Message from the Chair

Smiling man in a gray blazer and blue checkered shirt standing outdoors in front of green trees and white flowering shrubs.

Welcome! The Department of History and Philosophy is one of the largest departments in the Norman J. Radow College of Humanities and Social Sciences, offering classes to over 8000 students each semester in History, History Education and Philosophy. The department offers two baccalaureate degrees, four minors, and five Double Owl Pathways. Faculty teach classes in a student focused program designed to meet the needs of our twenty-first century graduates.

A liberal arts degree prepares students for life. Our graduates are excellent communicators, skilled researchers, problem solvers and critical thinkers with an appreciation for the complexities of the world around them. Employers value these skills. Whether they choose business, government, public service, law, or education our graduates are able to seek the career path that best meets their individual passion.

Students participate in the Philosophy Student Association and History Club, which sponsor a number of public lectures and forums throughout the year and Phi Alpha Theta, the national history honorary society. Students pursuing the Public History minor have a number of internship and field experience opportunities in the Atlanta Metro Area.

The department includes a number of impressive scholars. Our highly qualified faculty regularly present their research at regional, national and international meetings. They have published articles in major journals in their areas of specialization as well as a number of important monographs and book chapters. Faculty engagement continues to be a major goal of the department. Our award-winning faculty have received recognition for teaching, scholarship and service.

For more information, drop by the main office in Social Sciences 4120.


Tom Okie, Ph.D.
Chair and Professor of History and History Education

What We Do

History is the study of how people, ideas, and institutions shape the world.

Historians make sense of incomplete information. They investigate evidence, evaluate competing explanations, and build arguments about human experiences across time and place. History students learn the same process: how to ask better questions, recognize complexity, and make thoughtful judgments when the answers are not obvious.

What Historians Do Best

 

Interpret Evidence

Determining what sources reveal, what they leave out, and how they should be interpreted.

Recognize Complexity

Examining competing perspectives and recognizing why events rarely have simple explanations.

 

Build Strong Arguments

Developing conclusions based on evidence and communicating ideas clearly and persuasively.

Make Informed Judgments

Making informed decisions when information is incomplete or uncertain.

 

 

The Historian's Work

Historians Ask Questions of Evidence

Historians rarely work with complete records or straightforward answers. They work with evidence that is incomplete, contradictory, and often created for purposes different from the questions historians now ask.

A document is never just a document. Historians ask:

  • Who created this source?
  • Why was it created?
  • Who was the intended audience?
  • What assumptions shaped it?
  • What information may be missing?

A tax record, ship manifest, diary, court deposition, or newspaper article each reveals something about the past, but each also contains limitations that must be understood.

 

 

 

The past does not arrive as a complete story. Historians build understanding from the evidence that survives.

 

 

Understanding the past requires more than finding evidence. It requires knowing what that evidence can, and cannot, tell us.

Historians Interpret What Evidence Means

Historical records are uneven. Powerful institutions often leave extensive archives, while many people appear only indirectly through documents created by those with authority over them.

Historians learn to read sources carefully, recognizing both what they reveal and what they conceal. They use these skills to recover experiences that may otherwise be overlooked and to understand how people, institutions, and ideas interact.

Historians Build Arguments

Historians do not simply collect facts. They build arguments.

They engage with existing scholarship, weigh competing interpretations, assemble evidence, and explain why a conclusion is persuasive. Because historical questions rarely have perfect answers, historians must understand uncertainty and know how to make careful judgments.

 

Good historical thinking is not about finding the easiest answer. It is about developing the strongest answer the evidence allows.

 

Why Historians Are Needed

Making Sense of Information

The ability to evaluate information has become essential in a world filled with rapidly produced content and competing claims.

Public debates, institutional decisions, and cultural conversations often rely on interpretations of the past. Historians are trained to examine those interpretations, trace claims back to their sources, and determine what the evidence actually supports.

Understanding Change

Historians study how societies, institutions, and ideas evolve. They help explain why some changes happen quickly, why others take generations, and why outcomes are often more complicated than anyone expects.

