Phi Alpha Theta () is an American

honor society In the United States, an honor society is a rank organization that recognizes excellence among peers. Numerous societies recognize various fields and circumstances. The Order of the Arrow, for example, is the National Honor Society of the Boy Sc ...

for

undergraduate Undergraduate education is education conducted after secondary education and before postgraduate education. It typically includes all postsecondary programs up to the level of a bachelor's degree. For example, in the United States, an entry-lev ...

and graduate students and

professor Professor (commonly abbreviated as Prof.) is an Academy, academic rank at university, universities and other post-secondary education and research institutions in most countries. Literally, ''professor'' derives from Latin as a "person who pr ...

s of

history History (derived ) is the systematic study and the documentation of the human activity. The time period of event before the History of writing#Inventions of writing, invention of writing systems is considered prehistory. "History" is an umbr ...

. It has more than 400,000 members, with new members numbering about 9,000 a year through its 970 chapters.

Founding

Phi Alpha Theta was established on March 17, 1921, at the

University of Arkansas The University of Arkansas (U of A, UArk, or UA) is a public land-grant research university in Fayetteville, Arkansas. It is the flagship campus of the University of Arkansas System and the largest university in the state. Founded as Arkansas ...

by Professor Nels Cleven. Cleven had become convinced in his time at the university that a fraternity of scholars (which would accept men or women) was important for the study of history. He invited students to a meeting to form the society (then called the "University Historical Society") on March 14, and the society was officially recognized on the 17th. In April, the decision was made for the society to be known by the

Greek letters The Greek alphabet has been used to write the Greek language since the late 9th or early 8th century BCE. It is derived from the earlier Phoenician alphabet, and was the earliest known alphabetic script to have distinct letters for vowels as w ...

Phi Phi (; uppercase Φ, lowercase φ or ϕ; grc, ϕεῖ ''pheî'' ; Modern Greek: ''fi'' ) is the 21st letter of the Greek alphabet. In Archaic and Classical Greek (c. 9th century BC to 4th century BC), it represented an aspirated voicele ...

Alpha Alpha (uppercase , lowercase ; grc, ἄλφα, ''álpha'', or ell, άλφα, álfa) is the first letter of the Greek alphabet. In the system of Greek numerals, it has a value of one. Alpha is derived from the Phoenician letter aleph , whic ...

Theta Theta (, ; uppercase: Θ or ; lowercase: θ or ; grc, ''thē̂ta'' ; Modern: ''thī́ta'' ) is the eighth letter of the Greek alphabet, derived from the Phoenician letter Teth . In the system of Greek numerals, it has a value of 9. Gr ...

. These letters may refer to the words "

philia ''Philia'' (; ), is one of the four ancient Greek words for love: ''philia'', '' storge'', ''agape'' and ''eros''. In Aristotle's ''Nicomachean Ethics'', philia is usually translated as "friendship" or affection. The complete opposite is ca ...

," "

anthropos Anthropos (ἄνθρωπος) is Greek for human. Anthropos may also refer to: * Anthropos, in Gnosticism, the first human being, also referred to as ''Adamas'' (from Hebrew meaning ''earth'') or ''Geradamas'' * ′Anthropos′ as a part of an ...

," and "

theos THEOS, which translates from Greek as "God", is an operating system which started out as OASIS, a microcomputer operating system for small computers that use the Z80 processor. When the operating system was launched for the IBM Personal Compu ...

