Undergraduate Student Research Opportunities
Research
The History Department community enjoys extraordinary resources for studying history on and off campus. Undergraduate students can intern at world-class institutions, present their work at conferences and hone their research skills with special projects and seminars. Graduate students engage in research projects throughout their studies, completing in-depth seminars and working alongside faculty members on their latest research projects that span centuries and continents. The Phi Chi chapter of the Phi Alpha Theta honor society also offers students opportunities to showcase their research and network with peers.
History faculty are critically acclaimed authors in their focus areas, and they frequently win GW’s Morton A. Bender, Trachtenberg and Writing in the Disciplines awards for their research-rich curricula.
Research Around the World
Africa's Impact on the African American Experience
How does Africa figure in “real and imagined ways” to the African American experience? Professor of History and International Affairs Nemata Blyden spoke with CCAS Dean Paul Wahlbeck about the customs and traditions—from religion and food to language and music—that carried over from the African continent centuries ago and can still be seen today.
Failing Grade: Are Americans Flunking History?
History professor Christopher Brick has a lesson plan to raise our humanities IQ.
Commemorating History’s Dark Chapter
PhD student Ashley Valanzola is researching the stories of six extraordinary Jewish women—Holocaust survivors who worked to honor the memory of lives lost.
Carving Up the Thanksgiving Story
In his new book, David J. Silverman takes a close look at the traditional Thanksgiving story and the distortion of facts surrounding its legacy for Native Americans.
Bringing Eleanor Roosevelt's Legacy to Life
The words, wisdom and remarkable legacy of “The First Lady of the World” are being brought to life in an accessible digital archive through the painstaking work of the Eleanor Roosevelt Papers Project, a GW-chartered research center within the Department of History.
Three GW Historians Awarded ACLS Fellowships
In a rare feat for one academic department, three History Department professors — Joel Blecher, Dina Khoury and Erin Chapman — were awarded 2018-19 American Council of Learned Societies Fellowships.
Ancient Muslim Manuscripts Unearthed
Assistant Professor Joel Blecher discovered drafts of important works on Islamic thought which date back to the 15th century. The uncovered manuscripts reveal how medieval Islamic scholars drafted and revised their understanding of Muhammad’s teachings to the early Muslim community.
