History

Humanities Quadrangle, 2nd floor, 203.432.1366
http://history.yale.edu
M.A., M.Phil., Ph.D.

Chair
Regina Kunzel

Director of Graduate Studies
Jennifer Allen (203.432.1361)

Professors Sunil Amrith, Lauren Benton, Paola Bertucci, Ned Blackhawk, David Blight, Daniel Botsman, Paul Bushkovitch, Deborah Coen, Stephen Davis, Carolyn Dean, Fabian Drixler, Carlos Eire, Omnia El Shakry, David Engerman, Paul Freedman, Joanne Freeman, John Gaddis, Beverly Gage, Bruce Gordon, Greg Grandin, Valerie Hansen, Robert Harms, Elizabeth Hinton, Matthew Jacobson, Paul Kennedy, Jennifer Klein, Regina Kunzel, Noel Lenski, Kathryn Lofton, Mary Lui, Daniel Magaziner, J.G. Manning, Ivan Marcus, Joanne Meyerowitz, Alan Mikhail, Samuel Moyn, Nicholas Parrillo, Mark Peterson, Stephen Pitti, Claire Priest, Laura Robson, Naomi Rogers, Edward Rugemer, Paul Sabin, David Sorkin, Elli Stern, John Harley Warner, Arne Westad, John Witt, Jonathan Wyrtzen, Taisu Zhang

Associate Professors Jennifer Allen, Rohit De, Marcela Echeverri Muñoz, Anne Eller, Hussein Fancy, Crystal Feimster, Andrew Johnston, Isaac Nakhimovsky, Vanessa Ogle, Joanna Radin, William Rankin, Alden Young

Assistant Professors Alvita Akiboh, Sergei Antonov, Zeinab Azarbadegan, Maura Dykstra, Joe Glynias, Benedito Machava, Nana Osei Quarshie, Carolyn Roberts, Hannah Shepherd, Nurfadzilah Yahaya

Senior Lecturer Jay Gitlin

Fields of Study

Fields include ancient, medieval, early modern, and modern Europe (including Britain, Russia, and Eastern Europe), United States, Latin America, East Asia, South and Southeast Asia, Middle East, Africa, Jewish history; and diplomatic, environmental, ethnic, intellectual, labor, legal, military, political, religious, social, and women’s history, as well as the history of science and medicine (see the section in this bulletin on the History of Science and Medicine).

Special Requirements for the Ph.D. Degree

Language Requirements

All students must pass examinations in at least one foreign language by the end of the first year. Students are urged to do everything in their power to acquire adequate linguistic training before they enter Yale and should at a minimum be prepared to be examined in at least one language upon arrival. Typical language requirements for major subfields are as follows:

African Either (1) French and German or Portuguese or Dutch-Afrikaans; (2) French or German or Portuguese and Arabic; or (3) French or German or Portuguese or Dutch-Afrikaans and an African language approved by the director of graduate studies (DGS) and the faculty adviser.

American One language relevant to the student’s research interests approved by the adviser and DGS.

Ancient German and either French or Italian and two ancient languages, one of which must be Greek or Latin and the second of which can be either the second classical language or another ancient language (e.g., Hebrew, Aramaic/Syriac, Demotic, Coptic, Classical Armenian, Sanskrit).

Chinese Chinese and Japanese; additional languages like French, Russian, or German may be necessary for certain dissertation topics.

East European The language of the country of the student’s concentration plus two of the following: French, German, Russian, or an approved substitution.

Global/International Two languages to be determined by the DGS in consultation with the adviser.

Japanese Japanese and one additional language, as approved by the student’s adviser and the DGS.

Jewish Modern Hebrew and German, and additional languages such as Latin, Arabic, Yiddish, Russian, or Polish, as required by the student’s areas of specialization.

Latin American Spanish, Portuguese, and French.

Medieval French, German, and Latin.

Middle East Arabic, Persian, or Turkish (or modern Hebrew, depending on area of research) and a major European research language (French, German, Russian, or an approved substitute).

Modern Western European (including British) French and German; substitutions are permitted with the approval of the DGS.

Russian Russian plus French or German with other languages as required.

South Asia One South Asian language and a second relevant research language, whether another South Asian or a European or Asian language.

Southeast Asian Choice of Dutch, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Chinese, Sanskrit, or Arabic, plus one or more Southeast Asian language (e.g., Bahasa Indonesian, Burmese, Khmer, Lao, Malay, Tagalog, Thai, Tetum, or Vietnamese). In certain cases, Ph.D. dissertation research on Southeast Asia may also require knowledge of a regional or local language, e.g., Balinese or Cham.

Foreign students whose native language is not English may receive permission during their first year to hand in some written work in their own language. Since, however, the dissertation must be in English, they are advised to bring their writing skills up to the necessary level at the earliest opportunity.

Additional Requirements

During the first year of study, students normally take six term courses, including Approaching History (HIST 5000), which is required of first-year students. During the second year of study, they may opt to take four to six term courses, with the approval of their adviser and the DGS. One of these courses must be the Prospectus Seminar (HIST 5100), which is required of second-year students. The ten courses taken during the first two years should normally include at least six chosen from those offered by the department. Students must achieve Honors in at least two courses in the first year, and Honors in at least four courses by the end of the second year, with a High Pass average overall. Courses graded in the Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory mode (HIST 9998) count toward the course work requirement but do not count toward the Honors requirement. Courses that count for less than one full credit per term do not count toward the coursework requirement, including EMST 7000 and EMST 7001 for those in the combined program with Early Modern Studies.

Two of the ten courses must be research seminars in which the student produces an original research paper from primary sources. The Prospectus Seminar (HIST 5100) does not count as a research seminar. All graduate students, regardless of field, will be required to take two seminar courses in a time period other than their period of specialty.

Students in their second year should choose their courses so that at least one course will prepare them for a comprehensive examination field. Some fields offer reading seminars specifically designed to help prepare students for examination; others encourage students to sign up for Directed Reading (HIST 9998) with one of their examiners. Students should, in consultation with their major field examiner and the DGS, register for Field Studies (HIST 5250), which is a half-credit course and does not count toward the coursework requirements.  

Students should discuss the following options with their advisers before choosing one:

Option 1 Students take exams during the fourth semester of graduate study (i.e., the second semester of year two). The Comprehensive Statement of Intention Form must be submitted by the end of the third semester.

Option 2 Students take exams during the fifth semester of graduate study (i.e., the first semester of year three). The Comprehensive Statement of Intention Form must be submitted by the end of the fourth semester.

Students in good academic standing may, with adviser approval, request scheduling comprehensive examinations in the sixth semester.

