO006: Earth System Dynamics

GEO007: Environmental Geography

GEO008: Climate Change

History

HIS001: History of the British Isles II, 1042-1330

HIS002: History of the British Isles III, 1330-1550

HIS003: History of the British Isles V, 1685-1830

HIS004: History of the British Isles VI, 1815-1924

HIS005: European and World History 1000-1300

HIS006: European and World History 1300-1500

HIS007: European and World History 1830-1914

HIS008: European and World History 1750-1930

HIS009: European and World History 1914-1989

HIS010: Medieval Popular Politics

HIS011: Later Medieval Crime and Punishment

HIS012: The Black Death and Social Change, 1348-1450

HIS013: British Popular politics, 1780 – 1900

HIS014: The Victorians

HIS015: Women, Gender and Historical Change, Britain in the Long 19th Century

HIS016: Modern British Feminism

HIS017: History of Modern Israel

HIS018: Jews in Fin de Siècle Vienna

HIS019: Further Subject (see below)

Further Subjects are available in Hilary Term only.  Please put HIS019 on your application form and specify which option you would like to take.

List of Further Subjects:

  • Anglo-Saxon Archaeology c.600-750: Society and Economy in the Early Christian Period
  • The Near East in the Age of Justinian and Muhammad, 527-c.700
  • The Carolingian Renaissance
  • The Crusades, c.1095-1291
  • Culture and Society in Early Renaissance Italy, 1290-1348 
  • Flanders and Italy in the Quattrocento, 1420-80
  • The Wars of the Roses, 1450-1500
  • Women, Gender and Print Culture in Reformation England, c.1530-1640
  • Literature and Politics in Early Modern England
  • The Iberian Global Century, 1550-1650
  • Writing in the Early Modern Period, 1550-1750
  • Court Culture and Art in Early Modern Europe 1580-1700 
  • War and Society in Britain and Europe c.1650-1815
  • The Metropolitan Crucible, London 1685-1815
  • Medicine, Empire, and Improvement, 1720-1820
  • The Age of Jefferson, 1774-1826
  • Nationalism in Western Europe, 1799-1890
  • Imperialism and Nationalism in Sub-Saharan Africa c. 1870-1980
  • The Soviet Union, 1924-41
  • Scholastic and Humanist Political Thought
  • The Science of Society, 1650-1800
  • Political Theory and Social Science c.1780-1920

Human Sciences

HUM001: The Biology of Organisms including humans

HUM002: Genetics and Evolution

HUM003: Society, Culture and Environment

HUM004: Sociology and Demography

HUM005: Quantitative Methods for the Human Sciences

HUM006: Behaviour and its Evolution

HUM007: Human Genetics and Evolution

HUM008: Human Ecology

HUM009: Demography and Population

HUM010: Anthropological Analysis and Interpretation

HUM011: Sociological Theory

HUM012: Anthropology of a Selected Region (e.g. Europe, China, Lowland South America)

HUM013: Anthropology of Medicine

HUM014: Cognition and Culture

HUM015: Cognitive and Evolutionary Anthropology

HUM016: Gender

HUM017: Health and Disease

HUM018: Physical and Forensic Anthropology

HUM019: Sociology of Post-Industrial Societies

Oriental Studies

OST001: Biblical History

OST002: Biblical Archaeology

OST003: Biblical Narrative

OST004: Biblical Prophecy

OST005: Second Temple Judaism

OST006: Haskalah

OST007: Modern Jewish Society

OST008: State of Israel

OST009: Modern Hebrew Literature

OST010: Yiddish Literature

OST011: History of Jewish Bible Interpretation

OST012: Biblical Religion

OST013: Modern Jewish History

OST014: Judaism

Philosophy

PHI001: History of Philosophy from Descartes to Kant

PHI002: Knowledge and Reality*

PHI003: Ethics

PHI004: Philosophy of Mind*

PHI005: Philosophy of Religion

PHI006: The Philosophy of Logic and Language*

PHI007: Aesthetics

PHI008: Medieval Philosophy*

PHI009: Post-Kantian Philosophy*

PHI010: Ancient Philosophy

PHI011: Wittgenstein*

PHI012: Theory of Politics

PHI013: Individual Authors
E.g. Descartes, Spinoza, Leibniz, Locke, Hume, Berkeley, Kant

Politics

POL001: Comparative Government*

POL002: British Politics and Government since 1900*

POL003: Theory of Politics*

POL004: International Relations*

POL005: Political Sociology*

POL006: Modern British Government and Politics*

POL007: Government and Politics of the US*

POL008: Politics in Europe*

POL009: Politics in Russia and the Former Soviet Union*

POL010: Politics in Sub-Saharan Africa*

POL011: Politics in Latin America*

POL012: Politics in South Asia*

POL013: Politics in the Middle East*

POL014: International Relations in the Era of the Two World Wars*

POL015: International Relations in the Era of the Cold War*

POL016: Political Thought: Plato to Rousseau*

POL017: Political Thought: Bentham to Weber*

POL018: Marx and Marxism*

POL019: Government and Politics of Japan*

POL020: Politics in China*

POL021: Politics of the European Union*

POL022: Arab-Israel Conflict

POL023: Political Ideologies

Theology & Religion

REL001: Reformation

REL002: 19th-Century Christian Thought

REL003: Modern Theology

REL004: Philosophy of Religion

REL005: Nature of Religion

REL006: Hinduism

REL007: Buddhism

REL008: New Testament

REL009: Old Testament

REL010: Introduction to Mysticism