American Historical Association Careers for History Majors

The American Historical Association (AHA) has published an updated version of Career for HistorytMajors.  It's worth checking.  While you are at it, look at other recorses by following the careers label.

Some Cool Projects by Students

This fall semester, three seniors did cool projects.  Joe Aldridge wrote a senior thesis on the history or propaganda in which he looked at several case studies in the United States of propaganda and misinformation, older versions of "fake news."  Gina Gerard created a web page on Games in Education with resources and plans for educators using games to teach social studies.  Jeremiah Horrigan's thesis on the Compromise of 1850 provided an interesting look at the political conflict that was a stepping stone to the Civil War.

Over in the archives, students working on history internships with Dennis Frank did good work.  Ashlee Gray's work on the NY 154 resulted in, among other things, the map that visualizes casualties mentioned earlier.  Joseph Giglio worked on the John F. Carr collection.  Adam Wojcik did extensive archival work in the Antonucci Collection of World War II materials.  All gained valuable experience working with original documents and preparing them for use that includes digital access.

The Hardtack Regiment Newsletter mentions the good work of our students.  Mark Dunkelman writes,

"Recently I had reason to visit the website of the Dunkelman and Winey Collection of the 154th New York at St. Bonaventure University for the first time in quite a while and was greatly pleased to find much progress has been made in digitizing materials and adding links to them. University Archivist Dennis Frank credits intern Ashlee Gray and work/study student Anna Giglio for their work on the site. Anna has been working on the A-F list of soldiers; Ashlee on the P-Z list. There is still plenty to be done, but these two dedicated women are steadily chipping away at it and I’m very grateful to them for their efforts. Take a look:  http://achives.sbu.edu/civil_war/154th_site.html

Data Visualization and History Internship

Ashlee Gray, double-major in History and English, is wrapping up her internship in the University Archives with Dennis Frank.  Ashlee, an alumnus of the digital history class that experimented with app making, worked on collecting, analyzing, and displaying data from the New York 154 regiment papers in the University Archives.  She worked in Microsoft Excel and then moved on to visualizing and mapping the data.  Above is a map she produced.  Next semester she plans on continuing the project to produce a more refined final product.  (Hint:  give it a moment to load and it works best if you expand it to full screen.)

Practical Advice on Getting a Public History Job

The American Historical Association has a nice article, Practical Advice on Getting a Public History Job, that is worth a read.  The short version, in addition to studying history get the media, communications and other skills you need to land a job.

Board Games on Friday

It's the last day of classes!  Blow of some steam.  Chill before finals start.  Friday Dec 7 we'll be playing games and eating pizza (as long as it lasts) in the uppers seminar room in the Friedsam Memorial Library.

Summer Study in Japan

Professor Dalton is organizing a summer class that includes a trip to Japan.  You can see the details here.  Information sessions will be

5 p.m. Monday, Nov. 26
11:30 a.m. Tuesday, Dec. 4
Room 203 Swan Business Center

HIS200: Excel and Quantitative History

Last week in HIS200: Historical Methods and Historiography, students presented on their short research projects, which required them to engage with excel and Quantitative History. Our majors did an excellent job identifying possible data to extract for their final research papers and provided detailed analysis in their essays and presentations. Projects ranged from measuring polling data from 1945 to the present on Americans' changing perception of dropping atomic bombs in WWII to using mentions of Joan of Arc from 1700 to the present in Google Books to analyze her popularity at different points in history. 

Bill used Google Books to explore Joan of Arcs mentions from 1700 to the present. He used historical context to explain why her popularity rose and fell during certain decades. 

Noah created a database of battles waged by the Roman Republic and the Roman Empire over a 100-year period to find out when Rome had its most effective fighting force. 

Elizabeth employed an anonymous survey to analyze contemporary views on the impact of music during the Vietnam War.  

Mason gathered polling data from 1945 to the present on how Americans view the dropping of the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. He found that right after the war, Americans highly approved of the action but as the memory of the war faded, approval ratings dropped precipitously. 

Like Bill, Tom used Google Books to track mentions of the famous Japanese samurai, Miyamoto Musashi. He also created a pie chart that looked at the different types of studies that mentioned Musashi (see below).