This collection of essays argues that there is an pre-history, that is, a longer tradition of the transnationalization of historical culture and historical science. It seeks to substantiate the claim that history writing reflected the globality of its time as much as followed the nationalization of the societies in which it was produced.

This book looks at the memory of the communist past in Central and Eastern Europe, with a particular focus on Bulgaria: its "official" memory, constructed by institutions, its public memory, molded by media, rituals, books and films and the urban environment, and the everyday or 'vernacular' memory. It investigates how the recent past is remembered and the circumstances upon which this memory is conditioned - how is communism/socialism construed as a public recollection? Do these processes differ in the distinct post-communist countries? The book's first part traces the institutional and political dimensions of coping with the communist past and the second part concentrates on personal reminiscences and vernacular memory. The book will be of interest for researchers and students in the fields of memory studies, Central and East European studies, oral history and contemporary history, as well as for specialists at institutions of memory and memory activists and organisations.

This book redefines the relationship between Marxism and history. At its roots, Marxism was aimed at analyzing society in order to change it, reflecting on the past to create the 'poetry of the future.' No single event of the past was as important to early Marxists as the French Revolution of 1789. Studying the varying uses of the history of that past event among Karl Marx, Friedrich Engels, and prominent European Marxists before 1914 (Karl Kautsky, V.I. Lenin, and others), this book argues that we should take the historiography of concrete past events seriously. It was not only an auxiliary element of Marxism, but a core constitutive element in its formation. Thus, this book calls for transcending traditional approaches to Marxism as a fixed set of social theories combined with strategies for the present and future. Important to students of Marxism, the labor movement, and the French Revolution alike, this study contains refreshing perspectives on the interplay between past, present, and future and on the role of states, social classes, socio-economic determination, and political organization in history.

The topic of history was not a principal theme of the classical American Pragmatists, but in this book Marnie Binder presents the case for a pragmatist philosophy of history, examining supporting material from William James, John Dewey, F.C.S. Schiller, C.S. Peirce, George Herbert Mead, and Jane Addams. While the thinkers explored here have significant differences among themselves, together they provide distinct contributions to a fuller picture of what guides our selective memory and our present attention, and they indicate how this is all maintained via confirmation in the future. Philosophy needs history to help clarify meanings and concepts; part of the methodology of pragmatism is derived from history, as it is attested over time. History needs philosophy to critically analyze historical data; pragmatic interests influence how we study and record history. A Pragmatist Philosophy of History, therefore, provides a rich context for a method that brings the two disciplines together.

Ludwig Wittgenstein's brief Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus (1922) is one of the most important philosophical works of the twentieth century, yet it offers little orientation for the reader. The first-time reader is left wondering what it could be about, and the scholar is left with little guidance for interpretation. In Tractatus in Context, James C. Klagge presents the vital background necessary for appreciating Wittgenstein's gnomic masterpiece. Tractatus in Context contains the early reactions to the Tractatus, including the initial reviews written in 1922-1924. And while we can't talk with Wittgenstein, we can do the next best thing-hear what he had to say about the Tractatus. Klagge thus presents what Wittgenstein thought about germane issues leading up to his writing the book, in discussions and correspondence with others about his ideas, and what he had to say about the Tractatus after it was written-in letters, lectures and conversations. It offers, you might say, Wittgenstein's own commentary on the book. Key Features: Illuminates what is at stake in the Tractatus, by providing the views of others that engaged Wittgenstein as he was writing it. Includes Wittgenstein's earlier thoughts on ideas in the book as recorded in his notebooks, letters, and conversations as well as his later, retrospective comments on those ideas. Draws on new or little-known sources, such as Wittgenstein's coded notebooks, Hermine's notes, Frege's letters, Hansel's diary, Ramsey's notes, and Skinner's dictations. Draws connections between the background context and specific passages in the Tractatus, using a proposition-by-proposition commentary.

What is gender and who has it? History, theory and gender are inextricably linked, but how exactly do they fit together? How do historians use theories about gender to write history? In this jargon-free introduction, Susan Kingsley Kent presents a student-friendly guide to the origins, conceptual framework, subjectmatter and methods of gender history. Assuming no prior knowledge, Gender and History: - Sets out clear definitions of theory, history and gender - Explains that gender is not solely applicable to women, but to men as well - Tackles the hotly debated topic of power and gender relations - Explores gender history from a variety of angles, including anthropology, psychology and philosophy - Spans a broad chronological period, from the times of Aristotle to the present day - Includes a helpful glossary that explains key terms and concepts at a glance Lively and approachable, this is an essential text for anyone who wishes to learn how to use theories of gender in their historical studies.

This authoritative and comprehensive guide to key people and events in Anglo-Jewish history stretches from Cromwell's re-admittance of the Jews in 1656 to the present day and contains nearly 3000 entries, the vast majority of which are not featured in any other sources.

