Hello, I am 17 and need to decide what to study really soon.
This question goes to everyone who studied history is now working in said field.
My interest always has been in history, if I had a dream job it would involve said subject. I am however, uncertain if there are any good (with good I mean well paying and respected since that sadly is important) jobs that you can get with a masters in history.
I feel like if I study history I will never get bored and these will be the best years of my life but I need some sort of "goal" I work towards therefore, I need some sort of job I can think of to motivate myself.
You’ve probably heard this before but 17 is so young to decide what to do your life!! I fucked around in my undergrad for about 5 years, went back to school when I was 24, graduated and finally started working in my career when I was 29. I studied history in my undergrad but now I’m in healthcare. A background in history helps me understand aspects of public health and the social determinants of health but that’s about it lol
Anyways, academia is always a career option, usually a mix of research, teaching, admin/organizational tasks. The pay and prestige vary wildly depending on seniority and where you are in your career
Most history profs I know lament that some of the biggest and brightest historical minds end up in law school instead of staying in history. Law is a brutal lifestyle but the pay and prestige are very high once your career gets off the ground.
Then there’s independent work, think freelancing, consulting, and contract work. One of my old history profs specializes in Indigenous histories of the PNW; before going into academia he worked for local tribes preparing land claims. He was also asked to be a historical advisor for a certain film. A lot of the historians I know personally do contract work for archives, museums, court cases, genealogies, for example