Symbolism

The Society's colors are "madonna red" and "madonna blue".According to the Phi Alpha Theta Constitution, Article VII
accessed 17 Dec 2020. The description of the Society's emblem is precise: The emblem of the Society is a gold disc, ''"with the edge milled to represent a serpent's body, the forepart of the serpent's body being on the right side of the badge, and the eye shall be represented by a red jewel."'' On the face is a raised six-pointed star faced with black, ''"and bearing in gold the Greek letters Phi Alpha Theta horizontally across the middle, and the points bearing the Greek letters psi, pi, alpha, lambda, upsilon, and psi ''Ψ, Π, Α, Λ, Υ, and againin clockwise rotation beginning at the uppermost point."'' The emblem can be jeweled. This emblem may be mounted upon a gold key, ''"which shall be in the form of a rectangle nineteen by twenty-one millimeters, and the corners of which shall be cut along the arcs of circles having a radius of four millimeters, the centers of said circles being at the corners of the key, and the edges of the key shall be eveledto a distance not to exceed one millimeter from the edge."'' A cylindrical stem projects from the top of the emblem, finished with a ring. The cylinder projects from the lower edge of the key, similarly. The Society's official flower is the red rose.

Publications and leadership

Phi Alpha Theta publishes a quarterly historical journal entitled ''

The Historian ''The Historian'' is the 2005 debut novel of American author Elizabeth Kostova. The plot blends the history and folklore of Vlad Țepeș and his fictional equivalent Count Dracula. Kostova's father told her stories about Dracula when she was a c ...

'', which has over 12,500 individual subscribers and 1,000

library A library is a collection of materials, books or media that are accessible for use and not just for display purposes. A library provides physical (hard copies) or digital access (soft copies) materials, and may be a physical location or a vir ...

subscribers. ''The Historian'' splits the space in its quarterly issues between articles and book reviews. The book review section of the journal has been based at

Ohio Wesleyan University Ohio Wesleyan University (OWU) is a private liberal arts college in Delaware, Ohio. It was founded in 1842 by methodist leaders and Central Ohio residents as a nonsectarian institution, and is a member of the Ohio Five – a consortium ...

since 1994. The society's national headquarters and the journal's editorial offices are located at the

University of South Florida The University of South Florida (USF) is a public research university with its main campus located in Tampa, Florida, and other campuses in St. Petersburg and Sarasota. It is one of 12 members of the State University System of Florida. USF is ...

. ''Voces Novae: Chapman University Historical Review'' was founded in the Spring of 2009 by the ''Alpha Mu Gamma chapter'' of Phi Alpha Theta at

Chapman University Chapman University is a private research university in Orange, California. It encompasses ten schools and colleges, including Fowler School of Engineering, Dodge College of Film and Media Arts, Fowler School of Law, and Schmid College of Scie ...

. Jacob M. Blosser of

Texas Woman's University Texas Woman's University (TWU) is a public coeducational university in Denton, Texas, with two health science center-focused campuses in Dallas and Houston. While TWU has been fully co-educational since 1994, it is the largest state-supported u ...

is the current president of Phi Alpha Theta. Wendy Tunstall is Interim Executive Director. Adrian O’Connor of the University of South Florida is managing editor of ''The Historian'', and Jonathan Scott Perry also of USF is the journal's book review editor.

Membership requirements

Undergraduate students must have a 3.0 overall

grade point average Grading in education is the process of applying standardized measurements for varying levels of achievements in a course. Grades can be assigned as letters (usually A through F), as a range (for example, 1 to 6), as a percentage, or as a numbe ...

, at least a 3.1 average in their history courses and have completed 12 credits of history classes. Undergraduate candidates must also be in the top 35% of their class. Students enrolled at an online university are not eligible for membership. Students need not be majoring in history, but must have taken at least four history courses at the university level. Specific universities may develop higher qualifications. For example, the

College of Staten Island The College of Staten Island (CSI) is a public university in Staten Island, New York. It is one of the 11 four-year senior colleges within the City University of New York system. Programs in the liberal arts and sciences and professional studi ...

's PAT chapter requires undergraduate students to have a GPA of or better than 3.25, History GPA of or better than 3.5 and at least 16 hours completed in History classes. Graduate students must have a GPA of better than 3.5 and have completed approximately 30% of the residence requirements for the master's degree.

References

External links

The society's official web site

''The Historian'' homepage hosted by Blackwell Publishing

''The Historians Book Review Section website
{{authority control Honor societies Student societies in the United States Student organizations established in 1921 University of Arkansas Association of College Honor Societies 1921 establishments in Arkansas