All students must submit the Comprehensive Statement of Intention Form by the end of the fourth semester.

Students will have a choice of selecting three or four fields of concentration: a major field and either two or three minor fields. The examination must contain one minor field that deals fifty percent or more with the historiography of a region of the world other than the area of the student’s major field. The examination will have a written component that will be completed before the oral component. For their major field, students will either write a historiographical essay of 8,000 words, maximum, or prepare a syllabus for an undergraduate lecture class in the field; this is to be decided in consultation with the major field examiner. For each of the minor fields, the student will prepare a syllabus for an undergraduate lecture class in the field. All of these are to be written over the course of the examination preparation process and will be due not less than two weeks prior to the oral portion of the examination. The oral examination examines the students on their fields and will, additionally, include discussion of the materials produced for the written component of the examination. For those students who choose two minor fields, the major field will be examined for sixty minutes and the minor fields will be examined for thirty minutes each. For those students who choose three minor fields, each field will be examined for thirty minutes.

In order to advance to candidacy, all students must pass a prospectus colloquium. This should be completed by the end of the sixth term. The prospectus colloquium offers students an opportunity to discuss the dissertation prospectus with their dissertation committee in order to gain the committee’s advice on the research and writing of the dissertation and its approval for the project. The dissertation prospectus provides the basis of grant proposals.

Both the comprehensive examinations and the prospectus colloquium must be held by the end of the sixth term.

Completion of ten term courses (including HIST 5000 and HIST 5100), the language requirements of the relevant field, the comprehensive examinations, and the prospectus colloquium will qualify a student for admission to candidacy for the Ph.D., which must take place by the end of the third year of study.

It is also possible for students who have completed extensive graduate work prior to entering the Yale Ph.D. program to complete course work sooner. Students may petition for course waivers based on previous graduate work (up to three term courses) only after successful completion of the first year.

Students normally serve as teaching fellows during four-six terms to acquire professional training. Ordinarily, students teach in their third year and two subsequent years. During their first term of teaching, students must attend training sessions run by the Poorvu Center for Teaching and Learning and work with the associate director of graduate studies to discuss any matters of concern. Students in more advanced years may have the opportunity to teach as associates in teaching (ATs), in conjunction with a faculty member, or by leading discipline-specific writing seminars on their own. Both options are available only through a competitive process. Interested students should consult with their advisers and the DGS for further information.

By the end of their ninth term, students are required to submit a chapter of their dissertation to the dissertation committee. This chapter will then be discussed with the student by the committee, in a chapter conference, to give the student additional advice and counsel on the progress of the dissertation. This conference is designed to be an extension of the conversation begun in the prospectus colloquium and is not intended as a defense. Its aim is to give students early feedback on the research, argument, and style of the first writing accomplished on the dissertation.

No less than one month before students plan to submit their dissertations, a relatively polished full draft of the dissertation should be discussed with the student by the dissertation committee, in a dissertation defense of one to two hours, to give the student additional advice and counsel on completing the dissertation or on turning it into a book, as appropriate. Students are required to submit the draft to their committee in sufficient time for the committee to be able to read it (approximately one month). This defense is designed to give students advice on the overall arguments and the final shape of the dissertation or book, and to leave time for adjustments coming out of the discussion.

The fellowship package offered to Ph.D. students normally includes twelve months of fellowship support for two terms of research and writing without any teaching duties. With the approval of the academic adviser and the DGS, students may choose to take the fellowship terms at any point after they have advanced to candidacy and before the end of their sixth year. Students are prohibited from teaching during research and writing fellowship terms. 

Students who have not submitted the dissertation by the end of the sixth year need not register in order to submit. If, however, students wish to register for a seventh year for good academic reasons, they may petition for extended registration. The petition, submitted to the History DGS, will explain the academic reasons for the request. Only students who have completed the first chapter conference will be considered for extended registration.

Evaluation of First- and Second-Year Graduate Students

At the end of each term, the DGS will ask faculty members whether they have serious concerns about the academic progress of any first- or second-year students in the Ph.D. program. Faculty members who have such concerns will provide written feedback to the DGS at the DGS’s request. The DGS will use discretion in ensuring that feedback is provided in a clear and effective manner to any students about whom there are concerns. We expect such concerns to be rare.

Toward the end of the academic year, the History faculty will hold a special meeting to review each first- and second-year student in the program. The purpose of the meeting is to assess students’ academic progress. In order for second-year students to proceed to the third year, they must demonstrate through written work, classroom performance, and participation in departmental activities that they have the ability to: (a) speak and write clearly; (b) conduct independent research at a high level; and (c) develop coherent scholarly arguments. A faculty vote will be taken at the conclusion of the review meeting to decide whether each second-year student may stay in the program. In the unusual case that a majority of faculty present and voting determine that a student may not continue, the student will be informed in writing and withdrawn from the program. The review meeting must be a full faculty meeting, but faculty members with no knowledge of the students under review may abstain from the vote, and their abstentions will not count in the total. Those members of the faculty who have worked with or know the students being evaluated are required to attend. In the event that any necessary faculty members absolutely cannot be present, they may send their views in writing to the DGS, who will read them at the meeting.

A student informed of a vote of dismissal from the program may submit a formal letter of appeal within two weeks, accompanied by supporting documentation (research or other scholarly work), to the Graduate Advisory Committee. The Graduate Advisory Committee will render a final decision within two weeks of receipt of the appeal. Any members of the Graduate Advisory Committee who have worked directly with the student will recuse themselves from the final vote on the case.

Combined Ph.D. Programs

History and Black Studies

Students applying for transfer into the combined Ph.D. program must already have taken AFAM 5005 or be taking it in the term of application, must provide a plan outlining the AFAM courses already taken and those they will take, and must submit a research statement that explains how the combined Ph.D. will advance their research interests.

Students must provide two letters of recommendation: one from their adviser in the joint department or program, unless that adviser is jointly appointed with Black Studies, in which case a letter from the student’s DGS in the joint department or program is required and a second letter from a faculty member in Black Studies who commits to being the student’s adviser throughout the completion of the dissertation.

Students cannot apply sooner than the second term of the first year and must apply by January 3, which is the deadline for Black Studies’ annual admissions cycle. Preference will be given to students in the second year of their Ph.D. program. Applications will receive a faculty vote early in the spring term to approve or reject, and results will be communicated to the student no later than spring break.

History and Classics

The combined degree program in classics and history, with a concentration in ancient history, is offered by the Departments of Classics and History for students wishing to pursue graduate study in the history of the ancient Mediterranean and western Eurasia. Students are admitted with a primary home in either History or Classics.

