Overview
Historians at Emory conduct leading research in an array of geographic contexts and anchored by myriad thematic inquiries.
Faculty and students work within and, quite often, across the areas of concentration listed below, sustaining a robust tradition of scholarship framed by the diasporic, oceanic, and transnational.
Africa
Emory University's History Department has one of the top African history Ph.D. programs in the country. Our strengths lie in providing students excellent training in African history, outstanding opportunities for comparative study in a number of complementary fields and disciplines, and a broad and deep foundation in African Studies through Emory's internationally-recognized Institute of African Studies.
Ancient
Emory University’s Ph.D. in Ancient History emphasizes interdisciplinary work in the social, political, and cultural history of ancient Greek and Roman society, including Late Antiquity. The program draws on the strengths of the Emory faculty not only in History but also in Art History, Classics, Philosophy, and the Graduate Division of Religion. Family and gender history, Greek and Roman law, the history of religion, and the comparative history of slavery are some of the topics students can expect to study with the support of faculty actively working in these areas.
Asia
Emory University’s Ph.D. program in South Asian and East Asian is extremely selective. We admit a small number of outstanding students each year, to whom we provide close personal attention and support, thus building small cohorts of exceptional graduates. The department prides itself on offering disciplinary rigor and interdisciplinary stimulus in the training of its graduate students.
The Asian History program focuses on the theme of colonialism, postcolonialism, and the making of the modern. In the making of the modern we seek to draw attention to regional differences of early modern conditions and culture and the influence that such local differences had on modern historical trajectories.
The program is an outstanding place to focus on Asian history in its regional variations, global history, and subaltern studies, and provides an exceptional opportunity for students to investigate colonial and postcolonial conditions in the context of ongoing debates across the global South.
Early Modern Europe
Early Modern European history is one of the department’s best known and most successful Ph.D. programs. Building on the work of the late J. Russell Major, an internationally known expert on French Renaissance government and society whose doctoral students now hold a number of major positions in the profession, the current faculty members are proud of our close, collegial cooperation and our record in guiding students individually towards successful topics and careers.
Jewish
The Jewish history graduate program, part of the Emory University Laney Graduate School’s doctoral program in History, trains students interested in the Jewish experience in a variety of chronological periods, with special strengths in the modern era. Faculty research specializations include the history of Jews in the US, Eastern Europe, and Latin America.
The Ph.D. program in Jewish history provides students with rigorous training in their fields of specialization while encouraging comparative study. Students who focus on Jewish history are encouraged to study its chronological breadth while choosing a geographic area of specialization for coursework and examinations. They may also enroll in a Certificate Program in Jewish Studies, which will present them with cross-disciplinary perspectives through coursework and participation in a regular colloquium, the Seminar Series in Jewish Studies, which brings together graduate students and faculty from across the university for intellectual interchange. The Certificate Program will offer students a credential beyond their program training that strengthens their ability to compete for national fellowships, postdoctoral awards, and tenure-track positions in Jewish history.
Latin America
Emory's highly competitive Ph.D. in Latin American History provides students with an individually tailored graduate experience. The University's active Program in Latin American and Caribbean Studies, which includes over fifty graduate students in varied courses of study, complements graduate offerings in History, and encourages interdisciplinary approaches to research and teaching. Areas of topical strength in the program include questions of national identity and immigration for the national period and the interface of indigenous peoples with imperial institutions during the colonial period. The area of Latin American History is especially strong in the histories of Brazil and Mexico and in approaches including social and cultural history.
Modern Europe
Emory University's History Department offers a transnational, dynamic, and interdisciplinary approach to the study of Modern Europe from the eighteenth century to the present. Our faculty focuses on a wide array of approaches: cultural, economic, social, and political history, as well as international and environmental history. Students can organize their studies either around a particular national and geographical area or around themes such as revolutions, borderlands, the Cold War, human rights, decolonization, gender, and many others.
United States
Emory has a thriving, nationally recognized doctoral program in U.S. history with 11 faculty members and 7 associated faculty. US History students form close mentoring relationships with faculty amid a lively intellectual community of graduate students from many different fields within the history department, as well as within the larger interdisciplinary community in the Laney Graduate School.
