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History Labs
Each semester, NIAHD offers History Labs (HIST 201) for undergraduate students. The labs are small, one-credit classes that focus on a specific research project, allowing participants to deeply engage with primary documents, participate in museum ethnography, create digital databases, and develop analytical, methodological and communication skills.
Fall 2026 Labs
Accounting for Life
Tuesdays, 2:00-2:50 p.m. with Dr. Sarah McCartney 
Students will study and transcribe the account books of Virginia merchant Francis Jerdone as a way to understand various aspects of eighteenth-century life. In addition to learning the methods and process of document transcription, students will study both Jerdone's physical account books and the objects listed within them as material objects which reflect the culture and society in which they were created and used. As the project develops, students will consider ways to make the transcription available to researchers and present aspects of the project digitally to a public audience.
Museum Ethnography,
Tuesdays, 2:00-4:00 p.m. with Dr. Julie Richter
Students will use the space in the Milliner’s and Mantua-maker’s Shop at Colonial Williamsburg, conversations with the shop’s tradeswomen, and the objects on display to think critically about how changes in the physical space, the material objects, and the interpretation impact the visitor’s experience. The History Lab will give students
time and space to think about and read spaces for the role that curation plays in teaching and sharing history. In addition, students will talk with guests about their experiences in the shop, how their attention might be drawn or distracted by certain things, what takeaways they left with and how those might change depending on how the space/people/material objects are utilized.