Our faculty pursue this work across a wide range of periods, regions, and questions, demonstrating the many ways historical study helps us understand human experience.

 

In an age of abundant information, judgment matters.

 

How We Prepare Our Students for Employment, Graduate School, and Life

A history degree teaches a method rather than a body of content. Students learn how to enter unfamiliar subjects, identify reliable information, evaluate competing perspectives, and communicate well-supported conclusions.

Employment

Preparing for a Changing Workforce

Careers change. Industries transform. Technologies emerge. Graduates need the ability to learn quickly, adapt, and contribute in situations they have not encountered before.

History students practice this process throughout their education. They learn how to investigate unfamiliar problems, identify reliable information, recognize patterns, and make decisions based on evidence.

Skills employers value:

  • Research and analysis
  • Written and verbal communication
  • Evaluating information
  • Understanding different perspectives
  • Problem-solving in uncertain situations

The value of historical training is not tied to one industry or job title. It is the ability to understand new situations and make sound decisions wherever a career leads.

Graduate School

Preparing for Advanced Study

A history degree develops the skills required for graduate and professional programs:

  • sustained reading
  • independent research
  • analytical writing
  • evidence-based argumentation

History majors are especially well prepared for law school, where interpreting evidence and constructing persuasive arguments are central to legal reasoning.

Students also enter graduate programs with experience developing questions, conducting research, and defending conclusions through substantial written work.

Common pathways include:

  • Law
  • Public Policy
  • Business
  • Education
  • Library and Information Science
  • Public History and Museum Studies
  • Journalism
  • Doctoral Study

Beyond Careers and Classrooms

Developing Perspective for Life

The value of studying history extends beyond employment and academic advancement.

History students learn to:

Question assumptions
Recognize when familiar ideas are products of particular historical circumstances.

Engage with uncertainty
Understand that changing one's mind in response to better evidence is a strength.

Understand other perspectives
Consider how people in different circumstances understood their choices and challenges.

Recognize possibility
See that societies are shaped by decisions, which means they can also be changed by decisions.

 

History teaches students not only how to understand the world, but how to participate thoughtfully in it.

 

Additional Resources

Recent Awards

KSU Awards

  • Lauren MacIvor Thompson - KSU Outstanding Early Career Faculty Award (2025 - 2026)
  • Stephen Bartlett - KSU Outstanding Teaching Award (2024 - 2025)
  • Karolin Mirzakhan - RCHSS Diversity and Inclusion Award (2024 - 2025)
  • Akanmu Adebayo - KSU University Distinguished Professor Award Nominee (2024 - 2025)
  • Albert Churella - KSU Scholarship and Creative Activity Award Nominee (2024 - 2025)
  • Caroline Conner - KSU Outstanding Teaching Award (2023 - 2024)
  • Jennifer Dickey - RCHSS University Distinguished Professor Award (2023 - 2024)
  • Kay Traille - RCHSS Distinguished International Achievement Award (2023 - 2024)
  • Amy Dunagin - KSU Outstanding Early Career Faculty Award Nominee (2023 - 2024)
  • Paul Dover - RCHSS Distinguished Professor Award (2022 - 2023)
  • Karolin Mirzakhan - KSU Outstanding Teaching Award (2022 - 2023)
Yellow line illustration of a trophy resting on a stack of books, surrounded by stars and a laurel branch.

External Awards

  • Lauren MacIvor Thompson - Organization of American Historians Distinguished Lectureship (2026)
  • Public History Program - Georgia Historical Records Advisory Council Award for Student Archives Centered Work in a Public Institution (2025)
  • Jennifer Dickey - Society of Georgia Archivists' President's Award (2025)
  • Tom Okie - National Endowment of the Humanities' Public Scholar Award (2024)
  • LeeAnn Lands - Georgia Historical Records Advisory Council Award for Excellence in Archival Research (2024)
  • Caroline Conner - Georgia Association of Museums' Education Award (2024)
  • David Parker - Georgia Association of Historians' Distinguished Service in the Profession Award (2024)
  • Marianne Holdzkom - Adams Memorial Foundation Scholar Award (2024)