History Graduate Students Say Their Research Tracks 250 Years of America’s Complicated History
10 GW graduate students reflect on how their studies have related to the themes and struggles of America's diverse history.
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Examining the Past to
Understand the Future
Studying history through today's lens
Who We Are
With an unparalleled location in the nation's capital, award-winning faculty and access to some of the most important research repositories in the world, the GW Department of History offers an ideal platform from which to explore our past. Undergraduate and graduate students are exposed to a diversity of topics, from the Africa diaspora to the Cold War, from imperialism to urbanization, from the founding of Islam to Jewish history, from race relations to labor, law and politics. Students graduate with the knowledge and analytical tools necessary for success in a wide range of careers.
Where We Are
The Washington, D.C., area offers a front-row seat to history. Students are immersed in their surroundings through trips to museums, battlefields and historical sites including the Folger Shakespeare Library, the Jamestown Settlement, the Gettysburg Battlefield, the Society of the Cincinnati and George Washington’s Mount Vernon estate.
Through the department's collaborative relationships with institutions throughout the region, students also have extraordinary access to historical documents at the National Archives, the Library of Congress, the National Security Archive and the Smithsonian Institution.
"Thanks to the History Department, I was able to learn fascinating subjects, conduct important research, conference with knowledgeable and attentive professors, and graduate feeling prepared for the future as a historian."
Max Skidelsky
BA '20
History by the Numbers
Our Highlights
Department Headlines
GW Experts Reflect on American Democracy at 250
At a GW community event, Professor Denver Brunsman examine the current state of polarization as part of the United States’ larger story.
Haiti as Emblematic of the Black Struggle for Freedom
GW’s Africana Studies Program hosts a Black History Month Symposium on fugitivity and freedom.
Native Voices Rewrite America's Racial Story
History Professor David J. Silverman’s research reframes U.S. racial struggles to spotlight the role of Indigenous identities—past and present.
Faculty Books
Freedom in the Age of Slavery by historian Warren Eugene Milteer Jr. follows the history of free black people living in Virginia from the colonial period through Reconstruction, whether documenting...
Out of This Strife Will Come Freedom
Out of This Strife Will Come Freedom by historian Warren Eugene Mitleer Jr. brings light to the stories of free african-americans in the critical years before, during and after the Civil War through...
This biography by historian Jenna Weissman Joselit paints a portrait of the life of Mordecai M. Kaplan who was a rabbi, writer, teacher and his undeniable influence on American Judaism.
Award-winning author and historian David Silverman examines the emergence of a racial identity among Euro-Americans and their determination to reign dominance and superiority over others– like Native...