Graduate Program

Director of Graduate Studies: Peter C. Caldwell

Why Rice?

The graduate program in history at Rice University is mainly devoted to the training of research scholars who seek the Ph.D. and aim for employment at academic institutions. The uses of a history degree are numerous, however, and graduates sometimes choose careers in editing, public history, the federal government, and university administration. Recent graduates have found employment at such institutions as James Madison University, Virginia Historical Society, University of Kentucky, Texas Southern University, Henderson State University, California State University at Los Angeles, Maine Maritime Academy, Cleveland State University, University of Memphis, Yale University, West Point, Emory and Henry College, Miami University of Ohio, Boston College, University of Montana, SUNY Brockport, Northern Illinois University, Samford University, University of Dallas, Nova University, Texas A&M University, Mississippi State University, Auburn University, Oakland University, University of Florida, Indiana Weslayan, and University of Western Cape, South Africa.

With a faculty of 25 scholars who pride themselves on both teaching and research, the Rice history department is among the largest and strongest departments in a school that is distinctive for its combination of small scale with high quality. Rice is not much larger than a liberal arts college, yet it is an authentic research university with strength across the entire spectrum of graduate offerings in the humanities, social sciences, natural sciences, and engineering, as well as professional schools in music, architecture, and management. The highly selective undergraduate student body numbers only 3,102; the graduate school population currently stands at 2,237. In the history department, eight to 10 new students are admitted annually, yielding an ongoing community of about 35 graduate students in residence who interact vigorously, gaining as much from each other as from the faculty.

The smaller scale of things at Rice translates into close faculty attention and unparalleled flexibility. Students have considerable freedom in this department to create a program of historical study that speaks to their interests and professional ambitions. While our pedagogy program provides opportunities for teaching experience to all of our students who desire it, they are not burdened with the overwhelming amount of teaching, often far outside their own fields, that is a feature of graduate life at large, public institutions. The department places a high priority on support for graduate student research and professional development and provides substantial funds to underwrite, in particular, the cost of dissertation research.

Areas of Concentration

Traditionally, the department's strongest area of concentration has been the history of the United States, especially the history of the South. The Journal of Southern History is edited on campus as well as The Papers of Jefferson Davis. Several generations of Rice historians have trained students in southern history, and the success of those students has given the department unusual prominence in the field. Comparable strengths are to be found across the entire range of U.S. history: early America, post-WW II, labor, women's, intellectual/cultural, African-American, and Atlantic World.

The department's second largest cluster of students is working on modern European history. With three specialists working on Germany and Central Europe, as well as specialists in modern Britain and modern France, this constitutes an area of significant strength.

The department's world history field is designed to supplement a Ph.D. student's primary field of study.  Numerous faculty members in such diverse fields as Caribbean, Latin American, South African, Indonesian, African, Middle Eastern,  European expansion and colonialism, Chinese, Islamic, and ancient Mediterranean offer seminars in this area. Programs such as the Center for the Study of Women, Gender and Sexuality's Graduate Certificate and the Center on Race, Religion and Urban Life offer additional opportunities for interdisciplinary graduate work. Last, but not least, a variety of faculty members across the geographical and chronological fields offer expertise in intellectual and cultural history.