History of the World
Students explore global history from 1300 to the present through lectures, readings, case studies and collaborative discussion.
About Global History Lab
A global learning network for new historical narratives.
The Global History Lab connects students, scholars and partner institutions across borders to study global history, build research skills and create new public-facing historical work.
A Global Lab at Cambridge
Rooted at Cambridge, connected across the world.
Global History Lab brings together students, Teaching Fellows, scholars and partner institutions through a hybrid model of online learning, local classrooms and cross-border collaboration.
Overview
From Princeton to Cambridge.
GHL has evolved from its founding home at Princeton into a Cambridge-based global programme.
In September 2023 the Global History Lab moved from its founding home at Princeton University to the University of Cambridge, working with Cambridge Online Education to provide the online platform for learning.
In September 2024, the online platform for learning moved to Professional and Continuing Education. The Global History Lab is supported by Open Society Foundations.
Previous to its relocation to Cambridge, the GHL received a multi-year grant from the Open Society University Network in 2020. With this expansion came a move from Princeton’s Department of History, where the GHL was founded in 2012, to the Princeton Institute for International and Regional Studies.
With its new OSUN partners, Central European University and Bard College, the GHL expanded its global reach to international students at over twenty-five institutions and NGOs worldwide.
GHL teaches global history globally, using collaboration and exchange as part of the method itself.
How the Lab Works
A year-long journey from learning global history to producing new research.
GHL is structured around three connected stages. Students begin by studying world history together, then develop qualitative research methods, before producing original research through Global History Dialogues.
Qualitative Research Methods
Learners develop skills in oral history, ethics, visual methods, archiving, project design and historical research.
Global History Dialogues
Students apply their methods to original projects and are invited to share their work with wider audiences.
Pedagogical Innovation
Connection sits at the heart of the classroom.
Unlike many online and traditional history courses, where students learn parallel to each other, the GHL’s emphasis on collaboration, conversation and connection places interaction at the heart of the classroom.
A network of partner institutions offers the course concurrently, meaning students participate in local classrooms embedded in a larger global whole. This blended model allows students to use an online platform for lectures and distant peer interaction while also meeting with local colleagues for in-person discussion and assignments.
Interdependence is built into the class structure. Students are encouraged to see their peers, near and far, as contributors to the programme’s growing reservoir of shared knowledge.
What Makes GHL Different
Students do not just study global history. They learn it globally.
GHL connects learners across locations so that students encounter the global past through shared discussion, collaborative case studies and peer exchange.
This model brings refugee and non-refugee learners, universities, NGOs and educational foundations into a shared learning ecosystem, broadening who studies, writes and shares history.
Humanitarian History
Broadening who studies, writes and shares history.
From its inception, the GHL has been committed to including refugee and migrant learners, a commitment that has profoundly shaped the programme over the years.
The GHL is distinctive not only for its class makeup, but also for its content. Historical narratives are central to how we understand the world and make sense of the strangers who inhabit it.
The work of historical inquiry — from analysing primary sources, to creating narratives with other members of a team, to presenting findings in written and oral form — develops a wide range of transferable skills.
Research Mission
From access to research leadership.
GHL’s work has evolved from widening access to deepening its research mission. The programme now supports students and alumni to move from knowledge consumers to knowledge producers.
Narrative Observatories extends this mission by enabling GHL graduates to investigate how stories shape identity, belonging, exclusion and power in real time.
Narrative Observatories now stands as the research arm of Global History Lab.
Timeline
Key moments in the Lab’s development.
2012
Global History Lab was founded at Princeton University.
2020
GHL received a multi-year grant from the Open Society University Network and expanded its global network.
2023
GHL moved to the University of Cambridge.
2024
The online learning platform moved to Professional and Continuing Education.
Explore More
Discover the network, people and outputs behind Global History Lab.
Learn more about the partners, contributors and public-facing research that make up the Global History Lab.