The History Department and Programs
The History Department offers a major program resulting in a BA, participates in a History & Archaeology Joint Major, and offers two unique programs of study: New England Historical Archaeology and New England Prehistoric Archaeology, which are open to both degree-seeking and non-degree seeking students.
The educational mission of the Department of History is to offer to as many students as possible the skills, knowledge, insights and perspective on the human condition that the study of history has afforded to people since ancient times. The department also aims to acquaint them with the use and relevance of history to themselves and to their society in the late twentieth century as extension of experience, as mode of thought and investigation, as contribution to political judgment, as help to self-knowledge, and as aid to personal liberation from parochialism, and present-mindedness. We believe that the study of history is indispensable to each of the three aims of education: training for work, preparation for public life, and enrichment of private life.