Undergraduate Studies
The major in history seeks to provide students with a broad introduction to the historical origins of the modern world. The major is flexible, enabling students to devise individual programs tailored to their own specific needs and interests.
In consultation with their faculty adviser, students should design a major that makes sense in terms of their other course work and career plans. This major strategy will be different for each student. A student planning a professional career in history, for example, will certainly want to take a broad variety of courses, perhaps do an independent study (HIST 98a or 98b), write a senior thesis (HIST 99d) and master the foreign languages required for that area of specialization.
Students interested in other careers, such as law or business, will design programs of study that complement their course work in other departments and programs (for example, legal studies or economics). The department strongly recommends that students acquire geographical and chronological breadth, which is best provided by our set of two-semester surveys in American, Asian, European and Latin American history.
Apart from taking one or more of these surveys, students should also select appropriate offerings from our more advanced courses that are thematic or national in scope and that permit more intensive analysis. The department is deeply commited to the development of writing and analytical skills, which are invaluable and transferable, regardless of future career — be it higher education, teaching, law, business or public service.