The knowledge societies that we are living in need people who have been highly trained to participate in the creation of knowledge. PhD programs at Norwegian universities thus not only prepare PhD candidates for a career within academia but also cater to the need for competent professionals in public arenas such as for example, government, journalism, and public history.
In “Writing for the Public” lecturers who come from different public fields will share their vast experience in writing for public audiences. In this hands-on workshop students will be given the opportunity to hone their skills in varying text genres that are the precondition to pursue a career in an array of public institutions.
Interested PhD Candidates may also want to join the course “History in Society – the Case of Migration (3 ECTS)” which is organized digitally immediately before this course.
Confirmed lecturers:
Nina Burleigh, New York Times best-selling author, journalist, adjunct faculty NYU Arthur L Carter Journalism Institute.
Nina Kristiansen, Editor of Forskning.no and master of Media Science.
Deadlines:
Registration: August 19, 2021. We accept applications on a first-come-first-served basis for students of the partner institutions and other members of NRSH. For non-members, we will offer available spaces for PhD students in history and other historical disciplines after the registration date. To apply, please fill out this registration form.
We will assess the applications shortly after the deadline and inform you of the assessment no later than five days after the deadline.
Deadline for writing sample: September 16, 2021
After the course: Revised writing sample: November 4, 2021 (grading pass/fail)
Contact persons:
Associate Professor: Christa Santina Wirth, University of Agder
Administrative coordinator: Inger Lin, University of Agder
Required work
The course has lectures and sessions with feedback on student papers. We value student-active learning and expect everyone to arrive well prepared and ready to work together. Participants are expected to have read all the writing samples in their group prior to start of the course. Students may audit courses or take them for credit.
Readings – for everyone: Mandatory reading comprises approximately 70-100 pages. Reading lists and most of the texts are available through links or in MS Teams.
Mandatory writing - for credits: The students will compose a writing sample in advance of the course where they write about a key insight of their dissertation for a broad public. These writing samples may for example be in the form of (a) a historically informed speech for a public event by an imagined public speaker, (b) a piece of historically-informed journalism for a newspaper magazine (f) a web article for a database such as Norgeshistorie.no or snl.no. At the top of the writing sample the author must identify the outlet and conform to its style guide and norms for length. We appreciate it if the student includes images if such are commonly used in the chosen format. Students participating in the 'History and Society' course, may use the writing sample for this course.
Learning platform:
The learning platform used for this course is Microsoft Teams. The Writing Sample must be uploaded in MS Teams. The course will be held in Zoom.
Partner institutions of the Norwegian Graduate School in History are:
Norges teknisk-naturvitenskapelige universitet (NTNU) - Det humanistiske fakultet
Universitetet i Agder - Institutt for religion, filosofi og historie
Universitetet i Bergen - Institutt for arkeologi, historie, kultur- og religionsvitskap
Universitetet i Oslo - Institutt for arkeologi, konservering og historie, Universitetet i Oslo
Universitetet i Tromsø - Institutt for arkeologi, historie, religionsvitenskap og teologi
Nord Universitet - Fakultet for samfunnsvitenskap
Høgskulen i Volda - Samfunnsfag og historie
Handelshøyskolen BI - Institutt for rettsvitenskap og styring