European History (Taught)

This MA European History offers you the chance to study key ideas, debates and practices that have shaped our understanding of Europe and the most important historical and methodological approaches to critically interpreting European pasts and presents.

Why choose this course?

• You will learn from world-renowned experts in European history, including British, German, French, Italian, Balkan, Russian and Eastern European history, as well as international, transnational, global and comparative historical perspectives.

• We are unique in our wide-ranging approach to studying Europe through the critical perspectives of empire, nationalism and nation-making, migration, gender and social inequality.

• You will be joining a community of specialist historians whose research spans diverse historical periods, from the Early Modern to the present day, and puts Europe in dialogue with the world.

What you will learn

Rather than presuppose one all-encompassing definition of 'Europe', on this course we highlight the different contexts within which the European past and present can be analysed, and embrace a broad approach to the study of European history.

You will explore intellectual traditions, methodological questions, interdisciplinary approaches, and other themes and topics to a broadly defined European chronology and geography.

How you will learn

As well as choosing from option modules covering many aspects of European history and politics, you will also receive training in research methods and undertake your own argument-oriented dissertation. This makes the course an excellent entry point for more advanced study at either MPhil/PhD level or professionally, and it is also a valuable tool in advancing your knowledge and expertise if you work in educational professions.

You will be taught primarily through seminars, with some supervision support for your dissertation. Classes take place in the evening.

This course is part of our Birkbeck Flexible Master’s UK, which gives you the choice of how you want to study - on campus, online or via flexible learning, which combines both.

If you require a Student visa to study in the UK, you will only be able to apply for the on-campus study option for this course. Online and flexible options will not be available to you because they may affect the conditions of your visa.

Highlights

• You will study with historians actively engaged in their research topics and currently developing innovative research approaches: from microhistories of places and people to oral history and the study of memory; from histories of international organisations to ethnographic understandings of the archive; from intellectual history and the transmission of ideas to the critique of global empire.

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

• Situated in historic Bloomsbury, we are at the heart of academic London with access to unparalleled research resources such as: the Institute of Historical Research and the Institute of Classical Studies; the British Museum and other world-class galleries and museums; and the British Library, the largest national library in the world.

Careers and employability

On successfully graduating from this MA, you will have gained an array of important transferable skills, including:

• critical analysis and interpretation

• research skills

• argument-based writing

• networking

• presentation skills.

Graduates can pursue career paths in research in major international organisations, education, consulting in European business, the Civil Service, journalism, archiving and libraries. Possible professions include:

• teacher

• consultant

• Civil Service fast-streamer

• researcher

• journalist

• archivist

• museum education officer

• museum curator

• editorial assistant

• politician’s assistant.