approaches to history

7/27/2019 Approaches to History

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APPROACHES (TYPES)

OF HISTORY


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The question of how a historianapproaches historical events is one ofthe most important questions within

historiography.

It is commonly recognized byhistorians that, in themselves,

individual historical facts are not

particularly meaningful.

Such facts will only become usefulwhen assembled with other historical

evidence, and the process ofassembling this evidence is understood

as a particular historiographicalapproach.


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"Fields of history" refers to thecategories professional

historians use to classify theirbroad areas of work within the

overall discipline of history.

Some of these categories (e.g.,

cultural history, social history,intellectual history) refer tohistorical method rather thanspecific topic of study, whileothers coincide or partiallyoverlap with the practical

classification of history bytopic.


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TheAnnales School is a school ofhistorical writing named after theFrench scholarly journalAnnales

d'histoire conomique et sociale(later calledAnnales. Economies, socits, civilisations,

then renamed in 1994 asAnnales.Histoire, Sciences Sociales) where it wasfirst expounded.

Annales school history is best knownfor incorporating social scientific

methods into history.

THE ANNALES SCHOOL


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The Annales was founded andedited by Marc Bloch and LucienFebvre in 1929, while they were

teaching at the University ofStrasbourg, France.

These authors quickly becameassociated with the distinctive

Annales approach, whichcombined geography, history, and

the sociological approaches toproduce an approach which

rejected the predominant emphasison politics, diplomacy and war of

many 19th century historians.


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Instead, they pioneered an approach to a studyof long-term historical structures (la longue dure)

over events.

Geography, material culture, and what laterAnnalistes called mentalits, or the psychology ofthe epoch, are also characteristic areas of study.

An eminent member of this school, Georges

Duby, wrote in the forward of his bookLedimanche de Bouvinesthat the history he taught:

relegated the sensational to the sidelines and wasreluctant to give a simple accounting of events, but strived

on the contrary to pose and solve problems and, neglectingsurface disturbances, to observe the long and medium-term evolution of economy, society and civilization."


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Marc Bloch was shot by the Gestapo during the

German occupation of France in World War II,

and Febvre carried on the Annales approach in the1940s and 1950s.


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It was during this time (1930s-1940s) that hementored Fernand Braudel, who would

become one of the best known exponents ofthis school.

Braudel's work came to define a 'second' eraof Annales historiography and was very

influential throughout the 1960s and 1970s,especially for his work on the Mediterranean

region in the era of Philip II of Spain.

While authors such as Emmanuel Le RoyLadurie and Jacques Le Goff continue to

carry the Annales banner, today the Annalesapproach has been less distinctive as more

and more historians do work in culturalhistory and economic history.


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BIG HISTORY


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Big History examines history on a large scale across

long time frames through a multi-disciplinary approach.

Big Historygives a focus on the alteration andadaptations in the human experience.

Big Historyis a discrete field of historical study that arosein the late 1980s.

It is related to, but distinct from, world history, as the

field examines history from the beginning of time to the

present day and is thus closer to the older concept of

universal history.


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Th fi i Bi Hi i l


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The first courses in Big History were experimentalones taught in the late 1980s by John Mears at

Southern Methodist University (Dallas, Texas) and byDavid Christian at Macquarie University (Australia),

and more recently at San Diego State University.

Since then, a number of other universities haveoffered similar courses.


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The first book in Big History was published in

1996 byFred Spier entitled, The Structure of

Big History: From the Big Bang until Today, which

offers an ambitious defense of the project and

constructs a unified account of history across

all time scales.

Fred Spier and Johan Goudsblom,

1995


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Another notable text in Big History isDavid Christian'sMaps of Time: An

Introduction to Big History, which exploreshistory from the first micro-seconds of

the Big Bang, to the creation of the solarsystem, to the origins of life on earth,

the evolution of humans, the agriculturalrevolution, modernity, and the 20th

century.

Christian examines large-scale patternsand themes, and provides perspective of

time scales.

It was David Christian who coined theterm Big History in an effort to placehuman history within the context of the

history of life, the earth, and theuniverse.

David Christian


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CLIOMETRICS


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Cliometrics refers to the systematic use ofeconomic theory and econometric

techniques to study economic history.

The term was originally coined by Jonathan

R.T. Hughes and Stanley Reiter in 1960 andrefers to Clio, who was the muse of history

and heroic poetry in Greek mythology.

This term is also sometimes used referring tocounterfactual history.

