Study a Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) in History or Archaeology at Flinders

Undertake a PhD in History and Archaeology

Gain expertise in a specialised area of history and archaeology

Pursue an advanced research project in history, archaeology or maritime archaeology and expand our understanding of the cultural, social and political forces that shape and steer the world today.

Research supervisors

How to apply

Enquire

Why undertake a PhD in History or Archaeology

Gain expertise in a specialised area of history or archaeology. You will become an international expert in your topic
Make a difference to the world. Your research has the potential to improve people’s lives by understanding the near or distant past
Explore a fascinating research question that no one has answered before. You will have the opportunity to expand current knowledge or answer a previously unresolved issue in the field

Discover more about research at the College of Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences.

Your career

A PhD gained in History or Archaeology at Flinders provides a wide range of skills valued in all types of organisations and careers. It will enhance your analytical and communication skills, provide you with skills to quickly learn new concepts and adapt to change, and enhance your time management, organisation and resilience skills.

A PhD is a stepping stone to a career as a professional researcher in the public sector, think tanks, charities, universities, and private corporations. Individuals with PhDs in history and archaeology are highly sought after for various professions in public and private organisations and have found roles in writing, the law, public service, consulting, advising, teaching and publishing.

Potential occupations include:

academic
writer
consultant or advisor
professional researcher.

Potential employers include:

universities
think tanks
public sector
charities
private corporations.

Potential research supervisors

Flinders History and Archaeology academic staff are recognised as leaders in their fields both in Australia and globally. Our academic supervisors draw on their extensive knowledge and exciting research covering topics related to periods from the pre-historic through to the present, and from the local to international spaces and into outer space.

Associate Professor Wendy Van Duivenvoorde

Hear from Associate Professor Wendy Van Duivenvoorde as she talks about PhD opportunities in Archaeology, as well as her own research interests in Maritime Archaeology.

Dr Chris Wilson

Hear from Dr Chris Wilson as he talks about his interests in Archaeology and Indigenous Studies

History

Dr Romain Fathi	First world war studies, war commemorations, warfare and violence, Australian national identity, ANZAC.
Professor Matt Fitzpatrick	Comparative imperialism, German history, culture and politics, European history, genocide studies, history of ideas.
Dr Prudence Flowers	Social movement activism, modern conservatism, medicine and public health, the politics of gender, sexuality, and the body.
Dr Johanna Conterio	Modern Russian and Soviet history in transnational, international and global perspective, environmental history / environment and health, international history, maritime history / the Black Sea region, history of urban planning.
Associate Professor Catherine Kevin	Australian cultural history, Australian studies/history, gender studies, historical studies.
Professor Peter Monteath	Modern European and Australian history with a particular interest in prisoners of war, internment, and the German presence in Australia.
Dr Evan Smith	Criminology, historical studies, political science, law and legal studies.
Associate Professor Andrekos Varnava	Imperial/colonial, war/conflict, and migration histories.
Associate Professor Christine Winter	History of science and migration and identity studies, Australian cultural history, emigration, first world war, history, human rights, migrants and refugees, religion and religious studies, war studies.
Dr James Kane	History of the Crusades, with a particular focus on crusading ideology, terminology, and historiography.
Dr Alessandro Antonello	Environmental history, the environmental humanities, history of science, international history.

Archaeology

Dr Jonathon Benjamin	Submerged landscape archaeology, the impacts of sea-level rise on past societies, aerial archaeology, the neolithisation of Europe, coastal and maritime archaeology, underwater photographic and photogrammetric site recording.
Associate Professor Heather Burke	Standing structures, style and social identity, ideology, class and capitalism, the Frontier, contact and conflict, working class archaeology, the archaeology of incarceration and asylums, women and gender in historical archaeology, heritage interpretation and the contemporary uses of archaeology, archaeology of the Chinese in Australia, archaeology of WWII, artefact analysis and historical archaeology
Dr Alice Gorman	Space archaeology, astronomical and space sciences, anthropology, cultural heritage management of space exploration, gender studies.
Professor Amanda Kearney	Anthropology, Australian studies, culture, identify/ethnicity/nationalism, Indigenous identity.
Dr Ania Kotarba	Coastal, maritime and landscape archaeology, cultural heritage and international maritime trade and exchange within the Indian Ocean and its satellite basins from the Bronze Age to Middle Ages (with a special interest in the Hellenistic and Roman periods).
Dr Ian Moffat	Archaeological geophysics, isotope geochemistry, sedimentology, sequence stratigraphy, geoarchaeology, site formation processes.
Dr Mike Morley	Geoarchaeology, sediments, stratigraphy and microstratigraphy, archaeological caves and rock shelters, archaeological site formation processes, Middle and Late Pleistocene hominin dispersals, human-environment interactions, fluvial, coastal and montane geomorphology and landscape dynamics, tephrochronology.
Professor Donald Pate	Archaeological chemistry, environmental chemistry, stable isotope biogeochemistry, bio-archaeology, the human skeleton and anthropological archaeology.
Dr Martin Polkinghorne	Archaeology of Southeast Asia, Angkor, archaeometry, archaeology of the early modern period, political economy and archaeology.
Associate Professor Amy Roberts	Archaeology and anthropology of Indigenous Australia, Yorke Peninsula archaeology and anthropology, River Murray and Mallee archaeology and anthropology, rock art, Indigenous traditional fishing, the relationship between archaeology and Indigenous peoples, the relationship between archaeology and anthropology, archaeology, anthropology and intellectual property, archaeological science, stable carbon, nitrogen isotope analysis.
Professor Claire Smith	Indigenous communities, rock art, symbolic communication, decolonization, Indigenous health and well-being, heritage as a driver of sustainable development.
Associate Professor Wendy Van Duivenvoorde	Maritime trade and shipbuilding in the ancient Mediterranean and Northern Europe, nautical archaeology, classical archaeology, computer applications in archaeology, archaeobotany, archaeometallurgy, technological advancement, dendro-archaeology.
Dr Daryl Wesley	Rock art, heritage conservation, the archaeology of culture contact between South East Asians, Europeans and Aboriginal people in remote north-western Arnhem Land through hybrid economies, rock art of Arnhem Land.
Associate Professor Liam Brady	Indigenous archaeology, anthropology and history, rock art, material culture, ethnoarchaeology, seascapes, landscape archaeology.
Dr Christopher Wilson	Australian archaeology; Archaeology of the First Australians, Holocene occupation of the Lower Murray River and Coorong regions in south-eastern Australia; Indigenous cultural heritage; Repatriation of Indigenous ancestral remains; Indigenous Australian studies; and, critical race studies.