(AY2017/2018, Sem 2) NUS GEH1062 : Ghosts and Spirits in Society and Culture Review

Module Title: Ghosts and Spirits in Society and Culture

Module Code: GEH1062

Taken in AY2017/2018, Semester 2.

Lecturer: DR Noorman Abdullah

Tutor: DR Noorman Abdullah

Components	Percentage	Grade
Mid-term Test	20%	A
Presentation	20%	A+
Class Participation	10%	-
Finals	50%	-

Final Grade: A+

What is it about?

     GEH1062 focuses on the academic side of "Ghosts and Spirits" -- covering topics such as shamanism, spirit possessions, legend tripping, secularisation thesis, horror films, demons, sorcery, witchcraft and etc.

     There are in total four modes of assessment. Mid-term test is open-book, and takes place in week 9. Students are required to answer 2 compulsory essay questions in an hour. For presentation, you will be asked to present in different weeks (4, 6, 8, 10) depending on the topic you chose. The presentation is marked solely based on content so you will not be penalised for lack of interaction or for reading off your phone. For class participation, you are required to participate actively in tutorials by asking questions during other groups’ presentation and/or answer to other groups' enquires during your own presentation. Lastly, finals is open-book and students are required to answer 4 compulsory essay questions in 2 hours. Questions asked are based on our readings so as long as you finish all the readings, group your evidences for possible topics, you are good to go. To give you a gauge, the professor could ask you to analyse the relation between gender and power and explain how this helps you in the understanding of possession for instance. A possible answer would be that women are more susceptible to being possessed and portrayed negatively as monsters in horror films because of the pervasiveness of the androcentric culture.

Review

      GEH1062 is by far, my favourite module in NUS. DR Nooman Abdullah is an excellent lecturer and tutor. He is extremely thorough and clear in his explanation, which makes his lectures easy to follow. Most importantly, he makes it a point to make the module as accessible as possible by minimising the amount of readings. Yet, he does so without compromising on the quality of our education by selecting good readings. 

      Offered by the sociology department, GEH1062 opened my eyes to the academic world of  'Spirits and Supernatural'. Not only is the content interesting, the workload is also relatively light. Readings could be a bit long for some weeks but compared to other FASS modules, they are still relatively short. Mid-terms and Finals are both open-book and are generally manageable if you do your readings. As for presentation, you only need to ensure that you have a good content as that is the sole criteria.

      

      To score well for this module, it’s a must to read your readings as the examination questions focused a lot on the readings. For presentation, just make sure that you answer all the questions that the professor listed and you will be fine. 

Ratings

4.8/5