Economics with Hispanic Studies BA

This module focuses on a range of current issues facing the world economy, seeks to illustrate how economists model such issues, and examines potential policy responses. Example topics to be covered are:

• globalisation
• economic growth
• the global financial crisis
• the world economy
• emerging economic superpowers
• consequences of rising economic nationalism

This is an introductory module in microeconomics and macroeconomics; there is no assumption of any prior knowledge of economics.

The first semester considers microeconomics. It begins by analysing how the economic choices of households and firms can be understood using consumer and producer theory. It then looks at how these individual choices are aggregated into market demand and supply to be mediated through the price mechanism. A variety of market settings are considered, ranging from the paradigm of perfect competition to the analysis of monopolistic firms. The module continues by providing an introduction to the normative evaluation of economic outcomes and market failures.

The second semester considers macroeconomics - the study of the aggregate economy. This part will focus on the determinants of aggregate output, both in the short run - addressing cyclical movements of booms and busts - and in the long run - providing an introduction to economic growth. A running theme will be debated over the role of the government in macroeconomic management, covering fiscal and monetary policy. The module will introduce a series of basic models used in modern macroeconomics.

How does economics impact on politicians? And how do politicians impact on economics? You will study both contemporary economics and the political leaders who have put key economic theories into practice throughout history.

This module covers the following topics:

• The scope and method of economics
• Alexander Hamilton and the role of state in the economy
• Sir Robert Peel and Free Trade
• The Meiji Emperor and Industrialisation
• Franklin D Roosevelt and Demand Management
• Ludwig Erhard and Supply Side Economics
• Margaret Thatcher and Monetarism and Rolling Back the State
• Deng Xiaoping and Growth, Development and Convergence

The first half of the module provides an introduction to the mathematical methods required for economic modelling, focusing on linear algebra, optimisation and their role in formulating and solving economic problems.

The second half introduces the statistical methods required for data analysis in economics. We concentrate on statistical distribution theory and statistical inference before applying these concepts to the study of the linear regression model, whose extensions will be analysed in detail in subsequent econometrics modules.

The first half of the module provides an introduction to the mathematical methods required for economic modelling, focusing on linear algebra, optimisation and their role in formulating and solving economic problems. The second half introduces the statistical methods and concepts most applicable in economics.

The analysis of economic data necessarily proceeds in an environment where there is uncertainty about the processes that generated the data. Statistical methods provide a framework for understanding and characterising this uncertainty. These concepts are most conveniently introduced through the analysis of single-variable problems. However, economists are most often concerned about relationships among variables.

The module builds towards the study of regression analysis, which is often applied by economists in studying such relationships.

The first half of the module provides an introduction to the mathematical methods required for economic modelling, focusing on:

• mathematical finance
• analysis of functions
• supply and demand
• matrix algebra
• differentiation
• elasticities
• maximisation/minimisation
• optimisation subject to constraints
• Lagrange multipliers
• integration

The second half introduces the statistical methods and concepts most applicable in economics. The analysis of economic data necessarily proceeds in an environment where there is uncertainty about the processes that generated the data. Statistical methods provide a framework for understanding and characterising this uncertainty.

These concepts are most conveniently introduced through the analysis of single-variable problems. However, economists are most often concerned about relationships among variables. The module builds towards the study of regression analysis, which is often applied by economists in studying such relationships.

Welcome to Spanish at the University of Nottingham — this is where your journey to Spanish fluency begins!

Designed for students who have little or no prior experience of the language, this module will support you as you develop all the key areas of language acquisition: reading, writing, listening and speaking. To keep the classes interesting and relevant we'll use a wide range of source material from newspapers, audio-visual content and websites.

Through this, not only will your speaking and comprehension skills improve, but also your grammar usage and ability to understand the language in different contexts. By the end of this module, you'll be able to read basic texts, follow everyday conversations and engage in social conversation.

You'll also become more culturally aware of the countries that make up the Spanish-speaking world and get a better understanding of their varying current affairs and cultures.

Welcome to Spanish at the University of Nottingham — this is where your journey to Spanish fluency shall really begin to take off!

