PRINCETON UNIVERSITY

Guidelines for Graduate Study in History of Science

2002 - 2003

INTRODUCTION

The goal of the graduate Program in History of Science at Princeton is to enhance our students' enthusiasm for the subject while also training them for the joint professional responsibilities of teaching and research. A leading feature of the Program is its effort to bridge the gap between internal and external history of science. We seek to train students who are simultaneously competent in the intellectual, technical, and sociocultural aspects of the history of science. We are particularly insistent that the conceptual and technical content of past science must be taken into account even as we pursue history more broadly conceived. Specifically, we encourage research that pays close attention to primary texts in science, technology, and medicine, with the ultimate aim of reconstructing past scientific practices in their historical, philosophical, and cultural context. Our approach to graduate training is also distinctive in the extent to which it requires formal qualifications in other areas of history. Graduate students in this Program are simultaneously members of the History Department; in fact, they earn their Ph.D. degrees in History, not History of Science. (Faculty members in the program are also members of the History Department.) This pamphlet should therefore be read as a supplement to the Guidelines for Graduate Study in History, which students in the Program should carefully and repeatedly consult. That document provides a more detailed description and interpretation of many of the requirements and expectations outlined below, including those pertaining to research papers, financial aid, advising, supervised reading, teaching opportunities, procedures for the doctoral dissertation, and job placement. That information applies generally, though not in every detail, to graduate students in History of Science. In addition, students should consult the basic information on requirements and procedures set forth in the Graduate School Announcement.

The maximum period of enrollment in the Program (as in the History Department at large) is five years, including time spent on research in absentia. Program students can normally expect financial support throughout those five years at a level at least equal to that offered them upon admission to the Graduate School, presuming of course that they make satisfactory progress toward the Ph.D. degree.

Students with extensive prior preparation in the field may be able to finish in less than five years, and there is no formal set of requirements that must be met in lock-step fashion. But Program students, like other graduate students in the History Department, do face a heavy set of challenges and expectations, and most will require the full five years of enrollment to satisfy them. Although graduate training in this program is thus a long and demanding process, the normal time between admission and receipt of the Ph.D. is considerably less than the national average for doctoral students in history. As noted in a separate section below, almost all students gain some teaching experience during the later years of their enrollment, but teaching is not required for financial support.

At some point during their first two years of study, Program students are urged to develop a working relationship with one or more faculty members in other areas of history, who will oversee this part of their training. Some students may also wish to take advantage of the resources available at Princeton for training in the philosophy of science, anthropology of science, science policy, or in the university's science and engineering departments.

To prepare students for future teaching responsibilities we require a general knowledge of the history of science, supported by a more detailed command of a particular area of the subject, and by work in general history. This part of our program is concentrated in the first two years of study and culminates in the General Examination.

Preparation for scholarship in the discipline requires training and exercise in the basic techniques of historical research and writing, with special attention to the problems of dealing with the past records and artifacts of science, technology, and medicine. Research training, begun in seminars during the first two years of formal course work, culminates in the Doctoral Dissertation written during the last three years.

The General Examination and the Doctoral Dissertation thus constitute the main formal elements of our graduate program, and the normal course of study is built around them. As specified below, however, students must also satisfy language and research paper requirements before completing the General Examination. Satisfactory completion of these requirements is no less important than performance in course work and the General Examination. We attach special importance to the quality of written work, including the required research papers referred to below.

Throughout their career in the Program, graduate students should keep in close and frequent touch with the Director of Graduate Studies for History of Science. He or she is responsible for approving programs of study and choices of fields and for interpreting Program, Departmental, and University regulations. He or she also consults with the department's Financial Aid Officer and Job Placement Officer when considering any special needs that arise for Program students.

