My colleague Richard Toye at Exeter wrote this interesting blog about originality in historical research – the equivalent of the theoretical contribution in management and organization studies.
Richard Toye
Director, Centre for Imperial & Global History
For anyone contemplating a research career in History, perhaps the most daunting thing is coming up with an original project. Whatever your period or area of interest is, there is likely a considerable body of scholarship on it already, and in some fields the volume will look simply enormous. How, then, can you work out what remains left to be done? Even more importantly, how can you craft a PhD proposal that promises to do more than simply “fill a gap”?
Director, Centre for Imperial & Global History
For anyone contemplating a research career in History, perhaps the most daunting thing is coming up with an original project. Whatever your period or area of interest is, there is likely a considerable body of scholarship on it already, and in some fields the volume will look simply enormous. How, then, can you work out what remains left to be done? Even more importantly, how can you craft a PhD proposal that promises to do more than simply “fill a gap”?
After all, if you aspire to become a professional historian you ultimately need to write a thesis that can plausibly be presented as a major academic intervention. You will have to sell what you do to hiring committees in that way. That sounds scary, especially if you have only recently completed your undergraduate degree and, perhaps, are faced with the…
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Organizational History Network 