BA History

Develop key study and research skills as you discover diverse societies, cultures and individuals with our BA History degree.

Explore the past and what it means to be human as our academics take you on a journey through Britain, Europe, Africa, America, the Middle East and South Asia, spanning the past thousand years.

Choose history at the University of Reading

• Top 125 in the world for History, Philosophy and Theology (Times Higher Education World University Rankings by Subject 2022).
• Top 200 in the world for History (QS World Rankings 2023, by Subject).
• In 2022, we achieved a 94% satisfaction score for BA History (National Student Survey 2022).

Your first year acts as an introduction, helping you to transition from school to university and identify your individual areas of interest. You’ll be presented with new and exciting fields of history you may not have considered before, including people, power and revolution, and culture, art and ideas.

Experts from the Department of History will equip you with the skills you need to study and research history, as you start to shape your degree through your choice of optional modules – from time periods ranging from medieval to modern, and from America to Africa.

Vibrant, collaborative learning environment

From your first day, you are a historian too. Your learning will take place through small, interactive seminar groups, encouraging discussion and debate with academics and peers.

We place a great deal of importance on employability skills, and some of our modules offer short work placements and act as an introduction to career exploration.

Placements and employability support

Placements are a prominent feature of our degree courses, offering an opportunity to demonstrate how you can apply your skills and knowledge in real-world settings.

Through our links with the Careers Centre, you can source potential employers and help with CVs and letters of application. We have close links with:

• parliament
• National Trust
• English Heritage
• British Museum
• Berkshire Record Office
• Museum of English Rural Life
• Reading Museum.

Study history in context

Field trips in the UK and abroad enable you to access new areas of history within their historical surroundings. Past examples include the National Trust in Winchester and Westminster, and further afield in Paris and Berlin.

Additionally, you can choose to spend a term in your second year at one of our partner universities in Europe, the USA, Canada or Australia. We encourage all our students to seize this opportunity as it can open your eyes to new areas of history, build your confidence and skills, and set you apart in the job market.