Study Abroad

Students seeking approval for courses they are planning to take or already have taken while participating in a Study Abroad program should see the History Department Undergraduate Director. To approve a course as either equivalent to an existing UConn History course or as HIST 3993: Foreign Study, the Undergraduate Director will need to see as much specific information about this course as can be provided, preferably a course syllabus giving a course description with topics covered in the course, time spent in the classroom, readings, and assignments. The necessary forms and other information about study abroad opportunities are available through the UConn Study Abroad office.

Approved Study Abroad courses do count toward History major and minor course requirements.

Study Abroad at the University of Warwick

The University of Warwick offers UConn History students a wide range of courses in History since the Middle Ages. Founded in 1965, Warwick has quickly established a reputation as one of the top universities in the UK, consistently placing at or near fifth in national rankings. It has gained its high standing through excellent teaching and research, and by recruiting very able students from the UK and abroad. This reasonably-priced exchange program at Warwick will integrate you fully into the university's academic and social life, and you will experience the university just as you would if you were a British student. It is an excellent way to taste British education and culture. The university campus, sited outside the city of Coventry, about 100 miles northwest of London, houses over 10,000 students and is a significant cultural center in its own right. There is easy access to lively local towns and to the countryside of the Cotswolds, while high-speed Virgin Trains link Coventry to central London in about one hour.

The Academics

UConn students who attend the University of Warwick as part of this exchange may earn 12 credits for the fall term, 20 credits for the spring and summer terms, and a total of 32 credits if they attend the full year program.

Courses are available in the history of Europe, Asia, North and South America and the Caribbean. Click here for the International Students' page, where you will find a link to the International Student Experience, where you will find a list of courses, access to online course descriptions. The History Department has particular strengths in the Renaissance and Reformation, French history, early modern and modern Britain and Ireland, Russia, India, China, the United States, the Caribbean and Spanish America, and the history of medicine. Teaching is in seminars, supplemented by lectures, and you will find yourself in discussion groups of from 8-16 students. British university education differs somewhat from the U.S. pattern and you are given more independence than you are used to here. Attendance at seminars and lectures is required, but you will also be expected to learn on your own. Instead of course syllabi that direct you to specific readings, you will have reading lists from which it is up to you to choose a certain number of books and articles to read each week. Class meetings may be less frequent than here, but you will be expected to devote the available time to reading and preparing essays. Credit is earned both by submitting essays and by taking end of year examinations.

The academic year at Warwick consists of three ten-week terms: Autumn, from October to December; Spring, from January to March; and Summer, from April to June. Course offerings at Warwick are best suited to students visiting for the full year, but the facility exists for students to study there for one term (October to December) or two (normally January to June).

The Experience

Warwick is highly rated by UK and international students for its facilities, campus life, and access to off-campus attractions. UConn students will live on campus in single study-bedrooms, either on hallways or in flats with 5 to 15 other students; a proportion of rooms have private bathrooms. The university library houses over a million volumes and a wide range of electronic resources, and also runs a study center called The Learning Grid, open for use 24 hours a day. Three large student union and university social buildings house bars, restaurants, cafés, stores, banks, a launderette, and other services. The Warwick Arts Centre, just a few yards away at the center of campus, contains the university Bookstore, a movie theatre showing first-run and arts films daily, theatres and concert halls with full seasons of performances, an art gallery, restaurant, café, and bar. Sports facilities include two gymnasia, a pool, all-weather running track, and playing fields. Visiting students with sporting talent will be warmly welcomed by university teams and clubs, but all facilities are available to those with any level of ability, and you may find it easier to play or pick up a sport informally than at UConn. The Students Union, to which you will belong, sponsors a wide range of clubs and societies, who advertise themselves at a fair for new students at the beginning of each year, and also organizes events, including including One World Week in January, which is the World's Largest Student-Run International Event with more than 20,000 participants representing 120 countries. Frequent bus services connect the campus with Coventry, and with the elegant town of Leamington Spa, seven miles away, both of which have many pubs, restaurants, clubs, and shops. Kenilworth and Warwick, each with their medieval castles, are close by. Stratford-upon-Avon (Shakespeare's birthplace, home of the Royal Shakespeare Company) and Birmingham (Britain's second-largest city, with a lively revitalized city centre) are each within twenty miles of the Warwick campus.