THE PROGRAM OF GRADUATE STUDY IN HISTORY OF SCIENCE

I. THE FIRST TWO YEARS OF STUDY: COURSE WORK, LANGUAGE AND PAPER REQUIREMENTS, AND THE GENERAL EXAMINATION

A. Course Work

During their first two years, students pursue a pattern of courses, seminars, and independent work designed to prepare them for the General Examination, to satisfy their language and research paper requirements, and to train them in the research techniques of professional scholarship. The precise pattern may vary considerably between individuals, and each student should plan his or her course of study in close and frequent consultation with the Director of Graduate Studies for History of Science. It is nonetheless possible to give some general sense of the usual course of study. Program students typically take three courses during each of their first three semesters. Of these, at least one course each semester should be a graduate seminar in history of science. No later than the second semester, at least one course each term should be in other areas of history. In their fourth semester, students usually take only two courses, so that they may have time to complete any unmet requirements and to prepare for the General Examination, which is ordinarily taken at the end of the second year. Students without formal background in the field are strongly advised to attend, as early as possible, at least two of the three basic undergraduate courses offered in history of science ("The Scientific World View of Antiquity and the Middle Ages," "The Origins of Modern Science 1500-1750," and "Science in the Modern World"), and to participate in associated graduate precepts when offered. Students with special interest in the history of technology or medicine may also wish to enroll in the undergraduate courses "Technologies and their Societies: Historical Perspectives" or "Diseases and Doctors in the Modern West." These five courses provide an introduction to the major issues and sources in the history of science, technology, and medicine from antiquity to the present.

By the end of the second year, we expect students to demonstrate a satisfactory command of the basic material covered in two of the first three courses mentioned above, whether or not they choose to enroll in them. One means of demonstrating this command, which may be convenient for students without extensive prior training in the field, is to choose "General History of Science" as one of the three fields to be included in the General Examination. Proficiency in a general knowledge of history of science can also be demonstrated through courses, submission of prior work, bibliographic essays, or other means that meet approval of the Program faculty.

B. Language Requirement

All Program students must demonstrate a reading knowledge of two major foreign languages pertinent to their research in the history of science. By University statute, the language requirement must be met before the student takes his or her General Examination or is admitted to a third year of graduate study. We may deny readmission for a second year of study to any Program student who has not yet passed an examination in at least one of the two required languages. Especially for students who enter the Program without prior command of at least one foreign language, it is crucial to move swiftly toward meeting the language requirement. Failure to do so has become one of the major obstacles to satisfactory progress toward the General Examination. The student should seek approval of his or her language choices from the Director of Graduate Studies as early as possible in the course of study. Examinations are administered by the History Department at the beginning of every semester, and special introductory courses for reading knowledge in French and German are offered during the summer. (The History Department usually covers tuition charges for these courses.)

C. Writing Requirement

We think it important for students to write, and to have their writing criticized, long before they begin the dissertation. All students are therefore expected to write several short pieces-e.g., book reviews and bibliographic, historiographical, or interpretive essays-in connection with seminars or other courses. In addition, students are required to write two research papers based on primary sources before sitting for the general examination. For a useful description of the definition of and expectations for a research paper, including a schedule of due dates, see the pertinent section of the department's Guidelines for Graduate Study in History (available in 208 Dickinson Hall and posted on the departmental web site). Students often write one of these research papers in the context of a graduate seminar, and another based on independent research. At least one should involve close analysis of primary scientific or technical texts. Ideally, both research papers should be revised in the light of faculty comments and deposited in the student's file in a form suitable for presentation to potential academic audiences and employers.

D. The General Examination

The General Examination, normally taken at the end of the second year of study, consists of written and oral examinations in

a major field in the history of science;
a minor field in another area of history; and
one of the following options:

"general" history of science- traditionally known as "Plato to Nato";
a second special field in the history of science;
a second field in another area of history; or
a field in some related subject, e.g., philosophy of science or some branch of science or mathematics.

Precise definitions of fields, and special concentrations within them, are worked out in consultation with the Director of Graduate Studies for History of Science and an appropriate faculty member in the field. The major field in the history of science should be defined so as to have a topical or chronological breadth equivalent to that of an undergraduate lecture course within the specialty-e.g., the Scientific Revolution (1500-1700), American science since 1850, the physical sciences in the 18th and 19th centuries, the history of biology since 1750, etc. We discourage students from framing a generals field that could not reasonably be taught as an actual survey course. Though some of the field reading may be the same as that for the undergraduate courses mentioned above, the examinee will be expected to have worked much more thoroughly in the primary sources of the field and to be able to discuss both primary and secondary literature at a more advanced level. Since this major field will normally be the one within which the proposed dissertation falls, students should be prepared to treat some aspects of the field at the level of critical scholarly research. They should also be prepared to discuss how the issues arising in their special field are related to the historiography of science in general. The minor field in general history should consist of a broad study of a major period or topic-e.g. The Middle Ages, Renaissance and Reformation, Victorian England, the United States since 1876, Modern Chinese history. The student will find it helpful to choose a period or topic that relates to his or her special field in the history of science and potential dissertation topic. By the end of the second year, each student should have developed their field through graduate courses and in consultation with a pertinent member of the History Department, who will usually serve as the main examiner for this part of the General Examination. Roughly speaking, a successful performance in this portion of the General Examination should indicate the candidate's capacity to offer an undergraduate course in the field in a history department.

