The history department at St. Thomas guides students in the critical study and analysis of the societies and peoples of the past, and the various ways that “the past” is explained in “the present”. Students thus learn historical content as well as the methodological and philosophical issues that inform the exploration of history in our own time, including the difficulties in saying what exactly “history” is or should be.

As with our general approach to the study of history, the STU history department is creative and dynamic. Chronologically we offer courses from the first complex societies more than 5,000 years ago up to the present, though we are strongest in the period from circa 1000 C.E. onward. Geographically we cover everything from small local communities to cities, nation-states, regions such as the Atlantic world, Africa, Europe, Asia or Latin America, and the globe. Recently, however, we have been developing a global history curriculum that includes our World History survey and a growing range of courses that explore thematic and transnational histories (such as social movements, revolutions, citizenship, cities and water) on a global scale.  More...