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The University of Southampton
International Summer School

From Barter to Bitcoins: The Cultural Life of Money

International Summer School
International Summer School

This course explores what money really is. It expands our everyday perceptions of coins and notes by looking at the ways in which artists, writers and philosophers have revealed the social and political assumptions that money relies upon. The first class will introduce you to money’s contested histories, exploring how histories of barter have been placed against histories of debt and what this means for how money functions in contemporary economies. The second class will introduce you to the ways in which artists and writers have imagined alternative forms of money, exploring examples from counterfeiting to the gift economy. The final class explores what money means in our contemporary moment: analysing the social relations, and problems, that digital money brings.

The academic organising this topic is Professor Nicky Marsh, Professor in English.  Find out more about the PGR tutor, Lian Patston, on our Meet your PGR Tutor page.

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