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Georgetown University

Dept. of History
3700 O St., NW
Box 571035 - ICC 600
Washington, DC 20057-1035

Phone 202.687.6061
Fax 202.687.7245
E-mail: dcs9@georgetown.edu

Department Web Site

Areas of Specialization:

Asia, Europe (from Late Medieval to Modern), Latin America, Middle East and North Africa, Russia and Eastern Europe, Transregional, and U.S.

Program Description

Georgetown's History graduate program has a global reach. We are strong not only in U.S. and European history, but also in the rest of the world, with notable depth in Russia and Eastern Europe; the Middle East, Arab, and Islamic domains, including North Africa; East Asia; and Latin America. We are a leader in the growing emphasis on transnational history in the classroom and faculty scholarship, with recognized strengths in the Atlantic World, the Pacific World, international diplomacy and cultural interactions, the global environment, and comparative gender relations. Our students are as international as the fields they study.

Georgetown offers a Ph.D. in History, an MA in Global, International and Comparative History, and a joint MA in Global History with King's College London. We also participate in several joint programs at Georgetown: a joint MA with the School of Foreign Service, a joint PhD program with Arab Studies (M.A. in Arab Studies/PhD in History) and with German and European Studies (M.A. in German and European Studies/PhD in History).

The Ph.D. program is highly selective and rigorous, with long-standing strength in many fields. Our doctoral students have an excellent record in securing prestigious competitive research and dissertation-writing fellowships, as well as tenure-track jobs in premier universities and colleges. The program is open to students with a B.A. or M.A. in History or comparable background, and we accept approximately 10 percent of those who apply. Incoming classes average 15 students. Students entering with an MA in History can be eligible for advanced standing. The key materials to provide with the application are: transcripts; scores from the GRE General Test; TOEFL; a two-page statement of purpose; a sample of major work (a research paper demonstrating ability to work with primary sources); and three letters of recommendation. Anyone applying to the doctoral program is strongly encouraged to contact the Director of Graduate Studies and faculty in his or her area of interest.

The Georgetown Masters of Arts in Global, International, and Comparative History (MAGIC) is open to students who have completed a BA or equivalent degree in History, a social science, or literature and culture. In exceptional cases, it will consider strong applicants with majors in other fields. The key materials to provide with the application are transcripts; a statement that details preparation, general goals, and the outline of a proposed program of study; a short (5-15 page) analytical writing sample; GRE scores, and three letters of recommendation. For students with native languages other than English, strong English skills, as demonstrated by the TOEFL, will be required for admission. The program is highly selective and is capped at 15 students a year.

The Joint Master's Degree in Global History with King's College London exposes students to two sets of international history faculty in two major global metropolises: King's College London and Georgetown University in Washington, DC. The History Department at King's College has notable strengths in European, British, and Imperial History, which complement Georgetowns distinctive strengths. This collaboration offer students an extraordinarily rich array of thematic, geographic, and cultural perspectives from which to study global history. The two institutions' locations in the capital cities of the United Kingdom and the United States afford students direct access to a tremendous array of archival sources for the pursuit of their research projects.

This joint-degree program welcomes applicants with strong analytical, language, and writing skills who are seeking a program offering integrated global, international and comparative historical perspectives. The program will consider applicants who have completed a BA or equivalent degree in History, a social science, or literature and culture. In exceptional cases, we will consider strong applicants with majors in other fields. An undergraduate GPA above 3.3 is expected, and above 3.5 is encouraged. For applicants applying from Britain, the minimum requirement is a good upper second-class BA degree in History or a cognate discipline. Basic reading knowledge of a foreign language will also be expected, so that with two semesters of language study the students will be in a position to pass a foreign-language reading proficiency exam before the end of their second semester (a pre-requisite for continuing on to the second year of the program).

Special Programs or Resources

The Department places a high priority on providing teaching assistantship and teaching experience for doctoral students. All students on departmental fellowships have opportunities to serve as teaching assistants. Advanced doctoral candidates who have finished the research year are eligible to apply for a Royden B. Davis Fellowship, which provides a stipend and allows a student to design and teach an upper-division undergraduate class in one semester and to conduct research in the other semester. Advanced doctoral students have also taught sections of the departments general education history classes and regional history surveys. Mexican students can be considered for the CONACYT fellowship, which pays tuition and a stipend for up to five years in conjunction with El Consejo Nacional de Ciencia y Tecnologia. Students coming from Canada have won the SSHRC, which provides an additional stipend.

