A. Program Description. History, as three recent interpreters have written, is a “discipline, a profession, and a career.” (T. Bender, P. Katz, and C. Palmer, The Education of Historians for the Twenty-First Century. Urbana, Illinois: University of Illinois Press, 2004, pp. 4-5.) As a discipline, history has standards of evidence, styles of argumentation, and a literary and narrative dimension that distinguish it from other forms of scholarship. Historians interpret politics and institutions, and they study intellectual communities and social dynamics. Perhaps most importantly, they give a voice to those who might otherwise not be accorded one by society.

History has been among the most interdisciplinary of all the modern academic disciplines. As a profession, history involves a variety of scholarly activities and modes of intellectual production. Historians write for each other and for a public at large, and they are committed to styles of written communication and oral interaction that are clear, informative, and ethically sound. At conferences and in classrooms, in government and in museums, historians research and communicate about the past while remembering its lessons to help create a better future. As a career, history is, and should be, many things: historians work in the academy, creating new knowledge and teaching students at the college and university level; historians teach at the K-12 level of the educational system; historians design and curate exhibits in museums; and historians work for the government, for corporations, and for media outlets, strengthened and empowered by the standards and practices they acquire through rigorous professional training.

At Michigan State University, we are committed to studying and producing history in all its modern, multifarious, and happily diverse manifestations. We offer exciting and innovative graduate training, and we aim to cultivate graduate students who are ambitious and open to training that is itself dynamic and evolving. In the MSU History Department, through seminars, independent reading and research, and close relationships with faculty mentors, graduate students have the chance to learn, practice, and perfect the various tasks of professional historians on the way to earning a PhD degree. At a practical level, we make efforts to give graduate students the tools, structure, mentoring, and financial support allowing them to complete the program in a timely manner.

The Department does not offer a terminal MA. Students accepted into the PhD program take two years of coursework and complete comprehensive examinations in the third year, leaving ample time within the framework of department funding to conduct research and write the dissertation. Along the way, we offer regular and numerous opportunities for students to enhance their portfolios and expertise and become competitive for a diverse range of professional positions inside and outside the academy. Our graduate students are willing to be active partners in an evolving community, and we invite and expect students to take part in departmental matters – such as visiting lecturers, the graduate community, faculty searches, and so on – beyond the basic course requirements.

B. Special Programs. Michigan State is the home of H-Net, one of the most important and recognized centers for electronic scholarship in the world. And MATRIX, Michigan State's own center for humanities computing, offers resources and training that are unparalleled in this regard. LEADR, the Lab for Education in and Advancement of Digital Research, is a joint, forward-looking, student-centered venture of History, Anthropology and MATRIX. The cutting-edge lab opened in Old Horticulture Building, home of the History Department, in August 2014. Because of these resources, graduate students at Michigan State have a chance to be at the cutting edge of all the best that electronic resources have to offer.

C. Financial Aid. Awards for Incoming Students: The admission application is sufficient for applying for funding because all admitted students are considered for the awards available to incoming students each year. The Michigan State University Distinguished Fellowship Program offers four years of support for a limited number of U.S. citizens or permanent residents, including a stipend, tuition and health insurance. The Graduate Education Opportunity Program offers a combination of fellowship support and graduate assistantships to African American, Latin American, and Native American students through the Academic Achievement Graduate Assistantship, and the University Enrichment Fellowship. The History Graduate Teaching Award offers four years of support with a half-time graduate assistantship in the Department of History (2 years) and the Center for Integrative Studies in Arts and Humanities/CISAH (2 years).

Assistantships: The Department of History has an annual evaluation of existing and potential teaching and research assistants. Students who hope to serve as TAs or expect to continue to serve as TAs (because they have long-term assistantship packages) must participate in this evaluation process. This determines a ranked pool of potential TAs for both Fall and Spring semesters. TAs are unionized (Graduate Employees Union) and receive a monthly stipend, tuition, and benefits.

D. Degree Requirements. Complete 800-900 level courses in a major field of history and in each of two minor fields, at least one of which must be in history, as specified by the student’s guidance committee. The major field should be the field in which the student plans to focus research for the dissertation, drawn from the fields of history listed below; a minor field may be composed with consultation of the guidance committee that emphasizes thematic or interdisciplinary scholarship. Ordinarily, doctoral students are required to take at least 9 credits of formal graduate course work (800-900 level) in their major field and 6 credits of such course work in each minor field.

The Department of History requires a competence in at least two foreign languages for the PhD degree. The student must satisfy the first language requirement by the end of the first year of doctoral study; the second language requirement must be satisfied before the comprehensive examinations are begun.

Fields: Graduate students are expected to become experts in one major field and two minor fields, and they will constitute a committee, as explained below in IV and V, that consists of two professors in the major field and one each in the two minor fields.

Exams, Written and Oral: In practice, this means that students will prepare for four exams, two in the major field and one each in the minor field. They will come to an agreement with each of the four professors on the material on which they will be examined, consisting usually in a reading list of at least fifty to seventy-five books per exam, though this can vary according to case. The members of the committee will meet prior to the exam process and share this material among themselves. The history department expects graduate students to take exams in the fifth semester of residence, within a period of no longer than two weeks for all four exams. Writing time for each exam is limited to four hours, though in the case of non-native speakers of English this period can be extended up to two additional hours. Very soon after the written exams are completed (within a period not to exceed two weeks), an oral exam will follow with the committee. Students can expect to hear the results of each exam within forty-eight hours. Students must be enrolled for at least one credit the semester the oral comprehensive examination is taken. All doctoral students must register at Michigan State University for and successfully complete a minimum of 24 semester credits of doctoral dissertation research (HST 999).