CLIOMETRICS


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Cliometrics, originated in 1958with the work of Alfred Conradand John Meyer with the

publication of "The Economicsof Slavery in the Ante-Bellum

South," in theJournal of PoliticalEconomy.

Th li m tri r l ti t ll b


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The cliometric revolution actually beganin the mid-1960s and was particularly

ugly because most economic historianswere either historians or economists who

had very little connection to

mathematical techniques or statistics.


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COMPARATIVE HISTORY

C p ti hi t i th i b t


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Comparative history is the comparison between

different societies at a given time or sharing similar

cultural conditions.

Proponents of this approach include American historiansBarrington Moore and Herbert E. Bolton; British

historians Arnold Toynbee and Geoffrey Barraclough; and

German historian Oswald Spengler.


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Arnold Joseph Toynbee (1889

1975) was a British historianwhose twelve-volume analysis of

the rise and fall of civilizations,A

Study of History, 1934-1961, was a

synthesis of world history, ametahistory based on universal

rhythms of rise, flowering and

decline, which examined history

from a global perspective.

Toynbee presented history as the rise
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/af/ArnoldToynbee1961.jpg


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Toynbee presented history as the riseand fall of civilizations, rather than the

history of nation-states or of ethnicgroups.

He identified his civilizationsaccording to cultural and religious

rather than national criteria.


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Historians generally accept the comparison of

particular institutions (banking, women's rights,

ethnic identities) in different societies, but since

the hostile reaction to Toynbee in the 1950s,

generally do not pay much attention to sweeping

comparative studies.


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Cultural history (from the German term


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Cultural history (from the German term

Kulturgeschichte), at least in its common definition

since the 1970s, often combines the approaches

of anthropology and history to look at popular

cultural traditions and cultural interpretations of

historical experience.

Cultural history involves the records and


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Cultural history involves the records andnarrative descriptions of past knowledge,customs, and arts of a group of people.

Cultural history encompasses the continuum

of events occurring in succession leadingfrom the past to the present and even into

the future pertaining to a culture.

Cultural history as a discipline records and


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Cultural history, as a discipline, records andinterprets past events involving human beingsthrough the social, cultural, and political milieu

of or relating to the arts and manners that agroup favors.

Cultural history studies and interprets therecord of human societies by denoting the

various distinctive ways of living built up by agroup of people under consideration.

Cultural history involves the aggregate of pastcultural activity, such as ceremony, class inpractices, and the interaction with locales.

Jacob Burckhardt (1818 1897) was a Swiss


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Jacob Burckhardt (1818 1897) was a Swisshistorian of art and culture, fields which he

helped found.

Siegfried Giedion described Burckhardt'sachievement in the following terms:

"The great discoverer of the age of the Renaissance, he

first showed how a period should be treated in its entirety,with regard not only for its painting, sculpture andarchitecture, but for the social institutions of its daily life

as well

Burckhardt's best known work is The Civilization ofthe Renaissance in Italy(1860).

Burkhardt's historical writings did


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Burkhardt s historical writings didmuch to establish art history as anacademic discipline, and also haveliterary value in their own right.

His innovative approach to historicalresearch emphasized the value ofculture and art when analyzing the

social and political trends underlyinghistorical events.

Jacob Burckhardt helped foundcultural history as a discipline.

Cultural history overlaps in its
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/20/Jacburc2.gif


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Cultural history overlaps in itsapproaches with the Frenchmovements of his to i re d esmenta l i t s and the so-called new

history , and in the U.S. it is closelyassociated with the field of Amer icans tud ie s .Most often the focus is on phenomena

shared by non-elite groups in a society,such as: carnival, festival, and public

rituals; performance traditions; culturalevolutions in human relations (ideas,

sciences, arts, techniques); and culturalexpressions of social movements such

as nationalism.


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POLITICAL HISTORY

Political history is the narrative and analysis of


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Political history is the narrative and analysis of

political events, ideas, movements, and leaders.

It is usually structured around the nation state.

It is distinct from, but related to, other fields of history

such as social history, economic history, and military

history.


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Generally, political history focuses onevents relating to nation-states and the

formal political process.

According to Hegel, Political History "is anidea of the state with a moral and spiritual force

beyond the material interests of its subjects: itfollowed that the state was the main agent of

historical change"

This contrasts with, for instance, socialhistory, which focuses predominantly on

the actions and lifestyles of ordinarypeople, or people's history, which is

historical work from the perspective ofcommon people.


