Program overview
Graduate from the nation's first and longest-standing PhD program in Atlantic History. With expertise in research and innovation in teaching, our program rewards doctoral students with a strong foundation in the history of the Atlantic world from pre-colonial times to the modern era. Achieve an average time-to-degree of 5.6 years — way below the national average of 8 years.
The department is complemented by other programs in related fields within the Steven J. Green School of International and Public Affairs.
The doctoral program in History offers students opportunities to concentrate on Latin America, Africa, the United States, or Europe. Since the mid-fifteenth century, the Atlantic has provided the corridor for fundamental exchanges of peoples, technologies and ideas, defining and challenging communities across wide spans of time and space. The Atlantic Civilization focus of our doctoral program explores the many dimensions of these exchanges. Capitalizing on the department's notably strong resources and faculty, the program is designed around a curriculum that emphasizes the comparative framework of the Atlantic experience while reflecting the vitality of a cross-disciplinary approach.
Graduate students are encouraged to present papers at professional conferences and to publish their ongoing research. By way of example, several participants in a recent American History research seminar had their papers published in the edited volume Global Protestant Missions earning themselves a valuable publication credit in a reputable press!