All history courses are designed to increase students' knowledge about how human agency and contingency, patterns of continuity and change, and the interactions of cultures affect our understanding of history. Thus, students not only learn historical content, but they also develop the habits of mind needed for the critical investigation and appreciation of history.

Among our regular offerings are 100-level courses that fulfill the Historical Studies component of the core curriculum. The learning objectives for these courses are:

The organizing theme of these courses is ?Contact and Change,? which affords students an opportunity to examine two of the principal challenges facing historians: accounting for change and understanding people and societies separated from us by space and time.

The History Department also offers a history major and a minor. Students may pursue the history major by itself or paired with another major or minor to prepare for careers in education, business, law, communications, government, and library, museum, or archival work. The history major also prepares students for graduate work in History or in other history-related academic disciplines. Interested students may also select individual history courses as electives that complement and enhance another major. History pairs especially well with majors or minors in Political Science, International Studies, Education, Justice and Peace Studies, Art History, English, Modern and Classical Languages, American Culture and Difference, Communication and Journalism, and Legal Studies. Students who pursue liberal arts majors like History are also eligible for the Renaissance program.