This study draws on the life of renowned historian, Robert H. Ferrell, to explore issues related to the history profession. Ferrell's life story contextualizes postmodernism, the New Left, and the challenges of crafting history. The author analyzes Ferrell's biases, examining distinctions between his morals and actions as well as his private and public life. This book provides crucial insight into the subjectivity of history, the boundaries of the discipline, and the effects of historians' social lives on their work.

Today there is much talk of a 'crisis of trust'; a crisis which is almost certainly genuine, but usually misunderstood. Trust: A History offers a new perspective on the ways in which trust and distrust have functioned in past societies, providing an empirical and historical basis against which the present crisis can be examined, and suggesting ways in which the concept of trust can be used as a tool to understand our own and other societies. Geoffrey Hosking argues that social trust is mediated through symbolic systems, such as religion and money, and the institutions associated with them, such as churches and banks. Historically these institutions have nourished trust, but the resulting trust networks have tended to create quite tough boundaries around themselves, across which distrust is projected against outsiders. Hosking also shows how nation-states have been particularly good at absorbing symbolic systems and generating trust among large numbers of people, while also erecting distinct boundaries around themselves, despite an increasingly global economy. He asserts that in the modern world it has become common to entrust major resources to institutions we know little about, and suggests that we need to learn from historical experience and temper this with more traditional forms of trust, or become an ever more distrustful society, with potentially very destabilising consequences.

This book tackles cultural mobilization in the First World War as a plural process of identity formation and de-formation. It explores eight different settings in which individuals, communities and conceptual paradigms were mobilized. Taking an interdisciplinary approach, it interrogates one of the most challenging facets of the history of the Great War, one that keeps raising key questions on the way cultures respond to times of crisis. Mobilization during the First World War was a major process of material and imaginative engagement unfolding on a military, economic, political and cultural level, and existing identities were dramatically challenged and questioned by the whirl of discourses and representations involved.

The dynamics of transnational memory play a central role in modern politics, from postsocialist efforts at transitional justice to the global legacies of colonialism. Yet, the relatively young subfield of transnational memory studies remains underdeveloped and fractured across numerous disciplines, even as nascent, boundary-crossing theories on topics such as multi-vocal, traveling, or entangled remembrance suggest new ways of negotiating difficult political questions. This volume brings together theoretical and practical considerations to provide transnational memory scholars with an interdisciplinary investigation into agency-the "who" and the "how" of cross-border commemoration that motivates activists and fascinates observers.

This journal, published twice yearly, explores and assesses the past of the socialist movement and the broader processes in relation to it, both for a historical understanding, and as a contribution to the movement's development and future. This issue considers America at the millennium.

This book is a microhistory study of village settlements in early modern Northwest Italy that aims to expand the notion of place to include the process of producing a locality; that is, the production of native local subjects through practices, rituals and other forms of collective action. Undertaking a micro-analytical approach, the book examines the customs and practices associated with typically fragmented and polycentric Italian village settlements to analyze the territorial tensions between various segments of a village and its neighbors. The microspatial analysis reveals how these tensions are the expressions of conflictual relationships between lay, ecclesiastical and charitable bodies culminating in a "culture of fragmentation" that impacts local economic and political practices. The book also traces how the production of locality survived throughout the nineenth and twentieth century and is still observed today. In this light, the study of practices and policies of locality over time that this book undertakes is an essential tool to better understand the nature and role of these social bonds in today's society. Archival records and the methods for approaching this source material are included within the text, making it an accessible and invaluable book for students and teachers of social and cultural history.

Americanness: Inquiries into the Thought and Culture of the United States analyzes several core themes that connect Americans because of, and despite, their pronounced diversity. The book investigates shared ideas and ideals, such as individualism, mobility, materialism, and future-orientation, that drive an overarching American worldview. Simon J. Bronner begins with ideas of space and time as they formed and changed through the history of the United States, before moving to the emergence of modern American culture. He examines reasons America is characterized as having a "victory culture" that extends to the American legal, military, and business complexes. This victory culture is further analyzed by looking at the country's relationship with the game of football-a sport that thrives in America but has not caught on in other countries. Finally, the volume probes American consumerism driven by a desire for individual prosperity in a supposedly egalitarian society. Using interdisciplinary approaches drawn from psychology, sociology, ethnology, and history, Bronner seeks explanations for people invoking, and evoking, ideas that they perceive as American. This book would be an invaluable addition to courses on American history, sociology, cultural studies, and American studies.

This book discusses an archival turn in the work of contemporary Caribbean writers and visual artists across linguistic locations and whose work engages critically with various historical narratives and colonial and postcolonial records. This refiguration opens a critical space and retells stories and histories previously occluded in/by those records, and in spaces of the public sphere. Through poetics and aesthetics of fragmentation largely influenced by music and popular culture, their work encourages contrapuntal ways of (re)thinking histories; ways that interrogate the influence of colonial narratives in processes of silencing but also centre the knowledge found in oral histories and other forms of artistic archives outside official repositories. Discussing literature and selected artwork by artists from Britain, Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Haiti, Puerto Rico, and Trinidad and Tobago, Memory and the Archival Turn in Caribbean Literature and Culture demonstrates the historiographical significance of artistic and cultural production.