Situated in the heart of England, you will find the location a convenient starting point for visiting the rest of the UK, Ireland and Europe during the vacations while they are here. In addition to fast, regular trains to London, trains and buses connect it to all parts of the country, and to Wales and Scotland. Nearby airports, at Coventry and Birmingham, provide cheap (sometimes unbelievably cheap) flights to all parts of Europe and Ireland, and Birmingham also offers direct service to the USA and Asia.

Click here for the University of Connecticut Study Abroad web page on the University of Warwick program.

Study Abroad in Oaxaca, Mexico

Situated in a mountain valley in southern central Mexico, Oaxaca City is the capital city of one of the most culturally diverse states in Mexico and is a fascinating intersection of contemporary urban culture as well as both colonial and pre-Hispanic traditions. Oaxaca City, declared Humanity's Cultural Patrimony by UNESCO, owes its fame to the beauty and harmony of its architecture, the richness of its cultural traditions, the wide variety of its unique foods, and its temperate climate, spring-like throughout the year. Oaxaca is a city of some 300,000 people about 300 miles southeast of Mexico City, surrounded by villages where Zapoteco, Mixe, and Mixteco are spoken. Pre-Columbian sites (like Monte Albán and Mitla) as well as colonial and contemporary architecture offer students many opportunities to learn from archeological remains, contemporary indigenous cultures and modern Mexican culture. The UConn Winter in Oaxaca, Mexico program provides students an ideal location to learn in-depth about and experience our southern neighbor. The region's fascinating history, large population of indigenous peoples, heritage-rich archaeological sites, economic and political challenges, political relationship with Mexico City, and migration flows to and back from the United States, all provide a fascinating context for students interested in Mexico's rich culture and history.

The Academics

You will earn four UConn graded credits in the Oaxaca Winter Program, taking both a full-credit course in Mexican history and culture taught by UConn Professor Mark Overmyer-Velázquez and a one-credit Linkage Through Language (LTL) Spanish immersion class taught at the Becari Language School. Both classes make full use of the city, markets, day trips to pre-Columbian sites, and indigenous artisan villages. Credits will be earned from the following classes:

History 280: Mexico in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries (3 Credits) Using Oaxaca City and its environs as living historical archives, students will learn to navigate Mexico's rich recent past by visiting and interacting with the streets, parks, markets, people of this state capital. Oaxaca's inhabitants and economy played a central role in Mexico's colonial- and independence- period histories. Building upon the legacies of Oaxaca's colonial era, this course concentrates on the history of nineteenth- and twentieth-century Mexico, from the wars of independence in the early nineteenth century to the globalization of the present. Rather than focusing on the confusing surface flurry of events and leaders, stress is placed on broader trends of economic, political, social, and cultural development, and on the patterns of conflict and negotiation that conditioned them. Particular emphasis is given to the Revolution of 1910 and the long shadow it has cast for both the state and society.

Linkage Through Language - Spanish Immersion At the Becari Language School, students take intensive language classes, participate in conversation sessions with native Mexicans and attend lectures and workshops. Workshops offer hands-on experience as well as an opportunity to work directly with a Mexican artisan.

The Experience

The program is located at the Becari Language School. You will find Becari a warm and welcoming place, with an expert and accessible staff that always have time to answer a question or to help with a problem. The school will provide a comfortable home during the program with classroom space, computers with internet connections, a library, and a patio for recreation and casual conversation. Students will be housed with Mexican families, an experience which offers a great opportunity for immersion in the language and culture of Mexico. Families provide full room and board in houses in the city's center, always an easy walking distance to the zócalo, a large plaza where public festivals are held and people gather.

Click here for the University of Connecticut Study Abroad web page on the Oaxaca, Mexico Program.