In addition to preparing for the General Examination, students are advised to take seminars in the history of science that does not fall within their examination fields. Indeed, given the small size of our Program faculty, it will often be impossible for us to offer graduate seminars directly related to each student's special interests. To some extent, we try to compensate for this limitation through independent work, supervised reading and, in special cases and by special arrangement, through instruction offered by appropriate specialists at cooperating programs in the history of science at other universities such as Johns Hopkins, Harvard, Pennsylvania, Columbia, or Yale. But none of these arrangements can fully replace participation in the Program's own graduate seminars. We also firmly believe that a graduate seminar on any topic in the history of science offers an opportunity to acquire knowledge and skills that are of general value to the aspiring scholar in the field, including the chance to engage in collective critical discussion of primary texts and historiographical issues. And in any case, we want to discourage the sort of narrow specialization that can result when a student restricts attention solely to courses and graduate seminars pertinent to his or her major field and dissertation topic.

II. THE LAST THREE YEARS OF STUDY: THE PROSPECTUS, DISSERTATION, AND FINAL PUBLIC ORAL EXAMINATION

The course of study outlined above is designed to enable students to devote the last three years of graduate work entirely to research for and writing of the dissertation (along with the opportunity to gain some teaching experience). Quite apart from the intrinsic value of such concentrated effort, it is desirable for purposes of job placement that students complete their dissertations by the end of the fifth year of study, and in any case essential that the Director of Graduate Studies for History of Science be in a position during the fifth year to give prospective employers a firm sense of the progress being made toward that end. During his or her fourth semester, i.e. before taking the General Examination, each student should begin the process of selecting a dissertation adviser and topic. The official dissertation adviser must hold a regular faculty appointment in the History Department at Princeton. If the selected dissertation adviser takes a leave of absence, the student may pursue his or her work under the temporary guidance of another faculty member in the Department. In considering various topics, the student and adviser will bear in mind the limited time available for research and writing and the importance of finishing within the scheduled three years. Since the dissertation usually forms the basis of a scholar's early publications and research program, the chosen topic should also be capable of extension beyond the limits set by the dissertation. By the time the student completes the General Examination, he or she should have defined the domain of the dissertation and should be prepared to discuss it in general terms. By December 1 of his or her third year of enrollment, each student is required to submit a detailed dissertation prospectus and outline for faculty approval; the deadline for students who take the general examination at a time other than May of the second year will be arranged in consultation with the Director of Graduate Studies. To facilitate this requirement, the Department of History offers two important sources of summer support. In the summer following a student's first year, funds are available for travel to archives to explore possible materials on which to base a dissertation prospectus. Following successful completion of the general exams, normally in the second year, students are eligible to participate in a summer seminar aimed at preparation of the dissertation prospectus. The seminar meets every week for eight weeks and provides a stipend of $4000.

Students wishing to take advantage of either of these funding opportunities should discuss their plans with the Director of Graduate Studies for history of science, who makes a recommendation to the department. For the summer seminar, they should be prepared for concentrated work on their own prospectus and for serious engagement with those of other students in diverse fields. Participation is highly recommended but voluntary. Other opportunities may exist for furthering a particular student's work toward the dissertation, including work in a laboratory, attendance at one of the summer schools in history of science, or immediate immersion in an archive.

By the beginning of the fourth year, the student should provide the dissertation adviser with at least one draft chapter for criticism and revision. As the dissertation nears completion, the Director of Graduate Studies, in consultation with the student, names first and second readers in addition to the adviser. (In practice, the first reader quite often works with the student and reads the dissertation as it develops.) A third reader, from outside the department or outside the University, will also be named. In accordance with the regulations of the History Department and the University, only the first reader may call for major revisions in the dissertation once the adviser decides it is acceptable. When the adviser and the first reader are satisfied that the dissertation merits the Ph.D. degree, the student arranges for submitting copies to the other readers. At that point, the second and third readers may make suggestions for further improvements, but cannot require such improvements to be made before the dissertation is presented for public scrutiny. The adviser and each of the official readers will prepare a written evaluation of the dissertation and submit a formal recommendation as to its acceptability. These evaluations will be made available to the doctoral candidate. Upon receipt of the recommendations and a request from the Director of Graduate Studies for History of Science, the Graduate School authorizes a Final Public Oral Examination, at which the student defends the dissertation.

