ABSTRACT
The Routledge Companion to Historical Studies provides a much-needed critical introduction to the major historians and philosophers together with the central issues, ideas and theories which have prompted the rethinking of history that has gathered pace since the 1990s.
With twenty-nine new entries, and many that have been substantially updated, key concepts for the new history are examined through the ideas of leading thinkers such as Kant, Nietzsche, Croce, Collingwood, White, Foucault and Derrida, and subjects range over class, empiricism, hermeneutics, inference, relativism and technology.
New entries for the second edition include:
- Carl Becker
- Frank R. Ankersmit
- Jean-Francois Lyotard
- gender
- justified belief
- the aesthetic turn
- race
- film
- biography
- cultural history
- critical theory and experimental history.
With a revised introduction setting out the state of the discipline of history today, as well as an extended and updated bibliography, this is the essential reference work for all students of history.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
chapter |1 pages
AUTHOR’S INTRODUCTION
Rethinking history In one important respect at least, this is no different from any other book written about the nature of history in that it is authored from a particular perspective. That perspec- tive is the result of my experience and understanding of the post-empiricist challenge to history. As a history student in the late 1960s I was immersed in the then vogue for
chapter |1 pages
The Companion
The form chosen for this intervention in the debates over the thinking and practice of history today is that of a series of defi nitions ordered alphabetically. To ease usage all cross-references are written in bold when they are fi rst deployed. Thus, in the entry on historical explanation, objectivity and truth, all of which are entries in their own right. In addition, suggested
chapter |8 pages
History today: critical perspectives
Critical perspectives The empirical foundation: realist history Modernism, as the product of the seventeenth- and eighteenth-c entury Enlightenment, produced the dominance of certain ways of thinking about how we create knowledge. Postmodernism in the late twentieth century, in a variety of recent manifestations such
chapter |8 pages
The postmodern reversal: the real end of history or the end of realist history?
Recent variants of constructionist history, like the New Cultural History, the latest variant(s) of the New History and post-feminism, gender and post-M arxist history, have grown not only as the result of the deliberate acts of the historian behaving like a highly self-c onscious author, purposefully borrowing ideas and concepts from other disciplines (like anthropology, sociology and philosophy), but also as a result of the
chapter |230 pages
Conclusion
Deconstructive or post-e mpiricist history is most clearly manifest in its anti-m odernist assumption that ‘proper’ history is overdue for a rethinking of its metaphysical status. Writing the- past- as- history is not only about epistemology – it is an ontological issue. The historian is an author in a particular state of existence, not an impersonal observer outside time and place. What is the point of pretending it is not me creating the- past-
chapter |1 pages
ROUTLEDGE HISTORY Practicing History
This essential new collection of key articles offers a re-evaluation of the practice of history in light of cur- rent debates. Critical thinkers and practicing historians
chapter |1 pages
ROUTLEDGE HISTORY Historics
From a published author at the forefront of research in this area comes this provocative and seminal work that takes a unique and fresh new look at history and theory.
chapter |1 pages
ROUTLEDGE HISTORY Making History
exhaustive exploration of the practice of history, historical traditions and the theories that surround them. Discussing the development and growth of history
chapter |1 pages
ROUTLEDGE HISTORY What is History For?
An experienced author of history and theory presents this examination of the purpose of history at a time when recent debates have rendered the question ‘What is history for?’ of utmost importance.
chapter |1 pages
ROUTLEDGE HISTORY Experiments in Rethinking History
From two of the world’s leading postmodern historians, this thoroughly orig- inal collection of articles allows students and researchers to understand and learn important new ways of thinking and writing about the past.
chapter |1 pages
ROUTLEDGE HISTORY Rethinking History
History means many things to many people. But fi nding an answer to the question ‘What is history?’ is a task few feel equipped to answer nowadays. And yet, at the same
chapter |1 pages
ROUTLEDGE HISTORY The Nature of History Reader
In this timely collection, key pieces of writing by leading historians are reproduced and evaluated, with an explana- tion and critique of their character and assumptions, and
chapter |1 pages
ROUTLEDGE HISTORY History: What and Why? Second edition
ductory survey of historians’ views about the nature