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DIPLOMATIC HISTORY

Diplomatic history, sometimes referred


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p y, so e es e e edto as "Rankian History in honor of

Leopold von Ranke, focuses on politics,politicians and other high rulers and

views them as being the driving force ofcontinuity and change in history.

This type ofpolitical historyis the study ofthe conduct of international relations

between states or across state boundariesover time.

This is the most common form of

history and is often the classical andpopular belief of what history should be.

Diplomatic history is the past aggregate


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p y p gg gof the art and practice of conducting

negotiations between accredited personsrepresenting groups or nations.

It is the continuum of events occurring insuccession leading from the past to the

present and even into the future regardingdiplomacy, the conduct of state relations

through the intercession of individualswith regard to issues of peace-making,

culture, economics, trade and war.

Diplomatic history records or narratesevents relating to or characteristic ofdiplomacy.


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The first "scientific" political historywas written by Leopold von Ranke in

Germany in the 19th century.

An important aspect of politicalhistory is the study of ideology as a

force for historical change.

One author asserts that "politicalhistory as a whole cannot exist without the

study of ideological differences and theirimplications.

Studies of political history


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Studies of political historytypically center around a singlenation and its political change

and development.

Some historians identify thegrowing trend towards narrow

specialization in political historyduring recent decades: "while acollege professor in the 1940s soughtto identify himself as a "historian",by the 1950s "American historian"

was the designation.

From the 1970s onwards, new movements


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sought to challenge traditional approaches topolitical history.

The development of social history and

women's history shifted the emphasis awayfrom the study of leaders and national

decisions, and towards the role of ordinarycitizens.

By the 1970s "the new social history"


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y ybegan replacing the older style.

Emphasis shifted to a broader

spectrum of American life, includingsuch topics as the history of urban

life, public health, ethnicity, the media,and poverty.

As such, political history is sometimesseen as the more 'traditional' kind of

history, in contrast with the more'modern' approaches of other fields

of history.


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ETHNOHISTORY

Ethnohistory is the


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Ethnohistory is the

study of ethnographic

cultures and

indigenous customs byexamining historical

records.

It is also the study ofthe history of various

ethnic groups that may

or may not exist today.

Ethnohistory uses both historical and


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yethnographic data as its foundation.

Its historical methods and materials go

beyond the standard use of books andmanuscripts.

Practitioners recognize the utility of

maps, music, paintings, photography,folklore, oral tradition, ecology, siteexploration, archaeological materials,

museum collections, enduringcustoms, language, and place names.

Ethnohistorians have learned to


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use their special knowledge of thegroups they study, linguistic

insights, and the understanding of

cultural phenomena in ways thatmake for a more in-depth analysis

than the average historian iscapable of doing based solely on

written documents produced byand for one group.

They try to understand culture on

its own terms and according to itsown cultural code.

Ethnohistory differs from other historically-l d h d l i i h i b


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related methodologies in that it embracesemic perspectives as tools of analysis.

The field and it techniques are well suited

for writing histories of Indian peoplesbecause of its holistic and inclusive

framework.


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GENDER HISTORY

Despite its relatively short life,


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p yGender History (and its

forerunner Women's History) hashad a rather significant effect on

the general study of history.

Since the 1960s, when the initiallysmall field first achieved a

measure of acceptance, it hasgone through a number of

different phases, each with itsown challenges and outcomes, butalways making an impact of some

kind on the historical discipline.


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GREAT MAN THEORY OF

HISTORY


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The Great man theoryis a theory held by some

that aims to explainhistory by the impact of"Great men", or heroes:

highly influentialindividuals, either from

personal charisma,genius intellects, or

great political impact.

For example, a scholarly follower


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p yof the Great Man theory would

be likely to study the SecondWorld War by focusing on the big

personalities of the conflict SirWinston Churchill, Adolf Hitler,

Benito Mussolini, FranklinDelano Roosevelt, Joseph Stalin,

Hideki Tojo, etc. and view allof the historical events as being

tied directly to their ownindividual decisions and orders.

It is often linked to 19th centurymm nt t r nd hist ri n Th m s C rl l


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commentator and historian Thomas Carlyle,who commented that "The history of the world

is but the biography of great men."

The Great Man approach to history was mostpopular with professional historians in the

19th century; a popular work of this school istheEncyclopedia Britannica Eleventh Edition

(1911) which contains lengthy and detailed

biographies about the great men of history,but very few general or social histories.

This heroic view of history was also stronglyendorsed by some philosophical figures such

as Hegel, Nietzsche, and Spengler, but it fellout of favor after World War II.


