When writing a history essay, applying a theoretical lens can help you make a sophisticated argument and earn high marks. You always want to be mindful of your essay structure and the substance of any original documents, but, particularly for advanced classes and seminars, bringing in different historical theories can elevate your paper to the next level.

Most high school and college level history courses will require that you read, interpret, and analyze a document or set of documents from the past—otherwise known as primary sources. In this post, I will provide five basic questions that you should ask about your document(s) that will kickstart your thinking about the past and serve as a starting point for formulating an argument for a paper or project. These questions constitute the basic toolkit that all historians use when they research and write about any topic or time period. By asking and answering these questions you will be doing history at its most fundamental level.

If you’re taking a history class this semester, then its almost guaranteed that you’ll have to write a history term paper. You may already be a top-notch writer, but your professor might not tell you that history papers are a unique type of essay. The expectations for a history essays are different from most other classes, and professors and teaching assistants are often on the lookout for a few tell-tale signs of a mediocre or bad paper. Whether a short reading response or a long essay based in original research, here are four tips I wish I had known as an undergraduate student who needs to write a history term paper. Some are small, grammatical tips that can make a big stylistic difference. Others are bigger ideas about how a paper should be structured.

I love the film Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure and I've seen it more times than I can count. It is about two teenagers on the brink of failing high school, unless they ace their final history exam. The Hollywood twist? The protagonists acquire a time machine that allows them to travel through different eras of history. Throughout the film, Bill and Ted collect famous figures, such as Abraham Lincoln, and together with these historical figures, they're able pass their history final. Unfortunately, time travel is not a viable option for history students. In the real world, we cannot ask President Lincoln about the 13th Amendment, instead, we must read historical works and derive our own analyses and conclusions.

Find out why studying the Classics is so important!

"What are you gonna do with that degree?" is just one of the questions endlessly faced by Classics majors and those wondering if they should study the Classics. What Classics majors are gonna do is understand the past and present and enjoy every aspect of the world as we know it so much more, and here you'll find out why.