MA degrees in history
Our MA degrees offer an outstanding experience for students who want to pursue an interest in History at an advanced level. Our degrees range from the study of medieval to modern history and also include American and International specific options.
Make your degree your own
All of our degrees are carefully designed to allow you to build a programme that suits your needs: whether your aim is to develop a deeper understanding of History; gain research training because you ultimately want to complete a research degree (MPhil or PhD) in History or whether you are looking for professional development because you work in a sector where historical knowledge is valuable. Regardless of your ultimate goal and chosen degree, you will have access to high-quality, research-led teaching and training with both intellectual and social value.
An exciting future
Our MA degrees include several core modules: the Dissertation and Research Presentation modules plus a third core module specific to your degree; these make your degree coherent and help you to develop appropriate skills.
You then have the option to choose from a wide range of modules including both research skills and optional modules in your chosen subject area, so that you can design your degree based around your interests and skills. We also have an MA in Historical Research which allows you the flexibility of choosing from all of our option modules, covering any period or geographical location, and gives you a choice of five subject-specific core modules.
For more flexibility, all of our MA degrees are also available full-time (1 year) or part-time (2 years). Please note that all seminars are held during the day (Monday to Friday, 9.00am to 6.00pm).
Click here to view the structure and modules available for each of our individual MA degrees. Select your chosen degree from the list and click on the 'Content' tab.
MA Degree Programme Structure (for both full-time and part-time students).
Skills for the Future
Our MA degrees can help you fulfil any of the above goals and at the same time help you further develop a valuable set of transferable skills, which will be beneficial no matter what kind of work or further study you go onto after you graduate. You will develop your skills in historical research and ability to analyse the information that you uncover, using these skills to work independently and produce written work that is clearly argued and presented. You will also have the opportunity to be involved in group projects, making discoveries and producing assessed work as part of a team. Our core module, Research Presentation, also gives you the opportunity to design and deliver a high-quality presentation at our exciting MA Presentation Day, a conference-style event held in May each year. View the interesting and original topics our students have covered in the past on our Research Presentation module page.
We also have modules that can help you gain more specific experience and skills such our Work Placement module, where you can experience a work environment such as a museum or school working on a history-specific project, and our Presenting the Past: Making History Public module, which allows you to develop skills in interrogating public history and gain experience of using your historical knowledge and skills outside of academia.
These kinds of skills are why our graduates are successful in both further study and a wide range of careers – from taking PhDs, lecturing and working in the museum and tourist industry to business management and marketing.
Our updated Careers and Alumni page will follow soon!
In the meantime, to see what some of our postgraduate students have gone on to do click here.
History Postgraduate Student Culture
We are proud to have a large and active community of postgraduates, who make a very important contribution to the department's research culture.
The Department is a friendly place to study, our Postgraduate students discuss their research with each other: they hold regular postgraduate student meetings; organising informal discussion groups focussing on different fields of History from Early Modern to Imperial and Twentieth-Century History; and their own more formal research seminars.
MA students are encouraged to attend the postgraduate meetings and discussion groups, as well as the departmental research seminars.
Details of the Department research seminar series can be found: here.
Find out more about what our postgraduate students are up to here.
More about studying at Sheffield
- Download or order a hardcopy of our Postgraduate brochure here.
- Take a look at our FAQs page for MA applicants.
- Find out about funding opportunities for MA students.
- Find out why you should study at Sheffield. Or come and see for yourself on one of our Postgraduate Open Days or monthly Visit Afternoons.
- We've been named University of the Year by the 2011 Times Higher Education Awards. And the 2011 Times Higher survey says Sheffield is the university most people would recommend to a friend.