Un/sustainable Societies: Past, Present and Future

- Een track in Un/Sustainable Societies: Past, Present and Future met een duidelijke professionele en maatschappelijke relevantie
- Een uitstekende track die een groot aantal verschillende keuzevakken biedt met de flexibiliteit om je eigen specialisme te ontwikkelen
- Een duidelijke focus op de historische bronnen van hedendaagse ontwikkelingen met betrekking tot (gebrek aan) duurzaamheid en de praktische implementatie van academische historische kennis en methoden
- Een unieke focus op inzetbaarheid door vakken met betrekking tot methoden en professionele vaardigheden, plus praktische ervaring via speciale projecten en stages
- Een internationale en aantrekkelijke studie-omgeving met veel middelen om onderzoek te doen

A study period abroad can be combined with the placement and/or the Master's final assignment. You could also follow a seminar at a university abroad.

On completing the Master's track Un/sustainable Societies: Past, Present and Future, you are equipped with the academic and professional knowledge and skills that are required to work for (non) profit organisations, as you will be able to translate complex problems into accessible information and to analyse these problems from a historical perspective. Our graduates are able to interpret and to reflect on the meaning of the past itself, but also in relation to the present and future. You will learn to structure projects and policy documents, and to negotiate and adopt a diplomatic position. By doing a placement, you will get to know people from relevant fields and build a strong professional network. This Master's track provides you the expertize and tools to find general and specialist positions within a broad array of (non) profit organizations, giving you a clear advantage on the job market.

Research in the Department of History covers the earliest of human history to the present, focusing on regions from a global perspective. The international staff are all involved in teaching the Master’s track Un/sustainable Societies: Past, Present and Future, offering you the possibility to specialize in a wide range of topics.

For example, the track coordinator, Dr Iva Peša, leads a project that researches environmental histories of resource extraction in Africa. To understand the different responses to the transformative environmental effects of mining and oil drilling, the researchers in this group analyse oral history, archival research, literature and musical research. You can find more information on the webpages about staff members and their research and about the activities of the Research Centre for Historical Studies.

This wide-ranging expertise of our staff allows students to choose their own thesis subjects. Some examples of the topics of students’ theses are political deliberation in Ancient Athens, German forestry practices in early twentieth-century Tanzania, or the restitution of Jewish victims of the Shoah by Dutch municipalities.