History, PHD
Chairperson: Lezlie S. Knox, Ph.D.
Department of History Graduate Program website
Degree Offered
Doctor of Philosophy
Program Description
History includes politics, economics, and aesthetics, as well as social, spiritual and cultural relations—our past, our present, and our potential as human beings. The history graduate program, mindful of the discipline’s manifold importance and applications, offers master of arts and doctoral degree programs that allow students to explore the field in both breadth and depth, allowing for diverse professional outcomes.
Graduate study in history permits students to increase their knowledge of the past and the processes that have shaped the human experience. Such study may prepare students for careers in research, teaching, public service fields, cultural institutions and many business settings.
General Information
Direction and Advising
The director of graduate studies is charged with directing the department’s graduate programs and with the general advising of all graduate students in matters of course selection, financial aid, and placement. In addition, each student chooses, in consultation with the director of graduate studies, a field adviser who directs the student’s field-specific work, including: the master’s essay, the selection of post-master’s course work, completion of the Doctoral Program Planning Form and the doctoral dissertation.
Degree Overview
Students begin with the course HIST 6100 The Art and Craft of History, which addresses methodological and epistemological approaches to the study of history at the graduate level. The doctoral program offers degrees that emphasize a thematic approach to the past, while focused on a region and time. Doctoral candidates must have a master’s degree and normally complete 60 hours of course work beyond the bachelor’s. They must also pass a foreign language examination and written and oral doctoral qualifying exams in major and minor fields. Candidates attain the doctorate with the composition and defense of a book-length dissertation.
History Doctorate
Specializations: American Cultures and Societies; Empire and Decolonization; Race, Ethnicity and Gender; Historical Memory
In consultation with their major supervising professor and the director of graduate studies, students design subfields within these four specializations drawing on expertise across the department. These subfields necessarily are transnational in scope, but likely have a basis in the historiography of a specific region and time period so that each student has three subfields (e.g., American Cultures and Societies could include a regional and chronological focus in Colonial/Early U.S. history, but include further subfields in Colonial Latin America and the history of race).
A qualifying examination, with both written (9 hours) and oral (2 hours) components, is taken in the student’s area of specialization. A committee of three examiners will assess geographical and chronological knowledge appropriate for the proposed research area, as well as thematic and historiographical depth in the specialization. The oral component of the examination may also address the student's dissertation research.
The doctoral student also fulfills requirements for their research field and for career diversity discernment as delineated in department guidelines and are subject to the approval of the Graduate Committee.
A doctoral student must complete a program of study defined on an approved Doctoral Program Planning Form. The program includes course work, a reading knowledge of at least one world language, the qualifying examination and a dissertation.
COURSE WORK
The department’s normal course work requirement for the doctoral program is 42 credit hours beyond the master’s degree, representing 30 credit hours of course work plus the 12 credit hours required for the doctoral dissertation. In addition to the exams in the specialization subfields, the doctoral student fulfills requirements for their research field and for career diversity discernment as delineated in department guidelines and are subject to the approval of the Graduate Committee. If a student earned a master of arts in history at Marquette University, HIST 6100 The Art and Craft of History could be waived as part of the doctoral program, but it must be replaced with an additional 3-credit history course.
American Cultures and Societies
Code | Title | Hours |
---|---|---|
Required courses: | 15 | |
The Art and Craft of History | ||
Seminar in History (taken twice) | ||
Dissertation Seminar | ||
Doctoral Discernment and Field Preparation | ||
Additional courses selected from: | 15 | |
The British Atlantic World to the American Revolution | ||
The American Revolution and the New Nation | ||
The Sectional Conflict, Civil War Era and Gilded Age | ||
United States in the Twentieth Century | ||
Global History | ||
Studies in United States History | ||
Public History | ||
Applied History | ||
History and Memory | ||
From Colony to Empire: U.S. Foreign Relations 1776-1914 | ||
Rise to Global Superpower: U.S. Foreign Relations since 1914 | ||
The American West | ||
American Immigration | ||
Latinx Civil Rights Movements | ||
Religion and American Life | ||
African-American History | ||
American Urban History | ||
A History of Women in America | ||
Childhood in America | ||
A History of Native America | ||
Cultural and Intellectual History of the United States | ||
United States-Latin American Relations | ||
Additional courses as appropriate to field | ||
HIST 8999 | Doctoral Dissertation | 12 |
Total Credit Hours: | 42 |
EMPIRE AND DECOLONIZATION
Code | Title | Hours |
---|---|---|
Required courses: | 15 | |
The Art and Craft of History | ||
Seminar in History (taken twice) | ||
Dissertation Seminar | ||
Doctoral Discernment and Field Preparation | ||
