Writing History: A Guide for Students

Bringing together practical methods from both history and composition, Writing History provides a wealth of tips and advice to help students research and write essays for history classes. The book covers all aspects of writing about history, including finding topics and researching them, interpreting source materials, drawing inferences from sources, and constructing arguments. It concludes with three chapters that discuss writing effective sentences, using precise wording, and revising. Using numerous examples from the works of cultural, political, and social historians, Writing History serves as an ideal supplement to history courses that require students to conduct research. The third edition includes expanded sections on peer editing and topic selection, as well as new sections on searching and using the Internet.

William Kelleher Storey is Associate Professor of History at Millsaps College. Formerly Preceptor in Expository Writing at Harvard University, he is the author of Guns, Race, and Power in Colonial South Africa (2008) and Science and Power in Colonial Mauritius (1997).