Art History

The undergraduate program in art history is directed toward two main educational goals:

1. to provide students with an excellent liberal arts foundation through an understanding of the historical and global significance, cultural diversity, and intellectual richness of human artistic traditions from prehistoric times to the present; and
2. to provide these students with the intellectual tools needed to investigate the complex roles played by the arts in a variety of social contexts.

Skills in visual analysis, historical research, critical reading, analytical and descriptive writing, and oral communication are developed throughout the course of the study. The practice of art history is interdisciplinary, dynamically engaged with many fields in the humanities and social sciences, as well as with the University’s diverse area studies programs and the Ackland Art Museum. The art history major equips students with skills, knowledge, and values to negotiate rapidly changing, richly diverse, and increasingly interconnected local, national, and worldwide communities.

In addition to the program requirements listed below, students must

• attain a final cumulative GPA of at least 2.0
• complete a minimum of 45 academic credit hours earned from UNC-Chapel Hill courses
• take at least half of their major course requirements (courses and credit hours) at UNC-Chapel Hill
• earn a minimum of 18 hours of C or better in the major core requirements (some majors require 21 hours).

A maximum of two cross-listed courses taught by faculty members outside the Department of Art may count toward the major. It is strongly recommended that before taking a course numbered above 399, students take a lower-level course devoted to the same period. Advanced courses numbered 400 to 699 are lecture and discussion classes open to both graduate and undergraduate students.

Concentrations

Concentration I: 5000 BCE–400 CE

Concentration II: 200–1500 CE

Concentration III: 1250–1850

Concentration IV: 1750–1950

Concentration V: 1900–Present

• All students, regardless of their residency and/or citizenship, apply to UNC using The Common Application. The application will ask you for more information, including your personal biographical information, parent and sibling information, educational history, and extracurricular activities. There are also three writing samples: one essay on The Common Application and two short answer responses on the UNC-Chapel Hill Member Page.
• Secondary School/High School Transcripts
• All applicants are required to submit a statement from an official at their secondary school. This is often a University Counselor at your school, or an advisor, headmaster, or other official. Please note that this must come from someone at your secondary school. We will not accept statements from private counseling companies or agents.
• We require one letter of recommendation from a teacher who has taught you in your secondary school.
• We require all applicants, regardless of where they are from, to submit SAT or ACT scores. Our SAT code is 5816 and our ACT code is 3162. We have no preference between the SAT or ACT. If you send us both scores, we will look at whichever score is higher in our review of your application.
• TOEFL minimum is 100
• IELTS minimum is 7.0
• We do not require or offer interviews as part of our admissions process. However, non-native English speakers are welcome to submit unscripted interviews with third-party services such as InitialView, Vericant or Naviance Advantage. This is not a requirement and will only be used as supplemental information as needed by the Admissions Committee.

Scholarships

We consider all students, including international students, for a limited number of merit-based scholarships. There is no separate application for these scholarships—just by applying for admission, you’ll automatically be considered for these opportunities. Because these are quite limited in number, we encourage all students to be prepared to pay the full cost of attendance.

Students attending one of the 12 United World Colleges (UWC) are eligible for the Davis Scholars Program,providing they demonstrate financial need according to UNC-approved methodology. Admitted Davis UWC students will receive instructions regarding requisite forms for determining financial need. Qualifying Davis UWC Scholars can receive a scholarship of up to $10,000.