Additional courses selected from: | 15 | |
Medieval Europe | ||
Early Modern Europe | ||
Nineteenth-Century Europe | ||
Twentieth-Century Europe | ||
Global History | ||
Studies in Medieval History | ||
Studies in Early Modern History | ||
Studies in European History | ||
The Black Death | ||
The Crusades | ||
Women in Western Civilization | ||
Comparative Homefronts during the Second World War | ||
Intellectual History of Modern Europe | ||
Art and Power in 18th-century Britain | ||
History and Memory | ||
From Colony to Empire: U.S. Foreign Relations 1776-1914 | ||
Rise to Global Superpower: U.S. Foreign Relations since 1914 | ||
American Immigration | ||
African-American History | ||
A History of Native America | ||
Modern Britain | ||
The British Empire | ||
Modern Ireland: From the Rising to the Revolution | ||
Historical Justice in Modern Germany | ||
Nazi Germany and the Holocaust | ||
Russia to 1861 | ||
The Russian Revolution and the Soviet Union | ||
The Cold War | ||
Colonial Latin America | ||
United States-Latin American Relations | ||
The Caribbean | ||
History of Mexico | ||
North Africa | ||
Race and History of South Africa | ||
Modern Japan | ||
Modern China | ||
Comparative Twentieth-Century Genocides | ||
Additional courses as appropriate to field | ||
HIST 8999 | Doctoral Dissertation | 12 |
Total Credit Hours: | 42 |
Race, Ethnicity and Gender
Code | Title | Hours |
---|---|---|
Required courses: | 15 | |
The Art and Craft of History | ||
Seminar in History (taken twice) | ||
Dissertation Seminar | ||
Doctoral Discernment and Field Preparation | ||
Additional courses selected from: | 15 | |
The British Atlantic World to the American Revolution | ||
The American Revolution and the New Nation | ||
The Sectional Conflict, Civil War Era and Gilded Age | ||
United States in the Twentieth Century | ||
Medieval Europe | ||
Early Modern Europe | ||
Nineteenth-Century Europe | ||
Twentieth-Century Europe | ||
Global History | ||
Studies in Medieval History | ||
Studies in Early Modern History | ||
Studies in Latin American History | ||
Studies in United States History | ||
Studies in European History | ||
Studies in African History | ||
Studies in Asian History | ||
Studies in Global History | ||
History and Memory | ||
From Colony to Empire: U.S. Foreign Relations 1776-1914 | ||
Rise to Global Superpower: U.S. Foreign Relations since 1914 | ||
The American West | ||
American Immigration | ||
Latinx Civil Rights Movements | ||
Religion and American Life | ||
African-American History | ||
American Urban History | ||
A History of Women in America | ||
A History of Native America | ||
Cultural and Intellectual History of the United States | ||
The Black Death | ||
The Crusades | ||
Comparative Homefronts during the Second World War | ||
Art and Power in 18th-century Britain | ||
The British Empire | ||
Historical Justice in Modern Germany | ||
Nazi Germany and the Holocaust | ||
The Cold War | ||
Colonial Latin America | ||
History of Mexico | ||
United States-Latin American Relations | ||
North Africa | ||
Modern Japan | ||
Modern China | ||
Additional courses as appropriate to field | ||
HIST 8999 | Doctoral Dissertation | 12 |
Total Credit Hours: | 42 |
Historical Memory
Code | Title | Hours |
---|---|---|
Required courses: | 15 | |
The Art and Craft of History | ||
Seminar in History (taken twice) | ||
Dissertation Seminar | ||
Doctoral Discernment and Field Preparation | ||
Additional courses selected from: | 15 | |
The British Atlantic World to the American Revolution | ||
The American Revolution and the New Nation | ||
The Sectional Conflict, Civil War Era and Gilded Age | ||
United States in the Twentieth Century | ||
Medieval Europe | ||
Early Modern Europe | ||
Nineteenth-Century Europe | ||
Twentieth-Century Europe | ||
Global History | ||
Studies in United States History | ||
Studies in Medieval History | ||
Studies in Early Modern History | ||
Studies in European History | ||
Studies in Latin American History | ||
Studies in African History | ||
Studies in Asian History | ||
Studies in Global History | ||
Public History | ||
Applied History | ||
History and Memory | ||
Intellectual History of Modern Europe | ||
Art and Power in 18th-century Britain | ||
Additional courses as appropriate to field | ||
HIST 8999 | Doctoral Dissertation | 12 |
Total Credit Hours: | 42 |
World Language Requirement
The student must have knowledge of at least one world language pertinent to their area of research. Reading skills in world languages are assessed by the department. Students may also satisfy their world language competency requirement by achieving at least a B in a 6204 course offered by the Department of Languages, Literatures and Cultures. Satisfactory competence in the world language should be demonstrated prior to the qualifying examinations and no later than the end of the following semester. The dissertation director may require a doctoral student to show competence in a second world language or in statistical methods when the dissertation topic requires it.
Qualifying Examination
After completing all formal course work and language study, the doctoral student must take the doctoral qualifying examinations (DQEs), written and oral, in their specialization. Written qualifying examinations are nine hours in duration. Oral qualifying examinations, two hours in duration, are held about ten days after the written examinations.
The qualifying examination covers the students' area of specialization, along with chronologically and geographically appropriate fields as determined in consultation with the DGS and dissertation director. A committee of three department members assesses examination performance on the complete exam (written and oral components). A unanimous vote is required to pass the exam.
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