Designed for students who have completed an A level in the language, this module will support you to improve in all the key areas of language acquisition: reading, writing, listening and speaking. To keep the classes interesting and relevant we'll use a wide range of source material from newspapers, audio-visual content and websites.

Through this, not only will your speaking and comprehension skills improve, but also your grammar usage and ability to understand the language in different contexts.

You'll also become more culturally aware of the countries that make up the Spanish-speaking world and get a better understanding of their varying current affairs and cultures.

This module is designed as a foundation for all later modules covering Spanish and Portuguese literatures. The main aims of this module are to give you a general introduction to literature and the study of literature, while providing you with a partial overview of literary writing in the Spanish language. As well as to introduce some of the key theoretical issues of literary study and instil good reading and critical habits. Through this you will be tested on your skills in close reading, textual analysis, seminar participation and the ability to write cogent and convincing commentaries and essays. This module is worth 20 credits.

Through a combination of lectures, guided reading and research you'll explore the main patterns of Latin American political, economic and social history, between independence in the 1820s and the end of the twentieth century.

We'll focus on specific concepts, terminology, events and people, so as to develop an understanding of different perspectives and interpretations of the history in question. We'll also encourage you to appreciate the interaction between the ‘political history’ of major events and protagonists in official positions of power, and the ‘social history' of populations who both contributed to, and were affected by, political change.

You will learn to develop a critical approach to the study of history through a variety of materials; gain an ability to distinguish between the particular and the general and to develop the tools for comparative analysis.

Aimed at total beginners (or those with a little knowledge) this lively module will lay the foundations for your Portuguese language skills. Right from the first class we'll help you feel confident in gaining the key skills of reading, writing, listening and speaking.

We appreciate the importance of using interesting, relevant materials to aid your learning and will make use of a range of texts covering subjects from everyday life to current affairs. This way you will not only learn the Portuguese language, but also cultures from the lusophone world.

By the end of the module you will have the ability to understand spoken Portuguese, produce written texts and participate in conversations.

This module covers intermediate macroeconomics, including simple macro-models of goods; labour and money markets, such as IS-LM and aggregate supply/aggregate demand, including open economy extensions. Dynamic issues incorporating expectations and long run growth will also be considered.

The module will analyse policy questions surrounding exchange rates, monetary and fiscal policy, budget deficits and debt.

This module covers microeconomics including general equilibrium analysis; welfare economics; social choice; elementary game theory; and strategic behaviour of different actors such firms, voters and governments.

This module will provide an introduction to econometric techniques for modelling data. Topics to be covered include:

• panel data modelling (difference-in-difference models; regression discontinuity designs; experiments)
• qualitative response models
• time series models

This module generalises and builds upon the econometric techniques covered in the year one module, Mathematical Economics and Econometrics. This will involve introducing a number of new statistical and econometric concepts, together with some further development of the methodology that was introduced in year one.

The multivariate linear regression model will again provide our main framework for analysis. The module then introduces you to a range of statistical techniques that can be used to analyse the characteristics of univariate economic time series. The basic theoretical properties of time series models are discussed and we consider methods for fitting and checking the adequacy of empirical time series models. Methods of forecasting future values of economic time series are then considered.

This module will build on the language and cultural skills developed in last year's beginners' classes and will get you started on your exciting journey towards degree-level Spanish. Over the year, we're going to take you to the next level so by the end of the module you'll be ready to spend time living in a Spanish-speaking country.

We'll further develop your grammar and communication skills, building your confidence so that you feel happy working or studying abroad during year three. We know the thought of essay writing in another language may feel daunting, but we will help you develop these skills to competence.

To prepare you for participating in conversation with fluency we'll pay special attention to developing your ability to use complex sentence structures and rhetoric. You'll get plenty of speaking and writing practice during classes, collaborative projects and on your own time through a wide range of online and in-person interactive activities.

This module will build on the language and cultural skills developed in year one and get you started on your exciting journey towards degree-level Spanish. Over the year, we're going to take you to the next level so by the end of the module you'll be ready to spend time living in a Spanish-speaking country.

We'll further develop your grammar and communication skills, building your confidence so that you feel happy working or studying abroad during year 3. We know the thought of essay writing in another language may feel daunting, but we will help you develop these skills to competence.

