Course summary

This MA Global History: Empires, States and Cultures will expand and deepen your understanding of world history as you explore diverse interconnections across geographical and national boundaries. Why choose this course?

• Taught by experts in African, Asian, Atlantic, European and Middle Eastern histories, societies and cultures, this course offers you the opportunity to examine theoretical and empirical approaches to the study of global interactions across history.

• You will be able to explore fascinating themes such as empires and imperialism; nations and nationalisms; decolonisation, migrations and diasporas; environmental history; the transnational history of ideas.

• The course offers you valuable preparation for a range of academic and non-academic careers by providing you with training in research methods and the use of primary sources, while also nurturing your own research interests.

• Birkbeck was ranked in the top eight universities in the UK for its History research in the most recent 2021 Research Excellence Framework.

• Our research is unique in its range across geographical and chronological boundaries. We are the only university in London to include historians, classicists and archaeologists in the same team of academics investigating every period from prehistory to the early twenty-first century. We see the study of the past as crucial for our understanding of present-day society, culture and politics.

• MA students are eligible to apply for our prestigious Eric Hobsbawm Scholarships, subject to availability. One of the most influential historians of the twentieth century, Eric Hobsbawm taught at Birkbeck for over five decades and embodied what is central to our teaching and research: a continued commitment to critical enquiry and public engagement.

• We are at the heart of academic London with access to unparalleled research resources. Situated very close by are: the Institute of Classical Studies, with its library, training facilities and seminars; the British Museum, with its extensive collection of classical antiquities; and the British Library, the largest national library in the world.

• historically sensitive research skills

• constructing complex arguments, especially those requiring a long-term perspective

• understanding how the industry has changed over time and is continuing to evolve

• assessing the impact of globalisation on societies

• approaching political, cultural and economic issues from a global perspective.

• historian

• higher education lecturer

• archivist

• journalist

• heritage manager

• politician’s assistant

• academic librarian

• museum/gallery curator.