The Independent Research Seminar is an optional summer follow-up course to the spring course Fulbright History Lab. It gives students the opportunity to carry out the history research projects they designed in the spring. The Independent Research Seminar provides a well-structured, but self-implemented research experience for first- and second- year students interested in pursuing History or a related social science field. Over 8 weeks, students will use the skills they have previously acquired to carry out supervised independent field work and produce their own piece of scholarship. The final research project may take several different forms, from a conventional research paper to a policy memo, mini digital archive, documentary, or podcast (among other possibilities). Students will present their research and final project at a virtual conference hosted by Princeton University in July.
This course allows students to immediately apply the knowledge gained in HIS211 (Fulbright History Lab), and in doing so, to transition from being knowledge consumers to knowledge producers who will present work at an international conference at the conclusion of the course. In terms of the major flowchart, this course counts as one of the two required Research Seminars (ie, 4 out of 8 required 300-level credits) for the History major. Students have much leeway in crafting their own research project, and the project they execute can potentially serve as a foundation for a Capstone research project in the fourth year, whether in History or in another field (including interdisciplinary Capstones).
