To all those who have studied or study history

[GenosseGeneral]

I am currently thinking about which subject is the right one for me to study at university. One possible subject would be history since I am a history buff since I was a child. In my eyes I am also well qualified for the subject because I have good analytical skills, because I have quite good language skills and because I am interested in the subject and can bring a good basis of historical knowledge.
After all studying history won't be the problem- but finding a job afterwards seems to be. Cynics name taxi driver as the most common employment for history students. I know that there are, besides the 'classic' fields of the historian, namely reasearch and the education system, also chances in thinktanks or larger companies.


Since I know that the .Org consists out of history buffs (mostly) I hope that in here are some fnished history students who could tell about their experience since this might be interesting for people than just me.

[HoreTore]

I discarded history almost as soon as I thought about it for just this reason: it has no meaningful value in the job market. The only good options are museum/reasearch work, as well as reproducing your professors by becoming one.

If you like the idea of being a history researcher - go nuts. If you don't - stay away. An alternative would of course be research in a related field with history as a side skill. Sociology comes to mind as a field where you'd be well served by having some points in history.

If you intend to go into education below college, I'd say you should go for a standard education program instead. You'll soon find out that your shortcomings and areas of improvement lie with education knowledge, not the specifics of the subjects you're teaching. If you have a well-above average interest in the subject(like you have with history), you already have what you need.

A friend of mine finished his masters degree in engineering last year. This year he started on a bachelors degree in history - which will include three languages(he's done arabic, I think the next are Hebrew and Persian). I don't have a clue what he's doing, and I highly doubt he has any either....

[HoreTore]

For the record, I'm a teacher with social science as my field, which in norway is split in three between history, sociology and geography.

[Strike For The South]

I got drunk and here I am 4 years later with a degree and soc major with a tongue piercing

[Papewaio]

The monastery is the history forum I'm sure they can point you in the right direction.

[Major Robert Dump]

If I could do it all over again I would go engineer, or something in the biology field.

History is great if you plan to research, write, teach or go into law or journalism.