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Course syllabus Security and Crisis in Relation to ’the Everyday’

Swedish name: Säkerhet och kris i ett vardagsperspektiv

Course code:
1SS085
Valid from semester:
Autumn Term 2024
Education cycle:
First cycle
Scope:
7.5 credits
Progression:
G1N
Grading scale:
Three-grade scale
Main field of study:
Political Science: Security Studies
Department:
Department of Political Science and Law
Subject:
Political Science: Security Studies
Language of instruction:
The teaching is conducted in English.
Decided by:
Forsknings- och utbildningsnämndens kursplaneutskott (KUS)
Decision date:
2023-04-25

Entry requirements

Civics 1b alternatively Civics 1a1 + 1a2 and

English proficiency equivalent to English B or English 6 is also required.

Course content and structure

Research on ‘the everyday’ focuses on personal and ordinary experiences in relation to security and crisis, often drawing on feminist insights. It turns to overlooked agents and alternative sites that may be messy and mundane, taken for granted or invisible in mainstream literature. It includes studies on the micropolitics of 'new' or alternative security actors. Another strand in the literature is contestation; for instance resistance towards security strategies and the traditional framing of politics and crisis. Typically, research on the everyday highlight both vulnerabilities and the power/agency of subjects. This course offers an introduction to research on ‘the everyday’ in relation to security and crisis through lectures and seminars that connects to a number of key issues in the literature. These learning activities provide the student the opportunity to gain knowledge, analyse and critically assess these key issues.

Type of Instruction
  • Seminars
  • Lectures

Objectives

Upon completion of the course the student should be able to:

Knowledge and understanding
  • describe the main traits of the research studying everyday security and crisis, including the concepts and theories that characterise this literature,

Competence and skills
  • analyse issues relating to security and/or crisis from the perspective of the everyday,

Judgement and approach
  • problematize strengths and weaknessess of applying a focus on the everyday – in relation to approaching security and crisis through other, more traditional perspectives – and how this can contribute to a secure society.

Examination formats

Security and Crisisin Relation to ’the Everyday’ 
Scope: 7.5

Grading Scale: Fail, Pass, Pass with Distinction

The course is examined through participation in the compulsory seminars and an in-class examination.

The examiner may decide upon a supplementary task in order to approve the examination. Late examinations are not graded unless the examiner approves of it. The student has three working days to file in a supplementary task.

Grading
Grading takes place through a three-grade grading scale: Fail (U), Pass (G) and Pass with Distinction (VG). Grading criteria are reported at the latest at the start of the course.

In order to receive a passing grade (G), the student needs to achieve a passing grade for participation in the compulsory seminars and a passing grade on the written exam. In order to receive a pass with distinction (VG), the student needs in addition to the requirements for a passing grade, also achieve a pass with distinction on the written exam.

Restrictions in Number of Examinations 
There is no limit on the total number of examination opportunities.

Transitional provisions

When the course is no longer given or when the course content has changed substantially, the student has the right to be examined once per semester during a three-term period in accordance with this syllabus.

Other regulations

The course cannot be included in a degree with another course whose content fully or partially corresponds to the content of this course.

If the Swedish Defence University has formally decided that the student is entitled to receive special educational support due to a disability, the examiner may decide on alternative forms of examination for the student. The course director will conduct an evaluation on the completion of the course, which will form the basis for any changes to the course.