The combined degree in classics and history offers students a comprehensive education in the fundamental skills and most current methodologies in the study of the ancient Greek and Roman Mediterranean and its interaction with Eurasian and African cultures and landscapes. Its object is to train leaders in research and teaching by preparing them to handle the basic materials of ancient history through mastery of the traditional linguistic and technical skills. At the same time the combined degree in classics and history encourages students to rediscover, reshape, and repurpose traditional and nontraditional source materials using the most up-to-date and sophisticated tools at the historian’s disposal.

Students are called on to complete coursework in two ancient languages, historical theory, intra- and interdisciplinary skills, and fundamental research seminars. Interdisciplinary expertise is fostered through the annual seminar coordinated through the Yale Program for the Study of Ancient and Premodern Cultures and Societies (Archaia) and through required study in ancillary fields. Exams are rigorous and aimed at helping students hone skills and explore new terrain in ancient studies. Students are encouraged to take advantage of Yale’s superior collections and library resources in order to explore new avenues in their learning and approaches to historical problems. Yale’s outstanding faculty in classics, history, and related disciplines, such as Near Eastern languages and cultures, religious studies, art history, and anthropology, work together to ensure broad and deep learning that will enable our students to become world leaders in the field.

Requirements for the Combined Ph.D. Degree in Classics and History

  1. A minimum of twelve term courses, including:
  • The historical methods and theory course Approaching History (HIST 5000).
  • The Archaia core seminar (CLSS 7000 or equivalent).
  • Two graduate-level courses in two separate ancient languages. For students who are admitted in Classics, these must be Greek and Latin. Students who are admitted in History must study either Greek or Latin, and they may study both but may also choose another ancient language to fulfill this requirement. The surveys of Greek and Latin literature offered by Classics are encouraged but not mandatory for fulfillment of this requirement.
  • Two skills courses. These may include topics selected from epigraphy (epigraphy courses may be used to fulfill the language requirement concurrently); archaeology; art history; papyrology; numismatics; digital data, GIS, digital humanities, vel sim.; an advanced course in a non-classical ancient language (no more than one such course may be used in fulfillment of this requirement). Students are also encouraged to take advantage of educational opportunities outside of Yale (American Numismatic Society Summer Seminar; an archaeological excavation, e.g., the Gabii project).
  • Four courses (at least two of which must be research seminars) in the history of the ancient Mediterranean world. Historical courses that have a heavy skill component may be used concurrently to fulfill the skills requirement.
  • Two courses outside of ancient Mediterranean history, to be taken in programs outside of the Department of Classics. these are meant to introduce students to different historical periods, regions, and methodologies. Possibilities include (but are not limited to): social sciences (economics, anthropology, sociology, environmental science, statistics); religion (religious studies, Divinity School, Jewish studies); Near Eastern languages and civilizations (Egyptian language, Hebrew, Aramaic, Syriac, Arabic); anthropology and archaeology; or physical and biological sciences (paleoclimatology, ecology and forestry, genetics, medicine). Students should discuss course selection with the two directors of graduate studies.
  1. Classics proseminar offering an introduction to the discipline of classics and its various subdisciplines, to be taken in the first year in residence (not for credit).
  2. Practice translation exams in Greek and/or Latin, depending on which languages are required for the student’s program, based on texts assigned from the appropriate classics and history Ph.D. reading lists. These exams are taken before the beginning of the first and third terms and are meant to help students prepare for the qualifying translation exams to be taken before the beginning of the fifth term in the program.
  3. Departmental reading examinations in German, and in either French or Italian, or approved Yale courses or examinations that demonstrate reading proficiency in these languages (e.g., by achieving a grade of A in German/French/Italian for Reading Knowledge or by passing proficiency exams administered by Yale’s modern language departments). The department will also accept certain certificates of proficiency in French, German, or Italian in lieu of these exams, as listed in the Department of Classics Graduate Handbook. One modern language exam is to be passed by the end of the first year in residence and the second by the end of the second year in residence. 
  4. Translation examinations in two ancient languages. For students admitted through Classics, these must be Greek and Latin. For students admitted through History, at least one must be either Greek or Latin. Greek and Latin examinations will be based on the Classics and History Greek and Latin Ph.D. reading lists and will consist of a choice of eight passages in each language. For each language, students will be required to translate four of the eight passages, to include one verse passage, one documentary text (epigraphy/papyrology), and two passages of prose from literary sources. Some history students may find that expertise in another language—such as Hebrew, Aramaic/Syriac, Demotic, Coptic, Classical Armenian, a Persic language, or Sanskrit—is most beneficial for their research and teaching trajectory. Reading lists for these nonclassical languages will be devised by the student in collaboration with the faculty adviser and other relevant member(s) of the Yale faculty and fixed in writing no later than the end of the fourth term in residence. Examinations in these languages will also consist of a choice from eight passages, of which students must translate four, to be set and evaluated by faculty expert in the given language. Translation exams in all languages must be taken at the beginning of the fifth term in residence.
  5. A general examination in ancient history during the third year and no later than the end of the sixth term in residence. This is to be broken into one major and two or three minor fields. For the major field, students must prepare an 8,000-word essay in advance of the oral examination. For the minor fields, students must prepare (also in advance) a syllabus for an undergraduate class. The written essays and syllabi must be submitted by a fixed date, typically on the Friday before Thanksgiving or spring break. Oral exams will be completed shortly afterward to ensure time for the completion of the dissertation prospectus.
  6. A dissertation prospectus by the end of the sixth term in residence.
  7. A dissertation. By the end of their ninth term, students are required to submit a chapter of their dissertation, which will be discussed with the student by the committee in a chapter conference.

History and Early Modern Studies

Coursework The required number of courses and timeline for coursework follows the Department of History guidelines for history students in the combined program. In general, it is expected that courses in early modern studies constitute about one-third of the student’s doctoral coursework, and at least one course with an early modern focus must be taken outside the student’s primary department. Students will also enroll in EMST 7000/EMST 7001 and EMST 8000/EMST 8001 during the second year, neither of which count towards the total number of courses required for the Ph.D. in history. In the spring of third year, students in the Department of History are also encouraged, but not required, to enroll in EMST 9000.

Advising A student’s academic adviser is a member in the Department of History. A student may also choose to have as co-adviser a faculty member affiliated with the Program in Early Modern Studies who is not affiliated with History. 

Language Requirement The language requirement follows the Department of History requirements. 

Qualifying Exams Qualifying exams will follow the Department of History requirements with one added requirement that at least half the exam content must be about early modern subjects (the equivalent of one and a half fields if the student completes three fields, two fields if the student completes four fields).

