A Student's Guide to History

This is an introduction to the study of history for undergraduates. It aims to help students master basic concepts of the subject and to learn the skills they will need, from a description of what historians do and what kind of research they conduct, through notetaking in class, taking exams and doing research on their own. It also tells students how to read maps, charts and graphs. Appendices provide lists of basic resource for research and study, and include multicultural and multi-ethnic information, such as American Indian history, Puerto Rican history, women's history and African-American history.

A professor of history for 30 years, JULES R. BENJAMIN has recently retired from Ithaca College. His current research focuses on higher education in the digital age, and his scholarly works concern modern United States and Latin American diplomatic history. He is the author of several books and articles, including The United States and Cuba: Hegemony and Dependent Development, 1880-1934 (1977) and The United States and the Origins of the Cuban Revolution: An Empire of Liberty in an Age of National Liberation (1990).