Jobs for the Major
How this major affects a job search
It takes more than just an interest in history to become a historian, which means that even though your Uncle Leo gets riled up about the Revolutionary War (for whatever reason), he is not an historian. A historian is someone who is recognized as an authority on history.
To become an authority, you must spend a fair amount of time in school. Budding historians and future professors generally get their bachelor degree in history. If you want to sit out graduate school, you can earn an Advanced Certificate in Public History, an Architectural History certificate or a Museum Studies certificate. Certificate programs focus on teaching you skills that you'll need on the job. They typically take around ten months to a year to complete.
To make some dough or just to get a better jump on the job market, you'll need to attend graduate school. There, you'll learn all about how to properly research history. (Pinky out.) Those who want to get a job at a museum may take some art or museum studies or art classes.
A lot of historians earn their Ph.D. so that they can get a job in a university. Furthermore, a lot of historical consulting firms, government agencies, and museums require that their applicants have a Ph.D. Even once out of graduate school, your plight may not be over.
Why? Nowadays, employers can ask for the moon. The job market is so saturated with people who have their master's or Ph.D. that competition is fierce. It's like a tiger at a barbeque, and it won't let up anytime soon, because people continue to go the graduate school route.
Common Career Fields
Consulting Firm. Historical consulting firms conduct research, interview participants, plan for museums, analyze historical evidence for attorneys, and help organize corporate exhibits. Despite the range of options, there are not a whole lot of jobs available in this arena. There are a few positions for those with a bachelor's degree in history, and you may be able to find a position at a museum; however, more job opportunities will present themselves if you get a master's or Ph.D.
Curator. (Requires a Master's degree or Ph.D.) Curators are those who work in a museum, zoo, or other type of institution with a penchant for collecting stuff. They're only different from hoarders in that they don't have their own TV show. And, well, it's their job. On top of organizing and finding more stuff to add to their collection, curators are also responsible for price negotiating. History majors are especially qualified for curator positions at museums, since museums generally care about providing accurate portrayals of history. Like, loincloths on Aztec women? Puh-lease.
Historian. (Requires a Master's degree or Ph.D.) Admittedly, historians rarely get to discover groundbreaking evidence (true or otherwise) that changes the course of history. However, they often work with some pretty cool stuff. Recently, some art historians found a lost Leonardo da Vinci masterpiece hidden on a wall inside a cavity in Florence's town hall. In not-so-recent history, historians have uncovered and investigated such priceless artifacts as the Dead Sea Scrolls, King Tut's tomb, the Peking Man and the Rosetta Stone. (Until this last discovery, it took people forever to learn Spanish.)
Journalism. If you know anything about anything, journalism is always a solid career option. History majors have the joyous opportunity to demonstrate to a willing audience how and when history does actually repeat itself. Since all those formulas and equations are saved for the hard sciences, history majors do an awful lot of writing. Naturally, they become pretty qualified to write an article about, say, how the current president's latest political decisions mirror another president's, i.e. that the president's behavior has...a precedence? Heh.
Law. (Requires a law degree.) History majors are pretty knowledgeable about the system in general and how it functions. They know, for example, all about our nation's racial history and therefore would be able to defend (or prosecute) accordingly. History is often made due to the judicial system—its failures and achievements.
Librarian. Face it. You really want to be a librarian. Not a doctor or lawyer or high-tech guru-geek. A librarian. Why? You're the go-to person for finding out stuff. Any kind of stuff. Your sources are always gold-plated and correct. You sneer at your classmates whose info starts and ends with Wikipedia. Or, worse: "Hey, it was on the Internet, so, yeah…" Is that lame or what? Face it. You're an information junkie. Dredging the facts is your own, personal, (mostly) legal addiction. P.S. Just remember that for most serious librarian gigs, you'll need to go on to get your M.S. in Library Science or Library and Information Science.
Professor. (Requires a Master's degree or Ph.D.) A typical university professor teaches just a few courses—sometimes, out of textbooks that they themselves wrote—and focus on areas that they studied and fell in love with as teens, so there isn't a lot of homework to do, per se. However, they are highly encouraged to write. "Publish or perish" is the refrain from the Dean. So they research and hire their best graduate students to help them write their next book. Pretty cool…as long as you love doing that stuff. You will likely be surrounded by spongey minds, hungry to learn in a positive, growth-oriented climate. Dreaming about the future is the default for any conversation. It's about as opposite as you can get to the brutish, whiny, stressed climate of hedge fund managers around Wall Street who make a ton of money but generally lead miserable lives.
Current unemployment of the major
7%Percentage of majors who get a higher degree after college
46%Stats obtained from this source.