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Military Historian

• Message 1.Β 

  Posted by Rule_Britannia (U2429840) on Saturday, 12th November 2005

  Im still in school and i want to do something in hsitory and a while ago i saw on one of those progrrams the title 'Military Historian' but i can't find it anywere, i'm wondering if anyone could tell me how i could become one or if it even exists.id apreciat any help.

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• Message 2

  , in reply to message 1.

  Posted by DaveMBA (U1360771) on Saturday, 12th November 2005

  It is not a job title as such - it usually means someone, who writes military books (that would include me!) or who has done advanced academic study - like the Two Men in a Trench. Many of the latter end up in academic teaching jobs. If you want to do it on a casual basis, specialise in your chosen area, write articles for the relevant mags and once you have enough, you could always try approaching a publisher. However, much of military publishing is now 20th century warfare.
  
  I have seen at least one Amazon reviewer claiming to be a "military historian" so it could even be a title you simply claim. Remember that TV is run by peop,e with degrees in Meejah Stidies, who try to build up their suppsoed experts - as you will often see on here, those in the know tend to mock the supposed "experts", but the average viewer likes the titles.

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  Posted by Anglo-Norman (U1965016) on Sunday, 13th November 2005

  I would suggest you'll need a degree to be taken seriously as an historian (unless you want to be a TV historian, in which case a weird haircut would be a better bet ). I doubt there are any purely military Bachelors around, but with care you can focus on military history through a normal history degree. For example, this is what I did in my degree at the University of East Anglia:
  
  Year 1: Essay on the military revolution of the 16th/17th centuries for my 'Introduction to Early Modern History' unit.
  Year 2: Full unit on 'British Military History 1914-45'; essay on medical provision for medieval armies in 'Medicine and Society Before the 17th century'; essay on the impact of the Romans on the British landscape, which had a strong leaning to the military impact; essay on the role of castles in 'Norman and Plantagenet England'; essay discussing how radical the New Model Army was in 'The English Revolution'.
  Year 3: Unit on the Crusades, including essay on the Military Orders; Special Subject on Oliver Cromwell, with my dissertation on his effectiveness as a commander.
  
  You see?
  
  After that, if you're serious about the academic side, Leeds University runs both a taught and a research Master of Arts in Military History.

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  Posted by (( sean )) Free Nordmann (U2053581) on Monday, 14th November 2005

  it is good your still at school, plenty of time to focus your efforts and get well-rounded in related subject areas...you could maybe consentrate on French, maybe Latin...possibly your could read some war poets of both world wars, etc, etc, and other war orientated literatures...Anglo Saxon stuff. you might wanna start reading important texts (get a university read list...or ask on these message boards for a reading list that reflects your specific period of interest...rather than the general popular history stuff. if you live in London you could get voluntary work in the Army Museum or the Imperial War Museum...in one of the archives (documents, sound, photography...).
  
  best wishes

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• Message 5

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  Posted by DaveMBA (U1360771) on Monday, 14th November 2005

  You don't need a degree - well, except to deal with people, who try to pretend they are top dogs - you need to do origonal work, which is published. The academic crowd actually do very little to foster wider public understanding and are too interested in pushing their own agendas (Schama and Starkey being two). You can specialise in anything really - just make sure you have the linguistic tools to cope with he subject. There is also a very interesting row brewing over the alleged Queen Anne's Revenge site (Blackbeard's flagship) in the Int Journal of Nautical Arch.

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• Message 6

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  Posted by (( sean )) Free Nordmann (U2053581) on Monday, 14th November 2005

  You don't need a degree - well, except to deal with people, who try to pretend they are top dogs - you need to do origonal work, which is published. The academic crowd actually do very little to foster wider public understanding and are too interested in pushing their own agendas (Schama and Starkey being two). You can specialise in anything really - just make sure you have the linguistic tools to cope with he subject. There is also a very interesting row brewing over the alleged Queen Anne's Revenge site (Blackbeard's flagship) in the Int Journal of Nautical Arch. Β 
  
  i agree...you dont need a degree. but a degree does give you discipline in every sense, and the tools to do the origional work (...origional work i might add you have no remit to undertake until Master's level atleast, and not offically till your Phd). university also gives you contact with other historians and that network is useful. for most occupations that have any kind of status these days you require some kind of degree anyways so you might as well have one in something you like.
  
  and yes, academics are usaully only performing for an audience of other academics, wouldbe-academics, and students (maybe-academics)...and their writing is invariablly published in such specialized publications that only universitys subscribe to them. for my Master's research project i wrote about the tourist experiences of British servicemen in Egypt during the North African campaigns of WWII. i used primary sources, it was origional work (although i found that an Australain historian had writen an artical on the same themes but about ANZAKS in Egypt during WWI). it recieved alot of praise but as it stands as an academic text it is practically unreadable for a general readership and maybe not 'sexy' enough either (although there was a fair bit of fornification in it)...i guess that means that i might not be a very good writer in some respects. i dont care that i'm not going to be a 'top dog' and i know that the subjects that interest me arent gonna get me on TV.
  
  cheers

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