Prospectus and Admission to Candidacy Procedures for the prospectus follow Department of History guidelines. At least one faculty member affiliated with the Program in Early Modern Studies must be on the committee. Upon completion of all predissertation requirements, including the prospectus, students are admitted to candidacy for the combined Ph.D. degree. 

Dissertation At least one faculty member affiliated with the Program in Early Modern Studies must be on the dissertation committee. 

Teaching A student’s teaching assignments are determined by the Department of History, with every effort made to assign a student to at least one course (or course equivalent) in early modern studies.

Master’s Degrees

M.Phil. Students who have completed all requirements for admission to candidacy for the Ph.D. may receive the M.Phil. degree.

M.A. (en route to the Ph.D.) Students enrolled in the Ph.D. program may qualify for the M.A. degree upon completion of a minimum of seven graduate term courses at Yale, of which two must have earned Honors grades and the other five courses must average High Pass overall. Students must also pass an examination in one foreign language.

A student in the Ph.D. program in American Studies who wishes to obtain an M.A. degree in History, rather than an M.A. in American Studies, must include in the courses completed at least two research seminars in the History department.

Students enrolled in the Ph.D. program in Political Science may qualify for the M.A. degree in History, rather than an M.A. in Political Science, upon completion of a minimum of six graduate term courses in History at Yale, of which two must have earned Honors grades and the other four courses must average High Pass overall. A student must include in the six courses completed at least two research seminars in the History department.

Terminal Master’s Degree Program For this terminal master’s degree, students must pass seven term courses, four of which must be in history; substantial written work must be submitted in conjunction with at least two of these courses, and Honors grades are expected in two courses, with a High Pass average overall. An undergraduate language course, statistics course, or other applicable course in a technological “language” may count for one course credit toward the graduate degree with approval of the DGS. All students in this program must pass an examination in one foreign language. Financial aid is not available for this program.


More information is available on the department’s website, http://history.yale.edu.

Courses

HIST 5000a, Approaching History: Problems, Methods, and Theory  Daniel Magaziner and Anne Eller

An introduction to the professional study of history, which offers new doctoral students an opportunity to explore (and learn from each other about) the diversity of the field, while also addressing issues of shared concern and importance for the future of the discipline. By the end of the term participants have been exposed to some of the key methodological and theoretical approaches historians have developed for studying different time periods, places, and aspects of the human past. Required of and restricted to first-term History Ph.D. students.
T 1:30pm-3:25pm

HIST 5100b, Prospectus Seminar  Jennifer Allen

This course provides students with information, support, and exercises to guide and assist them in writing the dissertation prospectus. It also introduces students to other common forms of academic writing such as conference papers and journal articles. By the end of the term, each student will have produced a preliminary draft of the dissertation prospectus.
T 9:25am-11:20am

HIST 5250a or b / HSHM 5250a or b, Field Studies  Staff

This course does not count toward the coursework requirements for the Ph.D. or M.A. Undergraduates are not eligible to register for this course.  ½ Course cr
HTBA

HIST 5801b, Global and International History Workshop  Lauren Benton

This workshop offers graduate students opportunities for guided interactions with a community of scholars in global and international history. Students comment on the research of leading scholars and refine their abilities in historical analysis and research presentation. The seminar runs in conjunction with the Global and International History Workshop (GIHW), which brings between six and eight scholars to present their work each year. Presenters represent different temporal and geographical specializations but share an international orientation and methodology in their work. The workshop is open to any student whose research is, broadly speaking, situated within global and international history.  ½ Course cr
M 4pm-5:55pm

HIST 5804a and HIST 5805b / ANTH 8897a and ANTH 8898b / HSAR 6841a and HSAR 6842b / HSHM 7691a and HSHM 7692b, Topics in the Environmental Humanities  Paul Sabin

This is the required workshop for the Graduate Certificate in Environmental Humanities. The workshop meets six times per term to explore concepts, methods, and pedagogy in the environmental humanities, and to share student and faculty research. Each student pursuing the Graduate Certificate in Environmental Humanities must complete both a fall term and a spring term of the workshop, but the two terms of student participation need not be consecutive. The fall term each year emphasizes key concepts and major intellectual currents. The spring term each year emphasizes pedagogy, methods, and public practice. Specific topics vary each year. Students who have previously enrolled in the course may audit the course in a subsequent year. This course does not count toward the coursework requirement in history. Open only to students pursuing the Graduate Certificate in Environmental Humanities.  ½ Course cr per term
T 11:30am-1:20pm

HIST 5807a, Modern Europe Colloquium  Carolyn Dean

The Modern Europe Colloquium brings six to eight scholars working in the field of modern European history to the university each year to present their work. This course does not count toward the coursework requirements in History.  ½ Course cr
M 4pm-5:30pm

HIST 6000a / ANTH 5331a / CLSS 7000a / EALL 7730a / HSAR 6564a / JDST 6553a / NELC 5330a / RLST 8030a, Archaia Seminar: Art, Architecture, and Climate Change in the Premodern World  Avary Taylor

This seminar explores artistic, architectural, and material responses to environmental transformations, such as floods, droughts, volcanic events, and periods of exceptional abundance, across the premodern world. Foregrounding the indivisibility of natural worlds and human creativity, we examine how ancient peoples conceived of, and responded to, the disruptions and affordances of their environment. Through a comparative framework that puts cultures across the ancient world into conversation—from Mesopotamia to Mesoamerica and beyond—we trace the entanglements of art, politics, and climate, asking: how, if at all, did environmental change materialize in the things people made? This course serves as an Archaia Core Seminar. It is connected with Archaia’s Ancient Societies Workshop (ASW), which runs a series of events throughout the academic year related to the theme of the seminar. Students enrolled in the seminar must attend all ASW events during the semester in which the seminar is offered.
M 9:25am-11:20am

HIST 6010b / ANTH 5332b / CLSS 7001b / EALL 7731b / HSAR 6574b / JDST 6554b / NELC 5331b / RLST 8031b, Archaia Seminar: Literacy, Books, and the Materiality of Writing in the Premodern World  Victoria Almansa-Villatoro and Joe Glynias

What is literacy? What is reading? This course takes a longue durée approach to how premodern individuals produced and engaged with texts. From hieroglyphs to alphabets (and everything in between), this course considers ways of writing and the intersection between orality, aurality, and textuality in the premodern world, focusing on (but not limited to) the Eastern Mediterranean and Middle East. Due to its focus on the physical media of writing and the preservation and study of premodern writing materials by modern scholars, roughly half of the meetings of this course take place in Yale Collections. Topics covered by the course include pseudoscripts and pseudepigrapha, scribes and scholars, and the ideological and ritual uses of writing across premodern cultures. This course serves as an Archaia Core Seminar. It is connected with Archaia’s Ancient Societies Workshop (ASW), which runs a series of events throughout the academic year related to the theme of the seminar. Students enrolled in the seminar must attend all ASW events during the semester in which the seminar is offered.
W 9:25am-11:20am

