OBJECTIVES OF THE HISTORY HONOURS PROGRAM

The objectives of the program are twofold. By the end of this program successful students will have demonstrated their capacity:

1. To master a range of research skills that are specific to the academic study of History. These skills relate both to each student’s specific research interests and also to issues common to the History discipline overall. Some of these skills include:
   
   
   • a refined ability to use, interpret, and analyse primary sources of different kinds;
   • a capacity to synthesise coherently from information gathered from many different primary and secondary sources;
   • an informed awareness of the methodological and theoretical nature of the historian’s craft;
   • an ability to transform information into historical argument through the effective deployment of evidence and the rigorous, critical evaluation and comparative analysis of scholarly opinion;
   • an appreciation that historical argument has changed over time and that historical hypotheses are always open to challenge and revision on the basis of further investigations.
     
     
2. To refine, to an extent that goes beyond that of the Pass degree, skills in a range of general areas. These skills include such things as the capacity to:
   
   
   • research efficiently and thoroughly in areas both familiar and unfamiliar to the student;
   • plan, develop, and bring to completion a long-term research project to an acceptable professional standard and making a contribution to knowledge;
   • work independently and to organise effectively their own schedules of personal study;
   • employ the appropriate terminology and reporting conventions of a given discipline;
   • identify and extract relevant information from a mass of disparate materials;
   • write clearly and effectively.

In the Honours program these two objectives are met simultaneously. First, the program provides a comprehensive foundation for students hoping to pursue later post-graduate research. Students will acquire both advanced research expertise in the contextual areas of their specialisation and also an informed awareness of the conceptual frameworks, theoretical debates, and methods of enquiry of the History discipline more broadly. Second, for students planning to move into professional degrees or employment the program refines their research and writing skills from the undergraduate degree and also introduces new skills such as the capacity to work independently and with guidance on a long-term project. Finally, the School hopes that all students who participate in the Honours program will enhance their love of History and will appreciate the intrinsically rewarding nature of studying the past.