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HISTORY OF IDEAS


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The history of ideas is a field ofresearch in history that deals with the

expression, preservation, and change of

human ideas over time.

The history of ideas is a sister-disciplineto, or a particular approach within,

intellectual history.

Work in the history of ideas may involveinterdisciplinary research in the history

of philosophy, the history of science, or

the history of literature.

In Sweden, the history of ideas has been a distinctuniversity subject since the 1930s when Johan


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university subject since the 1930s, when JohanNordstrm, a scholar of literature, was appointed

professor of the new discipline at Uppsala University.

Today, several universities across the world providecourses in this field, usually as part of a graduate

program.


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MARXIST HISTORY


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M i t hi t i ll t l l i l


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Marxist history is generallyteleological,in that it posits a direction of history,

towards an end state of history asclassless human society.

Marxist historiography, that is, thewriting of Marxist history in line withthe given historiographical principles,

is generally seen as a tool.

Its aim is to bring those oppressed byhistory to self-consciousness, and toarm them with tactics and strategiesfrom history: it is both a historical

and a liberatory project.

Historians who use Marxist methodology, butdisagree with the mainstream of Marxism, often


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g ,describe themselves as marxisthistorians (with a

lowercaseM).

Methods from Marxist historiography, such as classanalysis, can be divorced from the liberatory intentof Marxist historiography; such practitioners often

refer to their work as marxianorMarxian.


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MICROHISTORY

Microhistory is a branch of the study of history.


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First developed in the 1970s, microhistory is the studyof the past on a very small scale.

The most common type of microhistory is the study ofa small town or village.

Other common studies include looking at individuals ofminor importance, or analyzing a single painting.

As the roots of major events are grounded in theactions of villagers these studies often have much larger

ramifications.

Microhistory is an important component of the "new

history" that has emerged since the 1960s.

It is usually done in close collaboration with the socialsciences, such as anthropology and sociology.


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MILITARY HISTORY

Military history is composed ofh i h hi f


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the events in the history ofhumanity that fall within the

category of conflict.

This may range from a meleebetween two tribes to conflictsbetween proper militaries to a

world war affecting the majorityof the human population.

Military historians record (inwriting or otherwise) the events ofmilitary history.


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ORAL HISTORY

Oral history is a method of historicald t ti i i t i ith


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documentation, using interviews withliving survivors of the time being

investigated.

Contemporary oral history involvesrecording or transcribing eyewitness

accounts of historical events.

Some anthropologists startedcollecting recordings (at first especially

of Native American folklore) onphonograph cylinders in the late 19thcentury.

In the 1930s the Works ProgressAdministration (WPA) sent out


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Administration (WPA) sent outinterviewers to collect accountsfrom various groups, including

surviving witnesses of theAmerican Civil War, Slavery, andother major historical events.

The Library of Congress also beganrecording traditional Americanmusic and folklore onto acetate

discs.

With the development of audio taperecordings after World War II, the

task of oral historians becameeasier.


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POST-MODERN HISTORY

Postmodernism is a term applied to a wide-ranging set of developments in critical theory,


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g g p y,philosophy, architecture, art, literature, andculture, which are generally characterized as

either emerging from, in reaction to, or

superseding, modernism.

Postmodernism (sometimes abbreviatedPomo) was originally a reaction to modernism

(not "post" in the purely temporal sense of

"after").

Largely influenced by the disillusionmentinduced by the Second World War,

postmodernism tends to refer to a cultural,

intellectual, or artistic state lacking a clearcentral hierarchy or organizing principle andembodying extreme complexity, contradiction,

ambiguity, and diversity.

Post-modernity is a derivative referring tonon-art aspects of history that were


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non art aspects of history that wereinfluenced by the new movement, namely

the evolutions in society, economy andculture since the 1960s.

The term was coined in 1949 to describea dissatisfaction with modern architecture,

leading to the postmodern architecture

movement.

Later, the term was applied to severalmovements, including in art, music, and

literature, that reacted against modernmovements, and are typically marked byrevival of traditional elements and

techniques.


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PROSOPOGRAPHY

Prosopography, in historical studies, is aninvestigation of the common background


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characteristics of a historical group, whose individualbiographies may be largely untraceable, by means of

a collective study of their lives.

Prosopography is an increasingly importantapproach within historical research.

Prosopographical research has theaim of learning about patterns of


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aim of learning about patterns ofrelationships and activities throughthe study of collective biography,

and proceeds by collecting andanalyzing statistically relevantquantities of biographical dataabout a well-defined group of

individuals.

