Introduction

Students encounter the romanticism and dynamism hidden in history and nurture their perceptiveness to open up a better future.

The study of history at AGU is unique in terms of the breadth of areas it covers, which is not seen at other universities. The Department comprises of four courses by area: Japanese History, Oriental History, Occidental History, Archaeology. Various specialized faculty members present diverse perspectives. The tradition of the Department since its founding has been to "look at history from a wide perspective and to conduct specialized analyses of concrete issues based on that perspective." First-year students thus learn an overview of all the courses, and in their second year they choose a course that interests them in order to conduct specialized research. To study history is to analyze the unbroken activities of human society, and to learn about the thoughts of people who lived before us. We may then review contemporary times and deliberate upon what the ideal future is.
Furthermore, with the progress of globalization today, learning about history leads to well-balanced knowledge and an accurate understanding of other cultures. We at the Department do not promote history as just a series of memorized facts, but rather an analytical history, which is the act of questioning commonly accepted ideas and independently searching for the truth by researching historical materials.

Curriculum