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Welcome to the Undergraduate Program

History is the study of the past, and how our lives today are shaped by our competing memories of the past. If it happened, historians explore it—whether it took place yesterday or five thousand years ago.

If you are interested in people and how they interact with the social and natural world, then you should be interested in history. Too many people imagine that history is merely the dry memorization of names and dates, but a concentration in history at the University of Michigan will quickly dispel that myth. Our courses cover everything: Music, politics, race and ethnicity, family life, technology, war, gender relations, science, medicine, religion, ideologies, and much, much more.

There really is no limit: If it happened, historians study it.

Historical research reminds us that the way we live our lives today is not set in stone, and that our world is one we constantly create and re-create for ourselves.  Perhaps even more important, we are reminded that the way we tell our historical stories—what we remember, what we forget, what we emphasize, what we gloss over—is always in flux and always open for debate. Ultimately, a belief in human agency—our power to make and transform our world—is at the heart of our discipline. Related to this is the conviction that complexity matters, that life is too complicated to be reduced to grand abstractions or generalizations that treat people as objects rather than subjects.

History is one of the most practical fields of study. Our students develop skills in critical thinking, analytical reasoning, eloquent writing, and thoughtful reading. Above all, we help students appreciate every aspect of life as part of a much broader and more complicated context, an approach that not only enriches our students’ lives but also allows them to become sophisticated decision-makers. It is no surprise that employers, law schools, other professional schools, and graduate programs in a wide variety of fields look so favorably upon history graduates.

Although we encourage everyone to consider a concentration (or at least a minor) in history, most of our courses are open to everyone. In fact, even in our upper-level classes a majority of the students are from other departments.

From this website you can explore our concentration, our minor, department organizations, information about careers for history majors, and much more. Please take a look around, and if you have any questions either go to our advising page, or e-mail us directly:

Director of Undergraduate Studies
Professor Brian Porter-Szűcs
baporter@umich.edu

Undergraduate Program Coordinator
coming soon

Join the concentrator's email group! umhistory@umich.edu with your name, ID number,umich.edu address and term of graduation.