Chair's Welcome
Welcome to the “virtual” Department of History at the University of New Brunswick. If you are a student contemplating History as a Majors, Minors, Honours, or Graduate student, we hope you find the website helpful. We try to keep the “News and Events” listing current, but if you have something to report that is of importance for History folk, please do let us know.
We are justly proud of our Department. It possesses an excellent record in both teaching and research, and many of our graduates have gone on to post-graduate programs both in Canada and abroad and to satisfying careers. We have been one of the University’s top ranked research departments for several years, and our members are at the cutting edge of their particular fields, having won their share of research grants and awards and regularly publishing books, articles, and chapters and presenting research at scholarly conferences.
We are also committed to excellence in teaching, and History often graduates the largest body of Majors/Honours students in the Faculty of Arts.This is interesting, because we usually do not have the largest classes at the introductory levels, but we do end up with the largest Honours and Majors programs. Why? I see three reasons: 1. students discover History to be an exciting and endlessly fascinating discipline; 2. the skills of research, critical analysis of sources, and writing and other means of presentation, are extremely useful in the modern world; and 3. the high quality of programs, teaching, and advising that students receive once they are in History.
We also have a very strong graduate program. Student evaluations are quite positive, but we strive constantly to improve the learning experience of our students. We have had our share of Commonwealth and Rhodes Scholarship winners, but even those who have not achieved such illustrious awards have found the education they received here to be rewarding indeed, regardless of where they went afterward. We have on our website links for students to help them with thinking about graduate studies and careers arising from a History degree, but we also very strongly believe that a degree in History is an excellent education for whatever anyone might do in the future.
I am happy too to report that members of the History Department are actively engaged in the broader community, and we continue to explore further opportunities. Historians seek to make sense of human behaviour in the past, most of which has direct relevance to who we are and what we do today.
If you are a UNB History alumnus, we’d love to hear from you and what you’re doing.
Feel free to contact me by email.
I wish you all the best in your endeavours,
Gary Waite
