Study programme

The Master's programme Cultural History and Heritage comprises one year (60 EC). A study year is divided into two semesters, running from September until January and from February until June. A semester is divided into two study periods. 

Curriculum

In the first study period you will fill your cultural-historical toolbox with theories, methods and presentation forms. In the second study period you will choose three tutorials: you step in to the workshop of you lecturers and become acquainted with the state of the art of research. In study periods 3 and 4 you will work independently: you do an internship and write your thesis. You can check the study schedule (PDF). 

Study period 1 | Compulsory courses

• Understanding Culture offers an in-depth overview of the most important theories in cultural history and offers you the theoretical perspectives that you will apply in the rest of your Master.
• Public History takes you beyond the Ivory Tower to explore how academic historians can work together with citizens and professionals from other cultural institutions to present the past.
• Sources and Methods is an introduction to the most important methods in cultural history and how to apply them to the sources. You will learn about discourse analysis, digital hermeneutics, visual analysis and material culture.

Study period 2 | Tutorials

In study period 2 you choose three tutorials. Tutorials are small-scale seminars (max. 12 students) in which you will conduct research within the expertise of your lecturers. You can choose from nine tutorials (five in English, four in Dutch), that deal with, for example, heritage in the 21^st century, popular culture and citizenship, cultural environmental history, global cultural history and postcolonial memory. In one of these three tutorials you will start to work on your MA thesis.

Study period 3 and 4 

The second part of your year is devoted to the internship and MA thesis. You will be supported in finding an internship and will also receive guidance from the programme during your internship. You will choose a topic within the expertise of your supervisor, to ensure you of the best possible supervision.

Part-time and language

Part-time students follow the same courses as full-time students. Their programme is spread out over two years. Our programme has a Dutch-language and an English-language Master. The modules of both Masters are the same, only the language is different. 

Examples of thesis titles

• Letters from ‘een Vriendinne van de Waarheid’: Etta Palm d’Aelders, citizeness-ship and the public sphere, 1788-1798.
• Algeria, Decolonisation, and the British press 1954-1962.
• Slavery on Display: Propositions for the improvement of the representation of material slavery history in museums.
• Jewish Americans and the Holocaust. The Holocaust discourse in Jewish American newspapers, 1945 – 2000.
• Spaces of National Culture in Imperial Germany. Baedeker Guidebooks of the North, South and Rhineland, 1871-1914.

Together making Bonairean heritage belong to the people of Bonaire again

Students of the Master's in Cultural History and Heritage and lecturers of the Master's in History, are working together with the residents of Bonaire to create a new story around their island's heritage. The Master's program emphasizes experiential education and collaborations with community partners."The research project shows that the exchange of knowledge on heritage, decolonisation and public history has added value for all parties involved. Thanks to the cooperation with Terramar, we as teachers and students gain knowledge that can never be obtained in that way in regular education.”

Thesis award

Students who pursue a degree in Cultural Historya and Heritage are intrinsically motivated and this shows in their study results. Our graduates are regularly awarded prizes for writing excellent theses.

• Celine Oldenhage won two thesis awards for her Master's thesis Uit de zekerheid des doods en onzekere uure vandien: Graven en begraven worden in de Amsterdamse kerken na 1578. First, she won the 2022-2023 VNK Thesis Award and a year later the 2024 Uitgeverij Verloren/Johan de Witt thesis award.
• Cultural History alumn Louisa Niesen won the 2021 Faculty Thesis Award for her thesis Modern Women? On Practices and Experiences of "Modernity" in the Everyday Lives of Female White-Collar Employees in the Weimar Republic. Read Louisa's testimonial.

Educational methods

• seminars (30%)
• group work (30%)
• self study (40%)

We use multiple forms of teaching: seminars, group work, self study and hands-on training such as the excursions and internships. Our teaching is activating: students participate and make the classes, together with their lecturers. We design our teaching in such a way that we expect our students to study, on average, 40 hours per week, including classes and excursions.

DOMcast

The UU Award for Exceptional Extracurricular Achievements 2020 was awarded to DOMcast, a group of students - including students of the MA Cultural History - who make podcasts about the personal history of a number of Utrecht residents. With their project, they have shown other students how inspiring and engaging research can be. 

Examinations

• active participation in seminars and classes
• oral presentations
• short weekly written assignments
• longer essays
• internship report (including a sample of the results of the internship work)
• participation in the cultural career seminar
• thesis

Our examination forms are adjusted to the diversity of our programme. Apart from the well-known papers and presentations, we innovate our examination, for example to the new graduation trajectory.