Submitted samples of written work
You may submit either two pieces of written work of approx. 2000 words each, or one longer essay of up to 5,000 words (in the latter case you should upload instead of the second essay a short statement, perhaps saying "I have submitted one long essay in lieu of the two short essays, as permitted by the Faculty of History". This will enable you to indicate on the checklist at the end of the application form that you have submitted both the first and second piece of written work, and thus fulfilled the application conditions for History).
In choosing what work to submit, you should bear in mind that when we read it we will be trying to establish:
- whether you can write effective English academic prose (what you submit must be your work, or your translation of your work, not a translation completed for you by someone else)
- whether your work is of an appropriate intellectual standard: e.g. whether it shows good historical understanding, conceptual sophistication, analytical and critical skill, and the ability to sustain a cogent argument
- whether you have appropriate background knowledge and technical (e.g. language, quantitative) skills for your chosen programme (it may of course be appropriate for you to develop such skills further during the programme)
The more highly we rate your work in all these regards, the more likely we are to nominate you for funding.
It is not essential
that the written work you submit relates closely to your
proposed research project – you may rely wholly upon
your proposal to establish your grasp of the relevant
field, but if you do have work of a high
standard that is relevant to your proposed research, in
terms of subject matter, method, or in any other way, it
would be sensible to send us that.