Short description of the Department of History

 

Research and Teaching Profile of the Department

The Department of History originally formed part of the Seminar for Philology and History, founded in 1849/50. It became a Seminar in its own right in 1872; its name was changed to Historical Department in 1955, and to Department of History, its current name, in 1979.

The Department is home to scholars with a wide variety of different research activities and multiple contacts within the scientific community. Together with the Department of Social and Economic History, the Department of History possesses a library of ca. 150.000 volumes and 180 periodicals that also includes related collections of slides and videos, as well as private papers relating to women's history. The Department is tightly linked to the Institute for Austrian Historical Research, founded in 1854 as a research institution, which specializes till today in medieval and Austrian history. In their teaching activities the members of the Institute for Austrian Historical Research are assigned to the Department of History.  

 

Research

The Department of History is devoted to the research and teaching of history from the Middle Ages to the present in an interdisciplinary context, and welcomes a variety of conceptual, methodological and theoretical approaches to historical scholarship.

  • Among its main areas of research are the History of the Holy Roman Empire, the Habsburg Monarchy, general Austrian History, European History, French History and the History of the Americas.
  • Topical fields of concentration include women's and gender studies, political history, history of science, microhistory, cultural studies, history of international relations, global history, the history of the media and e-learning as well as the edition of sources and auxiliary sciences.

The profile of the Department is thus a result of individual and collaborative diversity, ranging from local to global approaches, with a continuous emphasis on the teaching of history and its meaning for a wider public.

The Department is integrated into the scientific community by more than 200 agreements with other scholarly institutions that result in a number of workshops, conferences, joint publications, lecture series and invitations to visiting professors. Members of the Department also serve as editors of learned journals or members of editorial boards and academies of science, and have received a number of prizes, honorary doctorates and other rewards in recognition of their contribution to the field.

 

Teaching

Members of the Department perform about one-half of the teaching in the fields of study related to the Study Program 7 (History), including the supervision of B.A., M.A. and Ph.D. students. After earning the B.A. in history, students can choose among eight M.A. Programs in History:

MA History
MA Contemporary History
MA East European History
MA Economic and Social History
MA Historical Research, Auxiliary and Archival Sciences
MA Women`s and Gender History
MA Historical and Cultural European Studies
MA Global History or Global History and Global Studies

Additionally, the Department contributes to two international Masters Programs, one interdisciplinary Masters Program, and one interdisciplinary training course at the University of Vienna:

Erasmus Mundus Master Programme Global Studies - a European Perspective
Matilda - European Master in Women's and Gender
Master in History and Philosophy of Science (Joint Master with the Institute of Philosophy)
Master of Arts in Latin American Studies

The Department is a major contributor to the PhD Program in History. Additionally, from October 2006 to December 2009, the Department was institutional host to an interdisciplinary PhD program entitled "The Sciences in Historical Context," with faculty members from five different departments, whose Speaker is a member of the Department; since 2010 the Department is host to the successor PhD program entitled "The Sciences in Historical, Philosophical and Cultural Contexts," funded by the Austrian Science Foundation.

The Department regularly offers lectures and seminars conducted in languages other than German; numerous agreements concluded with partner universities all over Europe make the Department an attractive venue for students from abroad.

 

E-learning

The Department has carried out projects in internet supported teaching (IGL) since 1999. IGL is a platform organised by teaching staff individually, which offers on the one hand basic information and course materials, and on the other hand provides a foundation for other E-Learning-applications such as Fronter. Members of the Department are leading participants in „History online," „Hypertextcreator," the Teaching and Learning Portal of the Faculty of Historical and Cultural Studies, www.pastperfect.at and other E-Learning sites and tools.