Working toward success
The world is changing quickly, and the field of history is no different. As a national leader in the field, our department helps you adapt to work in the digital age and prepares you for success in a booming creative economy.
Skills you build by studying history:
- Analyze leadership decisions, styles and consequences
- Make decisions through systematic means and analysis
- Develop alternative ideas and debate their merits
- Direct both small and large long-term research projects
- Manage time for projects and assignments
- Interact and communicate effectively with a team
- Make evidence-based arguments by conducting research
- Organize huge amounts of information
- Interpret primary source documents
- Prioritize information and materials for an audience
- Communicating ideas in easily understandable ways using written, verbal and multimedia techniques
- Engage in respectful and effective debate
- Navigate diverse cultures and histories of peoples worldwide
- Understand that local decisions can’t be separated from global context and gain insight into how people make choices
- Answer questions that seem unanswerable with confidence and care. Among most important things you’ll learn is how to answer the question “Is that true?”
I became much better as a writer at South Carolina. As a student of history, you learn the art of writing, which is incredibly valuable in medical research.
Matt McMillan (2011, B.A. history) radiation oncology resident
Careers for history majors
A degree in history can lead to a variety of careers. Our program will cultivate the skills and knowledge to give you a competitive edge in the following areas:
- Public history — museums, historic preservation, archives
- Legal — lawyers, judges, paralegals, managers
- Education — elementary, secondary, colleges and universities, consulting
- Libraries and information sciences
- Politics
- Diplomacy and national security
- Media and journalism
- Writing
- Business and management
- Advertising
- Public policy and public administration
- Non-profit management and humanitarianism