HIST 6052a / CLSS 7575a, Roman Law  Noel Lenski

A graduate-level extension of CLCV 2575/HIST 2225. The course inculcates the basic principles of Roman law while training students in advanced topics in the subject and initiating them into research methods.
M 4pm-5:55pm

HIST 6100a, Medieval Encounters  Hussein Fancy

This course addresses the challenge of comparative study in medieval history. How have scholars approached the question of writing history across religious, cultural, and linguistic boundaries? What are the pitfalls of comparison? Can one escape the threat of provincialism? Is all global history merely a history of globalization? In addition to readings that offer models, students have a chance to develop key research skills and methods. There is a final research paper.
W 9:25am-11:20am

HIST 6155b / JDST 7264b / MDVL 7155b / RLST 7770b, Jews in Muslim Lands from the Seventh through the Sixteenth Century  Ivan Marcus

Introduction to Jewish culture and society in Muslim lands from the Prophet Muhammad to Suleiman the Magnificent. Topics include Islam and Judaism; Jerusalem as a holy site; rabbinic leadership and literature in Baghdad; Jewish courtiers, poets, and philosophers in Muslim Spain; and the Jews in the Ottoman Empire.
TTh 11:35am-12:50pm

HIST 6157b / JDST 7206b / MDVL 7157b / RLST 6160b, How the West Became Antisemitic: Jews and the Formation of Europe, 800–1500  Ivan Marcus

This seminar explores how medieval Jews and Christians interacted as religious societies between 800 and 1500.
T 1:30pm-3:25pm

HIST 6176b, New Approaches to Russian and Eurasian History: The Archival Revolution  Sergei Antonov

A reading seminar addressing recent work on Russian and Soviet history grounded in the ongoing “archival revolution” that began in the late 1980s. After reviewing the major earlier paradigms, we examine how they were overturned or significantly modified by archival-based evidence. Topics include the development of government and the law; historical actors and places marginalized by the earlier historiography, such as non-capital regions, the middle classes, conservatism, religion, and (more generally) non-state structures; and Russia’s position in the imperial, Soviet, and post-Soviet periods as a vast and complex multiethnic political entity. Class discussions in English. Readings in English with Russian options available.
M 1:30pm-3:25pm

HIST 6200a, European Empires and Law  Lauren Benton

Empires used law to structure conquest, establish the legitimacy of rule, justify violence, and absorb new populations and territories. Imperial interactions with conquered populations developed in important ways through the medium of law. The conflicts in and among empires helped to shape the global legal order and to mold the contents of international law. This course considers these and other topics and problems. Readings include selections from the works of key European jurists but focus mainly on providing students with a firm grasp of trends in the secondary literature on empire and law. The emphasis is on the legal history of European empires between 1500 and 1900, but students are encouraged to explore topics and interests in other imperial historiographies.
W 4pm-5:55pm

HIST 6229a / JDST 7261a / MDVL 7229a / RLST 7730a, Jews and the World: From the Bible through Early Modern Times  Ivan Marcus

The course is a comprehensive introduction for GS students as well as YC students.  It serves as a window course to pre-modern Jewish history.  For YC students this can lead to taking seminars on more limited topics.  For graduate students it is a good preparation for comprehensive exams and provides a model survey course to be offered later on as an instructor.
TTh 11:35am-12:50pm

HIST 6300a, Twentieth-Century Europe  Jennifer Allen

This reading seminar examines the history of twentieth-century Europe through recent scholarship that employs a range of methods and styles. Rather than attempting to establish a historiographical canon, the course offers an introduction to major themes that have occupied historians of this period and geography. After exploring the defining questions of the nineteenth century in order to understand the longer roots of many concerns of the twentieth, we turn to the topics of migration, war, revolution, anti-Semitism, democracy, the Cold War, decolonization, multiculturalism, and neoliberalism.
W 9:25am-11:20am

HIST 7000a / AMST 7700a, Topics, Themes, and Methods in U.S. History  Regina Kunzel and Joanne Meyerowitz

Exploring key readings in U.S. history, this seminar introduces important areas of research, members of the Yale faculty, and resources for research at Yale and beyond. Highly recommended for first and second year doctoral students in US History and American Studies. Open to other interested graduate students with permission of the instructors.
W 1:30pm-3:25pm

HIST 7001a, Research in American History  Beverly Gage and Mark Peterson

Research workshop with projects chosen from United States history, broadly defined. The course includes instruction in the craft of historical writing and exploration of key historical formats (journal article, dissertation prospectus, book review, op-ed, etc.). Students complete a major research paper and deliver a conference-style oral presentation of their research.
M 9:25am-11:20am

HIST 7111b / AFAM 7174b / AMST 8874b / BLST 7174, Readings in Atlantic Slavery  Edward Rugemer

This course explores the history on the emergence, spread, and lived experience of racial slavery in the Atlantic World, including the Caribbean, Latin America, and the United States from the fifteenth through the nineteenth centuries.
HTBA

HIST 7210b / AMST 6687b / WGSS 6697b, Colonial Domesticity and Reproductive Relations  Lisa Lowe

In this interdisciplinary seminar, we study the central importance of kinship, family, and domestic labor to the social reproduction of racial colonial processes. Settler colonialism, colonial slavery, overseas empire, and their aftermaths depend not only on the brute force of war, captivity, and occupation; they are also sustained and contested through culture, language, forms of family and household, and the social reproduction of race, gender, intimacy, and filiation. We trace a genealogy of “colonial domesticity” that considers histories of the sexual violation and separation of slave women from their children, compulsory boarding schools for Native Americans, racialized gendered divisions of care labor, transnational Asian adoption, and contemporary migrant detention and family separation; this genealogy also includes alternative forms of kinship, domesticity, generation, and relation. Readings include historical and anthropological studies of colonialism, feminist debates on social reproduction, and literary and visual culture materials by Maria Mies, Ann Laura Stoler, Silvia Federici, Tithi Bhattacharya, Ruha Benjamin, Kalindi Vora, Thavolia Glymph, Saidiya Hartman, Dorothy Roberts, Audra Simpson, Jodi Byrd, Amy Kaplan, Evelyn Nakano Glenn, Laura Briggs, Elizabeth Freeman, Chandan Reddy, Alys Weinbaum, Louise Erdrich, Mary Prince, Toni Morrison, Patricia Powell, Chang-rae Lee, Octavia Butler, and others. Permission of the instructor required.
W 4pm-5:55pm

