Director: Marnie Anderson, 2011-12
History 430d Thesis
8 credits
Full-year course; offered each year
History 431 Thesis
8 credits
Offered fall semester each year
Requirements
The Departmental Honors program is a one-year program taken during the senior year. If admitted, students write a thesis in both semesters of the senior year, or they may propose to write the thesis in one semester. Admission requires a grade-point average of 3.5 inside and outside the major.
The central feature of the History Honors program is the writing of a senior thesis with the guidance of a faculty advisor. Each Honors candidate defends the thesis at an oral examination which relates the thesis topic to the historical scholarship of the chosen field. The internal honors deadline for a complete polished draft suitable for review by a second reader is the Monday after Spring Break. Those drafts will then be evaluated by both the first and second readers. Readers will give comments that allow students to incorporate feedback so that they can turn in the final version by April 6, 2012 (the College deadline). A fall-semester thesis is due the first day of the spring semester, with the oral defense normally falling before spring break.
If you would like to be considered for the Honors Program, meet with a faculty member in the History Department to discuss your ideas and develop a proposal with the assistance of the potential thesis supervisor, during the spring semester of your junior year. Your proposal should include a full description of your topic, your planned research methodology (the breadth of sources you will use and how), a brief description of how your project fits into the historical scholarship on this topic, and a preliminary bibliography (including primary and secondary sources). The college requires that the faculty supervisor for the thesis be a member of the department, although you may have a second reader in another department or program. Submit your proposal to the Director of Honors in the History Department before the end of classes in your junior year, with the thesis supervisor’s signature.
Detailed information and the official application for Honors are available at the class deans' website under guidelines and forms for academic procedures.
See "Apply to Enter the Departmental Honors Program" at http://www.smith.edu/classdeans/guidelines.php .
The History Honors major comprises 11 semester courses, at least six of which shall normally be
taken at Smith, distributed as follows.
- Field of concentration: four semester courses, at least one of which is a Smith history department seminar. Two of these may be historically oriented courses at the 200–level or above in other disciplines, approved by the student's adviser.
- The thesis counting for two courses (8 credits)
- Five History courses or seminars, of which four are outside the field of concentration
- No more than two courses taken at the 100–level may count toward the major
- Geographic breadth: among the 11 semester courses counting towards the major there must be at least one course each in three of the following geographic regions
- Africa
- East Asia and Central Asia
- Europe
- Latin America
- Middle East and South Asia
- North America
Courses in the field of concentration and outside the field of concentration may be used to satisfy this requirement. AP credits may not be used to satisfy this requirement.
Courses cross–listed in the history department section of the catalogue count as History courses toward all requirements.
A student may count one (but only one) Advanced Placement examination in United States, European or World history with a grade of 4 or 5 as the equivalent of a course for 4 credits toward the major.
The S/U grading option is not allowed for courses counting toward the history honors major.