To prepare you for participating in conversation with fluency we'll pay special attention to developing your ability to use complex sentence structures and rhetoric. You'll get plenty of practice during laboratory classes where you'll have access to a wide range of contemporary audio-visual materials.

Take your understanding of Spanish and Portuguese further by delving into the rich history of cinema in Spain, Portugal, Latin America and Portuguese-speaking Africa. This will assist your language skills and also deepen your knowledge of a diversity of global cultures.

In the first semester we'll examine cinema from Spanish America since the 1960s, then, in the second semester, cinema from Brazil, Portugal and Africa. In so doing, we'll address questions of cinematic style and technique, socio-historical contexts and the politics of film-making.

Don't worry if you're just starting out on your language journey, the films will be available with English subtitles.

In this module you will explore a cultural period in the Hispanic world characterised by profound social change and the emergence of major world-figures of modern art (eg Pablo Picasso). It is structured around key literary and artistic movements from Spain and Spanish America from the early 19th century to the late 20th century, such as Romanticism, Realism, and Modernism. A large part of your focus will be reading literary and visual texts of the period in relation to the socio-economic and political context of Spain’s and Spanish America’s rapid, but hugely uneven, modernisation.

Individual novels, plays, films, paintings or poems will also be used to exemplify and explore particular movements and historical moments. You will develop skills in close analysis of complex texts, an understanding of some of the major directions of Spanish and Spanish American literature in the 20th century, and the ability to relate texts studied to historico-cultural contexts. This module is worth 20 credits.

Explore relations between early modern Spain, Portugal and their empires through art, cinema and historical documents to better understand the Spanish and Portuguese speaking countries in Latin America today.

Together we’ll study paintings starting from the mid-15th century in Portugal where voyages of ‘discovery’ were well under way, to Mexico and Brazil in the late eighteenth century.

To explore the political and cultural relations between the old countries in Europe and the new lands in the Americas we’ll read travelogues, testimonies and political discussion about the New World and look at modern cinematic and theoretical responses to the conquest and colonisation of the Americas.

These complementary areas of history and culture are perfectly balanced to help you understand how the Portuguese and Spanish empires are so relevant to contemporary global geo-politics.

Building on the foundations laid in Portuguese 1 Beginners (MLAC1049), this module will improve not only your language skills but also your confidence.

We'll continue using relevant contemporary materials such as websites, newspapers, magazines and video content to improve your understanding, but we'll also dive deeper into grammar awareness and sentence structure.

You'll grow your vocabulary and focus on areas you may need whilst working or studying in a lusophone country. Listening comprehension skills will be further developed to ensure you feel comfortable taking part in authentic speed conversations.

An independent research project, involving the application of techniques of economic analysis to a self-chosen research topic and the presentation of a written report. There will be lectures to provide general guidance on economic research methods and writing an undergraduate dissertation in economics.

Topics include:

• introduction to the dissertation
• types of dissertation
• literature reviews
• sources of data
• writing up your dissertation
• data entry and data management
• an introduction to STATA
• descriptive statistics
• practical issues in regression analysis
• model selection
• endogeneity bias

This advanced module will be your final step towards fluency, training you in a more formal, sophisticated register of spoken and written Spanish.

We'll continue to use a wide range of authentic Spanish texts to further deepen your knowledge and confidence at this advanced level. We'll look at how the texts are put together so that you may use these skills within your written and spoken Spanish, taking you to the highest level of proficiency.

This module adopts a broad focus on factors influencing growth and development, concentrating on core economic policy areas and the role of international organisations.

Topics covered include macroeconomic policies, in particular exchange rates and the role of the IMF; aid policy and the World Bank, effects of aid on growth, macroeconomic and fiscal policy, and poverty; trade policy and performance and the WTO; economic reforms and growth experiences in East Asia, China and Africa; human development and the UN Sustainable Development Goals.

This module generalises and builds upon the material covered in the Econometric Theory I and II. In the first part of the module, we study large sample, or asymptotic, theory. This is needed in order to obtain tractable results about the behaviour of estimators and tests when the standard modelling assumptions - which frequently cannot be verified in practice - are relaxed.