HIST 7260b / AMST 9003b / PHUM 9003b, Introduction to Public Humanities  Karin Roffman and Matthew Jacobson

What is the relationship between knowledge produced in the university and the circulation of ideas among a broader public, between academic expertise on the one hand and nonprofessionalized ways of knowing and thinking on the other? What is possible? This seminar provides an introduction to various institutional relations and to the modes of inquiry, interpretation, and presentation by which practitioners in the humanities seek to invigorate the flow of information and ideas among a public more broadly conceived than the academy, its classrooms, and its exclusive readership of specialists. Topics include public history, museum studies, oral and community history, public art, documentary film and photography, public writing and educational outreach, the socially conscious performing arts, and fundraising. In addition to core readings and discussions, the seminar includes presentations by several practitioners who are currently engaged in different aspects of the Public Humanities. With the help of Yale faculty and affiliated institutions, participants collaborate in developing and executing a Public Humanities project of their own definition and design. Possibilities might include, but are not limited to, an exhibit or installation, a documentary, a set of walking tours, a website, a documents collection for use in public schools.
Th 1:30pm-3:25pm

HIST 7401b, Indigenous Activism in North America  Ned Blackhawk

This seminar explores the outpouring of recent scholarly work in the field of Native American activism and invites students to contribute to it. Organized on the 100th anniversary of the passage of the Indian Citizenship Act of 1924, this seminar expands current approaches within Native American and Indigenous Studies that often emphasize questions of structure vs. agency; domination vs. resistance; or continuity over adaptation. It seeks to explore alternative possibilities to the binaries that occasionally obscure the under-recognized intellectual traditions motivating Native American and Indigenous activism.
HTBA

HIST 7440a / AMST 7040a / ER&M 6555a, American West and Its Borderlands  Stephen Pitti

This reading seminar examines historical scholarship on the US West and the US-Mexico border region with particular attention to recent works. It also attends to the development of the region's historiography. Topics include colonialism, migration, labor, urbanization, segregation, and political activism, and we pay careful attention to writings on the region’s Latinx, Indigenous, Asian American, and Black communities. The seminar is designed for students pursuing graduate work in history, and in particular for those preparing for oral examinations or dissertation topics on the region or one of these key topics.
W 1:30pm-3:25pm

HIST 7456a, Challenging Discrimination in the Law  Elizabeth Hinton

This graduate seminar examines how US criminal law and procedure address claims of racial discrimination through the doctrines of discriminatory purpose and disparate impact. Although racial disparities pervade policing, prosecution, sentencing, and punishment, constitutional law requires proof of intentional discrimination and generally rejects impact-based claims. Many such laws, though facially neutral, continue to exacerbate racial inequality. However, in Village of Arlington Heights v. Metro Housing Development Corporation, the United States Supreme Court recognized the historical record as one of the only evidentiary sources that can be used to prove discriminatory intent. Archival sources, government documents, and municipal records can provide critical insight into the legislative intent behind, and subsequent impact of, civil and criminal laws. The course brings together law students and Ph.D. students to explore discrimination in the law and avenues to challenge it. We analyze facially neutral criminal statutes that generate racially disparate outcomes through four case studies: the Armed Career Criminal Act, the § 924(c) Firearm Enhancement, California’s Racial Justice Act, and the Fair Sentencing Act of 2010. A central objective of the course is learning how to identify and analyze relevant archival materials that may aid in challenging such laws. Readings combine history, constitutional doctrine, statutory interpretation, and legal theory. Students are asked to complete archival annotations and information requests throughout the semester, and student teams lead one class discussion. The seminar culminates in a collaborative, statute-centered, and historically grounded research memo and final presentation.
M 1:30pm-3:25pm

HIST 7458a / BLST 7458a, Black Economics: History, Methods, Politics  Destin Jenkins and Gerald Jaynes

Two Yale professors meet at 81 Wall Street. One is an economist, the other a historian. They are of two generational cohorts but are equally interested in the study of Black life. Each approaches the work differently. What are those approaches? This course has two objectives. The first is methodological. We seek to introduce students to quantitative economic and qualitative historical methods. How do economists and historians explore and challenge inequality? Where do we meet? Where do we agree to go our separate ways? The second objective is to revisit an underappreciated approach to studying the relationship between race, the state, and the economy. During the late 1960s, scholars and activists such as Robert S. Browne, Norman Girvan, Lloyd Best, Walter Rodney, and others from across the African diaspora formed a number of research initiatives to assist Black people in their attempts to tackle uneven development, neocolonial extraction, the enduring problems of the plantation economy, and racial capitalism more generally in the United States, the Caribbean, and Africa. They built on the veritable work of Claudia Jones, W.E.B. Du Bois, and others who traveled earlier circuits of Black internationalism. Through an eclectic selection of readings, we seek to resituate political economy as an essential approach to the study of race in general, and Black futures in particular; draw out Black political economic thought from its many corners and in its various strands; consider what the “Black” in Black political economy means and has meant; and consider whether Black political economy is indeed compatible with Black studies in the twenty-first century.
W 4pm-5:55pm

HIST 7601a / AMST 7780a / WGSS 7734a, Capitalism, Labor, and Class Politics in 19th-20th Century US  Jennifer Klein

This is an intensive readings course, oriented around the concept of political economy.  In some cases, the emphasis is on the relations between business, labor, and the state; in others, the connections between community, work, and the state.  We focus on U.S. capitalism in its modern form--corporate, concentrated in ownership, global in reach, constitutive of state,  market, families, and class.  Yet we investigate different modes of capitalist accumulation and creation of landscapes, territories, boundaries.  Readings will enable us to look at how regionalism, race, and class power shaped the development of American capitalism.
W 9:25am-11:20am

HIST 8100b, Research in Modern International/Global History  Staff

This seminar provides an opportunity for graduate students to write a research paper on international/global history, broadly defined to include diplomacy, economic relations, social movements, cultural and intellectual connections, and other topics. The first part of the seminar includes readings and class discussions that focus on hands-on strategies and tactics for historical research and academic writing. Later seminar meetings are oriented toward benchmarks and workshops on students’ own research projects. Note: Undergraduate and M.A. students are required to request instructors permission and to submit a very brief note indicating why they think this class would be a good fit for them. Ph.D. students need to request permission but do not need to submit any notes—I will automatically approve them.
T 1:30pm-3:25pm

HIST 8111a, Readings in Twentieth-Century International History  David Engerman

This course is intended to serve as preparation for a qualifying exam field in twentieth-century international history. Open to graduate students with instructor permission.
M 9:25am-11:20am