Further information about in absentia status, leaves of absence and fellowships is available in the department's "Guidelines for Graduate Study in History."

III. ADDITIONAL FEATURES OF THE PROGRAM IN HISTORY OF SCIENCE

A. THE PROGRAM SEMINAR As part of their training in scholarship, all students are expected to participate in the Program Seminar when in residence. The Seminar will meet once a week throughout the academic year, primarily to discuss reports on research in progress. These reports may include, for example, draft articles or book chapters by faculty, draft dissertation chapters by students in their fourth and fifth years, dissertation prospectuses by those in their third year, and research papers by those in their first and second years. Other sessions may be devoted to the discussion of recent publications of historiographical importance, while still others may address general matters of interest to the discipline of the history of science at large or the Program at Princeton.

In addition to the Program Seminar, all students in residence are expected to participate in the History of Science Colloquium and Workshops.

B. THE HISTORY OF SCIENCE COLLOQUIUM

The Colloquium meets occasionally each semester to discuss papers by visiting scholars, and is designed mainly to afford students the opportunity to learn about work being done at the research front in the history of science at other institutions.

C. WORKSHOPS

Members of the Program faculty normally sponsor a series of three or four workshops a year on a particular theme that may culminate in publication. Themes from the past decade have included "Precision," "Visualization," "Materials," "Growing Explanations," "Mobility of Knowledge", "Model Systems, Cases and Exemplary Narratives," and most recently "Diasporas of Knowledge."Three or four invited speakers come to each one-day workshop; these all-day events normally take place on Friday or Saturday, and are free and open to participants in the university community and beyond. All history of science graduate students are expected to participate actively as readers and discussants of precirculated papers, as commentators, and sometimes as presenters of papers. Other regular participants will come from regional institutions on the Boston to Washington axis. Thus the workshops provide our graduate students an unusual opportunity for entering into the professional community of History of Science and for establishing personal contacts with other scholars.

D. TEACHING EXPERIENCE

Within the constraints set by undergraduate course enrollments and a limited teaching budget, the Program and the History Department try to offer graduate students the opportunity to acquire experience in the college classroom. In practice, this experience almost always takes the form of leading "precepts" (discussion sections) in undergraduate lecture courses. Ordinarily, students who have completed the General Examination and who desire teaching experience will have an opportunity to do some undergraduate teaching either in history of science or in other areas in the History Department, which may call upon Program students to teach in areas in which they have established competence. The Director of Graduate Studies works in conjunction with the Chair of the History Department to make teaching assignments for history of science courses and, where appropriate, other history courses. As noted above, Program students are not required to teach in order to retain fellowship support, but most choose to do so both because of the intrinsic rewards of the experience and because prospective academic employers increasingly expect it.

E. JOB PLACEMENT

During nearly forty years of existence, the Program in History of Science has compiled an enviable record in its efforts to place those who complete the Ph.D. Even during the worst periods in the job market for academics, the Program has been highly successful in placing its "products" in academic positions unless the candidate chose another sort of career. We are pleased by those results, and we take vicarious pride in the often-distinguished achievements of our graduate alumni and alumnae. The list of alumni posted on the Program website details their dissertation topics, supervisors, and current situations, when known.

We have a continuing commitment to maintain our record of exceptional job placement. In particular, the course of study outlined above seeks to meet three of the desiderata that prospective employers now emphasize: (1) the relatively prompt or predictable completion of a dissertation of high quality, especially when reinforced by other evidence of publishable work; (2) the broad competence in history and history of science that is increasingly valued by history departments, including those in liberal arts colleges, and by employers outside of academe; (3) at least some teaching experience. Recently, it should be said, the discipline of the history of science seems to be moving toward a pattern where a year or more of postdoctoral work is increasingly common before appointment to an assistant professorship.

Our placement efforts can be divided into two major stages, of which the second is by far the more important. The first stage comes after successful completion of the General Examination, when the student should begin to compile a dossier of credentials, including letters of recommendation from the faculty members who participated in that exam. At this point, the student should also decide whether or not he or she wishes to designate any existing written work suitable for submission to a prospective employer. If so, the submitted work will typically consist of one or both of the research papers required of students before they complete the General Examination.

The second and vastly more important stage comes as the dissertation nears completion. At that point, usually during the fifth and last year of enrollment, any prior written work must be supplemented with more recent evidence of scholarly progress in the form of draft chapters of the dissertation. No less significant, prospective employers in academe also expect to see recent letters of recommendation, above all from faculty members who have read part or all of the dissertation-in-progress.