This is an edited version of the syllabus, created to transfer the original to the education database Ladok education planning. For originals, refer to the archive. 
Reading list decided date: 2024-05-24
Austin, J. Luke. 2019. Security compositions. European Journal of International Security. 2019, 4: 249-273.
Bleiker, Roland and Hutchison, Emma. 2008. “Fear No More: Emotions and World Politics”, Review of International Studies. 34(1):115-135.
Bondesson, Sara. 2017. “Methodological Approaches: Possibilities and Challenges of Ethnography” in Vulnerability and Power: Social Justice Organizing in Rockaway, New York City, after Hurricane Sandy [thesis]. Uppsala: Uppsala University s. 63-91
Christensen, Tina W. 2015. “How extremist experiences become valuable knowledge in EXIT programmes”. Journal for Deradicalization, summer, no. 3.x
Cochrane, Brandy and Wolff, Lotte. 2021. Theorising Mothers’ Everyday Security in the Context of Irregular Migration. Journal of Human Security. 17(1): 57-65.
Crawford, Adam and Hutchinson, Steven. 2016. Mapping the contours of ‘everyday security’: Time, space and emotion. British Journal of Criminology. 56, 1184–1202
Daigle, Megan. 2016. ”Writing the Lives of Others: Storytelling and International Politics”, Millennium: Journal of International Studies, vol. 45, no. 1, pp. 25-42.
Enloe, Cynthia. 2011 ”The Mundane Matters”, International Political Sociology, v. 5, no. 4, pp. 447-450.
Eschle, Catherine. 2018. Nuclear (in)security in the everyday: Peace campers as everyday security practitioners. Security Dialogue 49(4): 289-305
Holmberg, Arita, 2021. Swedish teachers’ views of security in schools: narratives disconnected from the national security discourse. Critical Studies on Security. 9(3): 226-240
Hopkins, Peter, Hörschelmann, Kathrin, Benwell, Matthew. C and Studemeyer, Catherine 2019. Young people’s everyday landscapes of security and insecurity. Social &Cultural Geography, 20(4): 435-444
Gunning, Jeroen and Smaira, Dima. 2022. Who you gonna call? Theorising everyday security practices in urban spaces with multiple security actors – The case of Beirut’s Southern Suburbs. Political Geography 98, 102485
Jones, Peris and Kimari, Wangui. 2019. Security beyond the men: Women and their everyday security apparatus in Mathare, Nairobi. Urban Studies 56 (9): 1835-1849
Krystalli, Roxani and Schulz, Philipp. 2022. “Taking Love and Care Seriously: An Emergent Research Agenda for Remaking Worlds in the Wake of Violence”. International Studies Review. 24(1): x
Marshall, Matilda, 2021. Prepared for a crisis and the unexpected: managing everyday eventualities through food storage practices. Food, Culture & Society. Published online 31 August 2021.
Preston, John, 2009. “Preparing for emergencies: citizenship education, ‘whiteness’ and pedagogies of security”. Citizenship Studies 13(2): 187-200.
Ragazzi, Francesco, 2017. Countering terrorism and radicalisation: Securitising social policy?Critical Social Policy, 37(2): 163–179.
Shepherd, Laura. 2012. “Transdisciplinarity: The Politics and Practices of Knowledge Production” [blogpost], The Disorder of Things. Available: https://thedisorderofthings.com/2012/11/23/transdisciplinarity-the-politics-and-practices-of-knowledge-production/

Vastapuu, Leena. 2018. “Auto-photographing (in)securities: former young female soldiers’ post-war struggles in Monrovia” in Vuori, Juha A. and Rune Saugmann Andersen (eds.), Visual Security Studies: Sights and Spectacles of Insecurity and War. London and New York: Routledge. pp. 171-188.
Vaughan-Williams, Nick and Stevens, Daniel. 2016. Vernacular theories of everyday (in)security: The disruptive potential of non-elite knowledge. Security Dialogue 47(1): 40-58
Weldes, Jutta. 2014. “High Politics and Low data: Globalization Discourses and Popular Culture” in Yanow, Yanow and Peregrine Schwartz-Shea (eds.), Interpretation and Method: Empirical Research Methods and the Interpretive Turn. London and New York: Routledge. pp. 228-238
Wibben, Annick.T.R. 2020. Everyday security, feminism, and the continuum of violence. Journal of Global Security Studies 5(1): 115–121.
Williams, Fiona. 2018. Care: Intersections of scales, inequalities and crises. Current Sociology 66 (4): 547-561
1-2 articles may be added to this list.