The second part of the module continues the time series analysis taken in Econometric Theory II, with the emphasis on the behaviour of typical economic time series, and the implications of that behaviour in practical analysis, such as the construction of models linking economic time series. The key issues addressed will be the identification of non-stationarity through the construction of formal tests and the implications for modelling with non-stationary data.

Particular attention will be paid to the contributions of Sir Clive Granger to the spurious regression problem and to cointegration analysis, for which he was ultimately awarded the Nobel Prize.

This module discusses aspects of some of the main sub-areas of experimental and behavioural economics. This includes applications related to individual decision-making, strategic behaviour and market behaviour.

The module encourages reflection on both the role of experiments in economics and the assumptions that economics does (and should) make about people’s motivations. Both experimental economics and behavioural economics are still comparatively new fields within the wider discipline.

The module considers their potential and main achievements, relative to more traditional economic techniques. It encourages development of critical skills and reflection on specific research contributions in experimental and behavioural economics.

This module covers:

• saving, focusing on how agents make intertemporal decisions about their savings and wealth accumulation
• saving puzzles and household portfolios, focusing on credit markets and credit markets' imperfections, and why do households hold different kinds of assets
• asset allocation and asset pricing, focusing on intertemporal portfolio selection, asset pricing and the equity premium puzzle
• bond markets and fixed income securities
• the term structure of interest rates
• the role of behavioural finance in explaining stock market puzzles

This module provides an advanced economic analysis of the theory of organisation of firms and industries. It will analyse a variety of market structures related to the degree of market competition with a special emphasis on imperfectly competitive markets. It will also analyse issues related to the internal organisation of firms.

This module looks at:

• trade policy
• economic policy for trade and international factor mobility
• theory and evidence
• trade policy and imperfect competition
• trade and distortions
• the political economy of protection
• trade policy reform

This module covers an economic analysis of the labour market, with an emphasis on policy implications and institutional arrangements.

This module covers:

• dynamic general equilibrium models, focusing on how the time path of consumption, and saving, is determined by optimising agents and firms that interact on competitive markets
• growth in dynamic general equilibrium, focusing on the Solow model and the data, and the role played by accumulation of knowledge (endogenous innovation) in explaining long run growth
• Real Business Cycles (RBC), focusing on how the RBC approach accounts for business cycle fluctuations, and what links short run fluctuations and growth processes

This module will cover topics in advanced microeconomics and decision theory. The precise content may vary from year to year, but the module will start from the basis established by the Microeconomic Theory module.

This module provides a rigorous introduction to formal models of money in the macroeconomy. Following this, applications for areas of central banking, finance and international macroeconomics will be explored.

The module will cover the following:

Foundations

• The rational political individual?
• Voter participation
• Collective action and the role of the state

Core political economy

• The economic approach to politics
• Political aspects of economics: rights and the limits of the state
• Political aspects of economics: inequality and the duties of the state

Political economy in action

• Political economy in action: some current issues in applied political economy

The module will introduce some major themes of the economic analysis of government. Using the tools of modern microeconomic theory, it will explore how government institutions are designed, how they could be designed better, and how they shape economic policy.

This module covers:

• models of intra-industry trade
• trade policy in oligopolistic industries
• multinational enterprises
• testing trade theories
• the WTO and "new issues"

This module is intended to provide an introduction to mathematical techniques used in economics. In particular, examples of economic issues that can be analysed using mathematical models will be discussed in detail.

Particular attention will be given to providing an intuitive understanding of the logic behind the formal results presented.

This module will introduce you to economic policy analysis. It will focus on the role played by different institutional rules in shaping the behaviour of elected governments by providing incentives to elected governments.

This module will cover post-crisis monetary policy; controlling money markets with excess reserves; spill-overs of QE; effects of QE on asset and credit markets; low real equilibrium interest rates; uncertainty in monetary policy.

This module will provide an introduction to international monetary issues, including the determination of exchange rates and international spill-over effects. 

This module focuses on a range of econometric methods used in policy evaluation and in the identification and estimation of causal effects. Topics to be covered include:

• potential outcomes framework
• regression analysis and matching
• instrumental variables
• difference-in-differences
• regression discontinuity

This module covers the following:

Static numerical methods

• Numerical solution methods
• Numerical static optimisation methods
• Applications: resource allocation, computable general equilibrium

Dynamic numerical optimisation

• Discrete dynamic programming
• Implementation of the methods
• Applications: optimal growth, rational expectations, asset management

Agent-based economic modelling

• Foundations of agent-based modelling
• Basics of computer programming
• Applications: evolutionary games, markets   

Taught in Spanish, this module has been designed to give you a thorough insight into Spanish business including the contexts that have influenced its development and the ways it interacts with wider society.