Most of the academic positions available in any given year are announced during the Fall, though a prospective candidate should never assume that the hiring "season" is over. These positions are generally advertised in publications, including the Newsletter of the History of Science Society, the Employment Information Bulletin of the American Historical Association, or the Chronicle of Higher Education-all three of which are available in the History Graduate Office in Dickinson Hall. For the most current job listings, graduate students should consult the websites of these societies and journals, as well as the regularly updated job listings on the Humanities and Social Sciences On-Line site, H-NET. You can find all hard copy announcements of available positions in history and/or history of science that we receive placed in a notebook on the shelves in the Graduate Lounge in Dickinson Hall.

For positions announced as beginning the following academic year (i.e., in September), job interviews usually take place in the preceding fall or winter. Some may occur at the annual meeting of the History of Science Society, held in October or November, and candidates should plan to attend that meeting if possible. Their employment prospects may also be enhanced if they present a paper at one of the sessions of the Society. (But note that the deadline for submitting a paper for the program is April 1, at latest, and that the competition for slots on the program is strong.) The placement process makes it highly desirable that candidates be in residence or within easy reach during their last year of enrollment. If dissertation research requires travel abroad, it should be scheduled, if at all possible, for the third or fourth year of study.

In addition to our main placement effort on behalf of fifth-year students, we also try to help former students (both post-enrolled and alumni) in search of employment. We must, however, restrict our efforts mainly to current Ph.D. candidates or very recent graduates of the Program. According to departmental guidelines, we can maintain dossiers for employment-seeking students for a maximum of seven years, and will send the dossiers out to prospective employers for a maximum of three of those seven years. The student can specify when in that seven-year period he or she wishes to begin to be considered an active candidate for employment. After the three-year period of active dossier service has elapsed, responsibility for making sure that letters of recommendation and transcripts are sent to prospective employers will fall on the student.

F. REVIEW PROCEDURES

In keeping with Graduate School policy, we regularly review each graduate student's performance and, at several specific junctures, make decisions regarding the advisability of the student's continuing toward the Ph.D. Major decisions will be made according to the following schedule:

Toward the end of the student's first year of enrollment, the Program faculty reviews his or her performance to decide whether or not to recommend readmission for a second year of study. In general, a satisfactory record suffices for readmission, though some students' readmission may be deferred until June, pending completion of course work, required research papers, or other deficiencies noted by the faculty.

Toward the end of the student's second year, his or her total performance and progress to date are reviewed with an eye toward one of three decisions:

(1) Readmission for a third year of study to begin the dissertation. In this case, the Program faculty fully expects the student to successfully complete the General Examination before the Fall, and this decision is meant to encourage the student to look ahead to the dissertation. (2) Termination of enrollment at the end of the second year of study, in which case passing the General Examination will entitle the student to a M.A. (In the event of an initial failure on the General Examination the student is entitled to a second try during the following academic year.) (3) Deferral of a decision on readmission until all outstanding requirements and expectations are met and/or performance on the General Examination can be taken into account.

During the student's third year, the Program faculty reviews his or her progress on the dissertation. Demonstrated progress in the form of a full, written prospectus and outline and of evidence of substantial research underway, usually in the form of at least one chapter in draft, is expected as a basis for the staff's recommendation for readmission to the fourth year. At the end of the student's fourth year, the Program faculty again reviews his or her progress on the dissertation. We expect that each student will have submitted two or more chapters to the dissertation adviser by this point in time. Otherwise, the adviser must make a compelling case for the admission of the student to his or her fifth and last year of study in the Program.

The yearly reviews, particularly readmission, provide occasion for giving each student individualized feedback on the strengths and weaknesses of his or her performance. Thus even in the usual circumstance in which the student's enrollment proceeds uninterrupted for five years, these reviews will be a source of meaningful evaluation and encouragement.

These guidelines are not meant to be and in any case cannot be rigid, and they should be considered a supplement to the more comprehensive Guidelines for Graduate Study in History. We expect, furthermore, that every graduate student in history of science will have a highly individualized course of study. Any prospective or current graduate student who wishes further information and advice about the fit between the Program's guidelines and his or her particular circumstances can direct their questions to the Director of Graduate Studies for the History of Science at 208 Dickinson Hall, History Department, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ 08544 (Telephone 609-258-6705).