Research Design and Research Skills in Modern History

Seminar description

The training seminar differs from both department and research seminars in that it is not based on the study of substantive historical issues but is rather a ‘hands-on’ seminar designed to offer first-year researchers the opportunity to present their work and introduce them to the practicalities of historical research, for instance, by discussing  the use of archival and other primary sources and the methods appropriate to the use of different types of source-material, the definition of a research agenda, the formulation of research questions and hypotheses in dialogue with the sources, the evaluation of  existing historiography, the structuring of analysis and narrative etc. The training seminar is, above all, a forum in which first-year researchers can present their sources, hypotheses and ideas to their peers and to the professors leading the seminar in order to get critical feedback that is helpful to them in presenting their February papers.