We'll investigate a range of factors that have shaped the Spanish business landscape since the transition to democracy, such as:

• changes within the global and European regulatory environment
• ideological factors
• entrepreneurship
• government action to attract foreign investors, promote Spanish FDI and boost trade with regions such as Latin America, Europe and China.

You'll not only gain a historical understanding, but a contemporary perspective too by looking at case studies of both companies like Inditex (the owners of Zara and other important fashion brands) and important Spanish industries such as tourism. The module also explores some of the less positive impacts and criticisms of Spanish business practices relating to the environment, debt and corruption.

This module addresses the way in which cinema (both documentary and feature films) and literature (mostly short stories) have reflected, resisted, interrogated, and remembered the socio-political violence and conflicts that have shaped the 20th and 21st centuries so far in Europe (emphasis on the Iberian Peninsula) and Latin America (including Brazil).

The module adopts a comparative approach which focuses on the formal experiments and common preoccupations of filmmakers and writers across different national cultures and historical contexts (translations and subtitles will be provided when required). It will discuss questions on authoritarianism (Franquismo, Military Dictatorships in Central and South America, Salazarism, etc), colonial and neo-colonial practices, racial and class inequality and social injustice, gender and sexuality. Visual and literary texts may address significant conflicts as they occur and also the ways in the legacies of past traumas endure.

This module will offer a panorama of painting in Spain from the late 16th century to the late 19th century taking in four themes: portraiture, history and genre painting, religion, and mythology and myths.

Artists covered will include Domenikos Theotocópoulos, Diego de Silva y Velázquez, Jusepe de Ribera and Bartolomé Esteban Murillo from the Spanish Golden Age and Francisco de Goya, Vicente López, Martín Rico and Marià Fortuny from the 19th century.

You will have the opportunity to study other painters in the preparation of assessments throughout the year. There will be an emphasis on designing exhibitions and on understanding the paintings both within the context of art history and the history and cultures of Spain.

You may believe that politics and literature are two distinct fields of study, but this module will help you understand the complex but integral relationship between the two.

We’ll explore the representation of key social and political issues within contemporary Spanish literature. You’ll discover how literature in late capitalism, and contemporary ‘Hispanic’ authors in particular, dealt with issues of language, identity, culture, society, nationhood, gender, class, memory, time and writing.

We also explore debates regarding the consistency of the categories of ‘Spain’ and ‘Spanishness’ when analysing cultural production in contemporary Iberia. This shall lead us to assess the competing discursive practices involved in remapping the notion of Spanish canonical literature at the beginning of the new millennium.

This advanced module will be your final step towards fluency. We'll build on your grammatical competence and assist you to develop a more sophisticated and formal register of vocabulary, idiom and advanced syntax.

During class you'll gain the ability to discuss a wide range of topics in written and spoken Portuguese, giving you the confidence to converse articulately upon complex and intellectual subjects.

This module looks at key 20th century Spanish American novels and short stories and considers issues such as race, gender, sexuality and the conflict of cultures. You will be trained in using a broad range of tools of narrative and rhetorical analysis so as to engage in debates about literary representation and aesthetics, and will hone your use of these through a programme of research tasks, seminar presentations, group discussions, and written assignments.

Free education from cradle to grave has been central to modern Cuba’s cultural and ideological identity. This module will encourage you to explore Cuba’s revolutionary change since 1959, through an examination of its evolving ideologies. You’ll review the critical factors of nationalism, dependency, radicalism and leadership which shaped developments from the original rebellion up to the present day.

Together we’ll discover the role of education policies and the ways in which a ‘cultural revolution’ was fundamental to the socialisation process of, and popular participation in (or dissent from) the Revolution.

This study will help you form conclusions about both the meaning of ‘ideology’ within the context of the Revolution, and the international geo-political significance of Cuba's self-definition and evolution.