All doctoral students who receive five-year Department fellowships are awarded at least one year without service to further their dissertation research. The Department also offers limited research and travel stipends to students on a competitive basis. Georgetown doctoral students have a superior record in research fellowship competitions. In the past five years, our students have held DAAD, Fulbright-Hays, Fulbright, IREX, Marandon, Mellon-CLIR, NEH, SHAFR, SSRC, ACLS, Javits, ARCE, and AIMS fellowships. Students also have a superior record in attaining support for advanced language study, including the Institute for Turkish Studies and the Center for Arabic Study Abroad. In some fields, such as early-modern Europe, modern Germany, modern Russia, Poland, and the Middle East, every eligible student who has applied for an outside research fellowship has obtained one.

The History Department hosts the Georgetown Institute for Global History, which includes standing seminars in Early Modern Global History, Nineteenth Century US History, Modern International History, Middle East and North African History, and Russian History. These workshops contribute to a lively intellectual atmosphere, exposing students to cutting-edge historical scholarship and debate. The Department is also committed to its students professional development and regularly organizes workshops for its students on teaching, writing grant and fellowship proposals, and navigating the academic job market.

Georgetown offers the unparalleled research resources of Washington, D.C.: the 26 million volumes of the Library of Congress; the National Archives; the remarkable range of specialized libraries, such as the National Library of Medicine, the Folger Shakespeare Library (which contains a superb collection on early-modern Continental European and English history), the Department of Agriculture, and several others. The university's Lauinger Library contains over 1.4 million volumes and a range of special collections, including the nearly 350,000 items of the Government Documents Depository.

Financial Aid

The Department offers various forms of financial aid to doctoral students. The Department currently awards several five-year fellowships to incoming students that provide tuition support and a stipend. Students who hold these fellowships will do no service their first year, and may have a second year free from service after they have finished their comprehensive exams, with the specific timing determined in consultation with the student's committee. Service usually entails a teaching assistantship. Additional teaching assistantships are awarded to non-fellowship students in an annual competition. These awards are not automatically renewable, but those who hold an assistantship may re-enter the competition in succeeding years. A number of tuition scholarships are awarded based on an annual competition. These awards are available to students progressing within the seven-year time limit and depend on availability of funds.

Degree Requirements

Doctoral students complete four requirements for the Ph.D.: 36 hours of coursework (minimum 3.3 GPA), appropriate language exams (two, except in the U.S. concentration, which requires one), comprehensive exams, and the dissertation. An introductory colloquium taken in the first semester and a year-long research seminar in the major field, taken in either the first or second year are mandatory. Students consult their advisory committee (led by a mentor and overseen by faculty in each field of study) to select courses in the major field, the research field, and the two minor fields. These fields can be defined geographically or thematically, but major and minor fields must cover separate geographic regions. Students who have done graduate work elsewhere are considered for up to nine credits of advanced standing. Students may also take courses at Washington-area Consortium universities. The first language exam is taken during orientation week, retaken if necessary, and ideally passed during the first year of study; with the exception of those in the US concentration students must pass two language exams before taking the comprehensive exam. Comprehensive exams consist of two written and a two-hour oral exam usually taken by the end of the third year. The dissertation committee consists of three or four advisors. After completing a polished draft of the dissertation, the student makes an oral defense.

MAGIC students complete two requirements: 30 hours of course work (minimum 3.3 GPA) and an appropriate language exam. The 30 hours of courses will normally be taken over the course of three semesters, but may extend over four (for those needing more language study, or finding work in the area). Students must take at least three courses a semester their first two semesters in the program. Mandatory courses are two colloquia, one in Global/International History and one in Comparative History, respectively, as well as a two-semester research seminar. Students will chose from the list of graduate-level courses (500 and above) offered by the History department. In addition, students may take up to two courses outside of the History Department. In consultation with the program Director, students will design their own programs of study, either comparing two regions of the world with respect to a common theme or placing a nation or a world region in international context, and exploring developments from the sixteenth century to the present.

All MAGIC students must demonstrate competence in at least one language other than English by passing a department-administered examination before beginning their third full semester in the program. For students with native languages other than English, the native language plus English will normally fulfill the program's language requirement.



University Information:

Information from Department of Education
(Includes information on the size, location, and general characteristics of faculty and student body)

Information from the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching
(Includes rating of the institution's rating of the graduate instructional program and size and setting)

 

Faculty Information (Fall 2011):

Full-time Faculty: 49

Relative Size based on Number of Full-time Faculty: Large [Explain]

 

Student Demographics (Fall 2011):

Number of Doctoral Students in Program: 84

New Doctoral Students Entering Program: 11

Proportion of Doctoral Students Receiving Financial Aid: 77%

Number of Graduate Students Enrolled: 119

Relative Size Based on Graduate Student Enrollment: Large [Explain]

 

Degree Information:

First PhD conferred: 1923

History PhDs conferred to Date: 507

Number of PhDs Conferred (2011–12): 9

Relative Size Based on PhDs Conferred: Large [Explain]

Current Dissertations in Progress

PhDs Conferred by Department

 

 

Last Updated: October 19, 2012