Melissa Hampton

Phi Alpha Theta, UC Berkeley’s premier undergraduate honors society, facilitates a wide range of activities every year designed to give history students the opportunity to better get to know one another, their graduate students, and their faculty on campus. Throughout the year, we sponsor events ranging from the intellectual to the purely social, including a stimulating lecture series, faculty-student dinners, and the History 101 undergraduate thesis colloquium at the end of every spring. This fall, Phi Alpha Theta was proud to hear from Professor Ethan Shagan, who discussed the process of writing his newest book on moderation and violence in Early Modern Europe. And just following this November’s historic presidential election, we were joined by Professor Robin Einhorn, who put the 2008 race in historical context and talked about the unique and changing nature of elections within the United States. The semester culminated in our annual fall faculty-student dinner, which allowed our large number of new members to enjoy pleasant conversation and a good meal with their favorite members of the UC Berkeley faculty.