A uniform set of criteria needs tobe applied to the group in order to

achieve meaningful results.


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PSYCOHISTORY

Psychohistory is the study of thepsychological motivations of historical


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p y g vevents.

It combines the insights ofpsychotherapy with the researchmethodology of the social sciences tounderstand the emotional origin of thesocial and political behavior of groups

and nations, past and present.

This field of study is considered bysome to have significant differences

from the mainstream fields of historyand psychology.

Psychohistory derives many of its insights fromareas that are perceived to be ignored by

h h f f


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conventional historians as shaping factors ofhuman history, in particular, the effects of

childbirth, parenting practice, and child abuse.

The historical impact of incest, infanticide andchild sacrifice are also considered.

There are three inter-related areas of psychohistorical study.


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The History of Childhood - which looks at such questions as:

How have children been raised throughout history

How has the family been constitutedHow and why have practices changed over time

The changing place and value of children in society over time

How and why our views of child abuse and neglect have changed

Psychobiography - which seeks to understand individual historical people andtheir motivations in history.

Group Psychohistory - which seeks to understand the motivations of large

groups, including nations, in history and current affairs.

In doing so, psychohistory advances the use of group-fantasy analysis ofpolitical speeches, political cartoons and media headlines since the fantasy

words therein offer clues to unconscious thinking and behaviors.


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QUANTITATIVE HISTORY

Quantitative History is an approach to historicalresearch that makes use of quantitative, statistical


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and computer tools.

It is considered a branch of social science historyand

has favorite journals, such as Historical Methods,Social

Science History, and theJournal of Interdisciplinary

History.


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SOCIAL HISTORY

Social history is a area ofhistorical study considered by

b i l i h


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some to be a social science thatattempts to view historical

evidence from the point of view

of developing social trends.

In this view, it may include areasof economic history, legal historyand the analysis of other aspects

of civil society that show theevolution of social norms,behaviors and more.

It is distinguished from political

history, military history and theso-called history of great men.

While proponents of history from below andthe French annalesschool of historians have


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considered themselves part of social history, itis seen as a much broader movement among

historians in the development of

historiography.

Unlike other approaches, it tries to see itselfas a synthetic form of history not limited to

the statement of so-called historical fact butwilling to analyze historical data in a more

systematic manner.

A question in social history is whether themasses follow the leaders or whether it is the

other way around.

An example of social history can be seen in theAmerican Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s and

1960


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1960s.

Typical history would focus on the who, what,

when and where; whereas social history focuses onthe causes of the movement itself.

Social historians would pose such questions as,"Why did the movement come about when it

did?", and "What specific elements fostered thegrowth?" "What elements hindered the

development?"

This approach is favored by scholars because it

allows for a full discussion on the sometimes lessstudied aspects.

By understanding the past, we can begin tounderstand who we are now.


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WHIG HISTORY

POSITIVIST HISTORY

Whig historiography perceives the past as ateleological progression toward the present.


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In general, Whig historians look for and

favour the rise of constitutional government,personal freedoms and scientific progress inany historical period.

The term is often used pejoratively to denoteany historian that adopts such positions, but it

also connotes a specific set of Britishhistorians who embodied Whigideals.

Its antithesis can be seen in certain kinds ofcultural pessimism.


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WORLD HISTORY

World History is a field ofhistorical study that emerged

di i d i fi ld i


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as a distinct academic field in

the 1980s.

It examines human history

from a global perspective.

Unlike most history writing of the19th and most of the 20th centuries,


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which focused on narratives ofindividuals, and on national and

ethnic perspectives, World Historylooks for common patterns that

emerge across all cultures.

World historians use a thematic

approach, with two major focalpoints: integration (how processes ofworld history have drawn people of

the world together) and difference(how patterns of world history reveal

the diversity of the humanexperience).

The study of world history is in someways a product of the current period


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y p pof accelerated globalization.

This period is tending both tointegrate various cultures and to

highlight their differences.

The advent of World History as adistinct field of study was heralded in

the 1980s by the creation of theWorld History Association and ofgraduate programs at a handful of

universities.

Over the past 20 years, scholarlypublications professional and academic


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publications, professional and academic

organizations, and graduate programs

in World History have proliferated.

It has become an increasingly popular

approach to teaching history in United

States high schools and colleges.

Many new textbooks are being

published with a World Historyapproach.

approaches to history

Documents