HIST 8135a / AFAM 7197 / AMST 7797a / BLST 7197a, Atlantic Abolitions  Marcela Echeverri Munoz

This readings course explores the historiography on the century of abolition, when the new states of the Americas abolished racial slavery. Beginning with the first abolitions in the U.S. North during the 1780s, we consider the emergence and process of abolition throughout the Atlantic world, including the Caribbean, Spanish America, and Brazil, through the 1880s.
Th 4pm-5:55pm

HIST 8150a, Readings in Economic History, Capitalism, and Political Economy  Vanessa Ogle

In this graduate reading seminar, we explore different actors and institutions that shaped the formation of the global economy since the early modern period. The readings focus on a number of forces and their interplay with the economic lives of both ordinary men and women and more elite figures: states/political institutions, the environment, law, war, empire, companies, and capitalists. The seminar provides students with a solid knowledge of the questions currently discussed in the burgeoning subfield of the so-called “new history of capitalism.” We pay particular attention to the contours of these debates beyond the history of the United States, and to the international and global dimensions of economic history. No familiarity with economics or economic history required. While this is a reading seminar, students looking to write a research paper on related topics are welcome to pursue this option as part of the course. The course is designed for history Ph.D. students and others who have had previous exposure to history classes at the university level. Basic familiarity with broader historical developments since the eighteenth century is expected.
T 9:25am-11:20am

HIST 8160a / ANTH 6841a / ENV 836a / PLSC 7790a / SOCY 7170a, Agrarian Societies: Culture, Society, History, and Development  Jonathan Wyrtzen and Elisabeth Wood

An interdisciplinary examination of agrarian societies, contemporary and historical, Western and non-Western. Major analytical perspectives from anthropology, economics, history, political science, and environmental studies are used to develop a meaning-centered and historically grounded account of the transformations of rural society. Team-taught.
W 1:30pm-3:25pm

HIST 8171a / FREN 9003a, Gender, Sexuality, and Modernity in Comparative Perspective  Carolyn Dean and Omnia El Shakry

This graduate research seminar introduces us to the various lines of inquiry informing theories and histories of gender and sexuality. The course asks how historians and other scholars constitute gender and sexuality as objects of inquiry while addressing poststructuralist, feminist, postcolonial, and queer theory perspectives. The course aims to introduce students to the foundations of the field, beginning with sexology and psychoanalysis and its interpreters, and especially with Sigmund Freud’s and Michel Foucault’s groundbreaking work. Themes include psychoanalytic discourses and the construction of sexual subjects; colonialism, nationalism, and gender; bourgeois bodies and racial selves; sexualities; subalternity; religion, agency, and the feminist subject; and queering the modern. The emphasis is on a discursive understanding of gender and sexuality, while attending to diverse geographical regions.
T 9:25am-11:20am

HIST 8210a, Colonial Latin America and its Historiography  Marcela Echeverri Munoz

This course reviews the historiography of Colonial Latin America, providing a view of the field. We read classic works and more recent contributions by scholars on Native American worlds; the encounter and formation of Iberian colonial societies in the Americas; environments and economies; Atlantic and global connections; slavery and race relations; ethnicity and indigeneity; law and politics; and the Age of Revolutions and Independence.
Th 9:25am-11:20am

HIST 8320a / AFST 8839a, Environmental History of Africa  Robert Harms

An examination of the interaction between people and their environment in Africa and the ways in which this interaction has affected or shaped the course of African history.
W 9:25am-11:20am

HIST 8471b, Anthropology and/for/is/vs. History  Alan Mikhail and Omnia El Shakry

Scholarly fields regularly and usefully inform each other. This course seeks to understand the relationships between anthropology and history, with an emphasis on how historians might learn from anthropology. We read classic and recent theoretical and ethnographic texts to examine, among other topics, experience, ethics, form, and archival practice. Open to graduate students from any department. Undergraduates not permitted.
T 1:30pm-3:25pm

HIST 8500a, Topics in the Historiography of Modern China  Arne Westad

This reading seminar surveys major themes in Chinese history since the late nineteenth century. Through reading both classic and recent research, students familiarize themselves with key debates that have shaped the historical understanding of modern China.
Th 4pm-5:55pm

HIST 8521b / RLST 5920b, Society and Religion on the Silk Road  Eric Greene

An introduction to artifacts and documents pertaining to social history and religion from the most important sites on the Northern and Southern Silk Roads in China, including Niya, Kizil, Turfan, and Dunhuang. Assigned readings are in English. Readers of Chinese also participate in a separate section reading documents in classical Chinese from Turfan and Dunhuang.
W 1:30pm-3:25pm

HIST 8531a, Documents in Tang, Song, and Yuan Dynasties  Valerie Hansen

A survey of the historical genres of premodern China: the dynastic histories, other chronicles, gazetteers, literati notes, and Buddhist and Daoist canons. How to determine what different information these sources contain for research topics in different fields. Prerequisite: at least one term of classical Chinese.
T 9:25am-11:20am

HIST 8536a, The City in Imperial China  Maura Dykstra

This course surveys the philosophical and practical dimensions of city organization and governance from the walled domains and ritual federations of Early China to the highly-controlled wards and streets of Middle China and the sophisticated administrative institutions of Late Imperial urban municipalities. The development of imperial cities is situated in the particular traditions and sources of Chinese dynasties and empires while also held in conversation with the broader field of urban history (especially during the Early Modern modules of the seminar).
W 1:30pm-3:25pm

HIST 8550a, Readings in Japanese History to 1900  Fabian Drixler

A critical introduction to debates in the history of Japan up to about 1900, with particular emphasis on the Tokugawa period but some coverage of earlier times as well. Readings are in English but, depending on student interest, supplemental materials may also be assigned in Japanese.
M 1:30pm-3:25pm

HIST 8551b, Into the Archives: History, Power, and the Written Word  Hannah Shepherd

This is a seminar aimed at advanced undergraduates and graduate students interested in learning more about how historians have grappled with the institution at the heart of much historical practice: the archive. The course focuses on reading and discussing key theoretical and historical works on “the archive” and archives and how these relate to discussions of power, from cases across the globe. We also explore how historians have written about their own relationships to these institutions, as well as their experience of working in archives. Weekly short writing assignments allow students to develop their academic writing skills in conjunction with small-group review of their drafts. The final four weeks of the seminar spend time exploring Yale’s own archival collections as the focus of a final piece of research and writing, drafts of which are workshopped in class.
HTBA

HIST 8553a / EAST 8301a / EMST 6890a, Research in Japanese History  Daniel Botsman

