The students and faculty of the Department of History are committed to public history; to the many and diverse ways in which history—beyond the walls of the classroom—can be put to work in the world.
Public history includes the forms and venues in which history is presented to the general public, as at museums or historical sites. It includes history researched and written for specialized audiences or purposes—such as a government agency, court of law, or documentary filmmaker. And it includes historical research and writing pursued collaboratively with community partners. At UI, students can learn about public history through undergraduate and graduate coursework as well as through internships with community partners. Our graduate public history initiative, History Corps, provides a laboratory for students and interns to practice project design and management, oral history, digital history, grant writing, and other skills associated with public history.
These pages curates recent public history projects at Iowa, or by Iowa-affiliated students and scholars.
The Iowa City area is rich in historical resources and knowledge.
Our students and faculty are extraordinarily lucky to be part of a larger community of engaged scholars and public historians.
The Digital Scholarship and Publishing Studio at the University of Iowa Libraries supports a wide array of public history initiatives, including History Corps and the crowd-sourced DIY History projects.
Campus and area archives and museums, including the Iowa Women’s Archive, the University of Iowa Archives and Special Collections, the Pentacrest Museums, the Office of State Archeologist, the State Historical Society of Iowa, and the Herbert Hoover Presidential Library in West Branch, support a wide variety of public programming.
As it prepared to reopen in 2022 in a new, state-of-the-art building, the University of Iowa Stanley Museum of Art partnered with the Graduate College and departments of History and English to offer two summer digital internships to train graduate students in digital methods through experiential (online) learning.
The University of Iowa Labor Center sustains the legendary Iowa Labor Oral History Oral Project.
The Obermann Center for Advanced Studies and the Office of Community Engagement support and sustain the University-wide commitment to public scholarship and community engagement.