After a general introduction to the broad array of sources and reference materials available for conducting research related to the history of Japan since ca. 1600, students prepare original research papers on topics of their own choosing in a collaborative workshop environment. Prerequisite: reading knowledge of Japanese.
Th 1:30pm-3:25pm

HIST 8832a, Infrastructures of Power  Nurfadzilah Yahaya

This seminar examines infrastructure as a site of power, exploring how built systems, from irrigation networks and railroads to telegraph cables and oil extraction, produced and sustained colonial and postcolonial conditions. We ask how infrastructure projects created new forms of territorial control, legal authority, and environmental transformation across multiple historical contexts, how these systems were experienced by different populations, and how they continue to shape contemporary possibilities. We trace infrastructure across global contexts, attending to the technical, legal, and social dimensions of projects that remade landscapes and governance structures. The course moves from foundational theoretical approaches through historical case studies, concluding with analyses of how these systems persist, fail, or get repurposed in the present. Students develop a final research project analyzing an infrastructure system of their choice in specific locations.
W 9:25am-11:20am

HIST 8842b / JDST 7448b / RLST 6930b, Introduction to Modern Jewish Politics  David Sorkin and Elli Stern

This course introduces graduate students and advanced undergraduates to the major issues of modern Jewish politics through a close reading of canonical and recent scholarship with an emphasis on Europe, Israel, the United States, and the Maghreb/Mashreq. The course pays special attention to the ways in which constantly shifting political conditions have led to reconsiderations and reconceptualizations of the political past—across the millennia, the political present, and the envisioned future.
W 9:25am-11:20am

HIST 8900a / AFAM 7119 / BLST 7119a / HSHM 7710a, Researching and Writing Histories of Health, Medicine, and Science  Carolyn Roberts

This small graduate seminar is for students currently researching and writing histories of health, science, and medicine. Students learn about slow scholarship, the politics of the archive, and research organization and management and explore the craft of writing. Preference is given to graduate students in history, the history of science and medicine, and African American studies.
F 1:30pm-3:25pm

HIST 8903b / HSHM 7800b, History beyond the Archive  Nana Osei Quarshie

This course focuses on three broad themes. First, we examine the social construction of “the archive.” What forms of knowledge accumulation constitute a historical repository? Second, we examine the role of the archive in the interplay of ethnography and historiography. How do ethnographic history, historical ethnography, and history of the present differ? Lastly, we examine the necessity of the archive and consider various alternative grounds upon which history can be constructed. What might it mean to imagine a history (or a history of science, medicine, and technology) beyond the archive?
W 1:30pm-3:25pm

HIST 8911a / HSHM 7020a, Problems in the History of Science  Taylor Moore

Surveys current methodologies through key theoretical and critical works. Students encounter major twentieth-century methodological moments that have left lasting imprints on the field: positivism and anti-positivism, the sociology of knowledge, actor-network theory, and historical epistemology, as well as newer approaches focusing on space, infrastructure, translation, and exchange. We also consider central conceptual problems for the field, such as the demarcation of science from pseudoscience; the definition of modernity and the narrative of the Scientific Revolution; vernacular science, the colonial archive, and non-textual sources.
M 9:25am-11:20am

HIST 8930a / AMST 8877a / HSHM 7030a, Problems in the History of Medicine and Public Health  John Warner

An examination of the variety of approaches to the social, cultural, and intellectual history of medicine, focusing on the United States. Reading and discussion of the recent scholarly literature on medical cultures, public health, and illness experiences from the early national period through the present. Topics include the role of gender, class, ethnicity, race, religion, and region in the experience of health care and sickness and in the construction of medical knowledge; the interplay between vernacular and professional understandings of the body; the role of the marketplace in shaping professional identities and patient expectations; health activism and social justice; citizenship, nationalism, and imperialism; and the visual cultures of medicine.
T 1:30pm-3:25pm

HIST 8950b / AFAM 9129b / BLST 9129b / HSHM 7750b, The Afterlives of Slavery, Health, and Medicine  Carolyn Roberts

This experiential, workshop-style class explores contemporary approaches to Black/African American healing practices in the ongoing wake of slavery and its afterlives in the African diaspora. We engage with work by physician-activists, artist-theologians, anthropologists, poets, community organizers and others who focus on human flourishing and transformative justice for individuals, bodies, communities, and lands. Topics include studies of rest and joy, somatic mindfulness and breathwork, eco-spirituality, body affirmation, food sovereignty, and anti-racism in medicine and health care.
F 9:25am-11:20am

HIST 8980a / EMST 6193a / HSHM 7460a, What was/is History? The Craft of Historical Writing from Antiquity to the Present  Paola Bertucci

This graduate seminar explores the changing practices and meanings associated with historical writings across time, with particular attention to the early modern and Enlightenment periods. We examine the craft of history: the concrete practices through which historians worked—including philology, archival research, antiquarianism, chronology, narrative, and critique—and the intellectual assumptions that gave those practices authority. Throughout, we consider how historians grappled with problems familiar from the academic discipline of the history of science: evidence and testimony, credibility and doubt, method and experiment, the tension between observation and explanation. Students are actively involved in syllabus design. They are expected to propose readings from twentieth-century historiographical tradition to be included in class discussions in the second part of the semester. They also select at least one primary source dating from antiquity to 1800 to discuss along with one of the books in the syllabus.
Th 1:30pm-3:25pm

HIST 8999b / HSHM 7650b, Workshop for Article Publication  Bill Rankin

Writing a seminar paper is something quite different from revising it, polishing it, incorporating feedback, and ultimately publishing it. These are crucial skills, especially given the benefits of having a stand-alone article in press before the dissertation is complete. This writing seminar is open to all students in History, HSHM, and allied fields who have previously written an article-length research paper. Working together and individually, the goal of the term is to revise the paper in preparation for submission to an academic journal (of the student’s choice). We address common writing dilemmas—including structure, argument, introductions, scale, evidence, and intervention—as well as strategies for choosing a journal, writing within and beyond a subfield, and (eventually) responding to peer review. Similar to the Mellon writing-in-residence program, we prioritize collegial support and constructive exchange. Open to all topics, time periods, and methodological approaches.
W 9:25am-11:20am

HIST 9997b / HSHM 9970b, Pedagogy Seminar  David Engerman

Faculty members instruct their Teaching Fellows on the pedagogical methods for teaching specific subject matter.  0 Course cr
HTBA

HIST 9998a, Directed Readings  Staff

Offered by permission of the instructor and DGS to meet special requirements not covered by regular courses. Graded Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory.
HTBA

HIST 9999a, Directed Research  Staff

Offered by arrangement with the instructor and permission of DGS to meet special requirements.
HTBA