Doing Oral History: A Practical Guide is considered the premier guidebook to oral history, used by professional oral historians, public historians, archivists, and genealogists as a core text in college courses and throughout the public history community. Over the past decades, the development of digital audio and video recording technology has continued to alter the practice of oral history, making it even easier to produce quality recordings and to disseminate them on the Internet. This basic manual offers detailed advice on setting up an oral history project, conducting interviews, making video recordings, preserving oral history collections in archives and libraries, and teaching and presenting oral history. Using the existing Q&A format, the third edition asks new questions and augments previous answers with new material, particularly in these areas: 1. Technology: As before, the book avoids recommending specific equipment, but weighs the merits of the types of technology available for audio and video recording, transcription, preservation, and dissemination. Information about web sites is expanded, and more discussion is provided about how other oral history projects have posted their interviews online. 2. Teaching: The new edition addresses the use of oral history in online teaching. It also expands the discussion of Institutional Review Boards (IRBs) with the latest information about compliance issues. 3. Presentation: Once interviews have been conducted, there are many opportunities for creative presentation. There is much new material available on innovative forms of presentation developed over the last decade, including interpretive dance and other public performances. 4. Legal considerations: The recent Boston College case, in which the courts have ruled that Irish police should have access to sealed oral history transcripts, has re-focused attention on the problems of protecting donor restrictions. The new edition offers case studies from the past decade. 5. Theory and Memory: As a beginner's manual, Doing Oral History has not dealt extensively with theoretical issues, on the grounds that these emerge best from practice. But the third edition includes the latest thinking about memory and provides a sample of some of the theoretical issues surrounding oral sources. It will include examples of increased studies into catastrophe and trauma, and the special considerations these have generated for interviewers. 6. Internationalism: Perhaps the biggest development in the past decade has been the spreading of oral history around the world, facilitated in part by the International Oral History Association. New oral history projects have developed in areas that have undergone social and political upheavals, where the traditional archives reflect the old regimes, particularly in Eastern Europe, the Middle East, Asia, Africa, and Latin America. The third edition includes many more references to non-U.S. projects that will still be relevant to an American audience. These changes make the third edition of Doing Oral History an even more useful tool for beginners, teachers, archivists, and all those oral history managers who have inherited older collections that must be converted to the latest technology.

This journal, published twice yearly, explores and assesses the past of the socialist movement and the broader processes in relation to it, both for a historical understanding, and as a contribution to the movement's development and future. This issue considers the future of history as a process.

This journal, published twice yearly, explores and assesses the past of the socialist movement and the broader processes in relation to it, both for a historical understanding, and as a contribution to the movement's development and future. This issue considers the future against the millennium.

This volume examines recent examples of Argentine literature, film, theatre and visual art from the children of the disappeared. By exploring their creative narration of childhood memories and the controversial use of parody, humour and fantasy, Maguire considers how this post-dictatorship generation are increasingly looking towards the past in order to disrupt the politics of the present. More broadly, this interdisciplinary study also scrutinizes the relevance of postmemory in a Latin American context, arguing that the politics of local Argentine memory practices must be taken actively into account if such a theoretical framework is to remain a productive and appropriate analytical lens. The Politics of Postmemory thus engages critically with theories of cultural memory in the Argentine, Latin American and global contexts, resulting in a timely and innovative text that will be of significant interest to students and scholars in the fields of, among others, cultural studies, film studies, critical theory and trauma studies.

This book takes a sociocultural, developmental and dialogical perspective to explore the constructive and interconnected nature of remembering and imagining. Conceived as cognitive-affective processes, both emerge at the border of the person and his or her socio-cultural world. Memory is approached as a functional adaption to the environment using the resources of the past in preparation for action in the present. Imagination is tightly related to memory in that both aim to escape the confines of the concrete here-and-now situation; however, while memory is primarily oriented to the past, imagination looks to the future. Both are embedded in the exchanges with the social and cultural milieu, and thus theorizing them has relied on key ideas from Lev Vygotsky, Frederic Bartlett and Mikhail Bakhtin. Thus, this book aims to integrate theories of remembering and imagining, through rich empirical studies in diverse cultural settings and concerning the development of self and identity. These two groups of studies compose the subparts that organize the book.

This volume brings together 25 defining texts in global history. These pieces cover approaches to the subject from antiquity to the present century and, taken together, show the development of the discipline, providing a solid historiographical, theoretical and methodological overview that will be invaluable for students. The collection gives a unique sense of how, at different times, in different cultural circumstances, students of the past have approached the problems of encompassing the world in a single narrative or theory. This is a reader with an implicit story to unfold. Felipe Fernandez-Armesto tracks how a global understanding of history originated in prophetic writings, how the "Renaissance discovery of the world" multiplied the opportunities for historians to think about history globally, how scientific investigations of change came to exert influence and inspire new thinking among global historians, how "culture wars" ensued between advocates of scientific and cultural models and how changing contexts in the 20th century produced new thematic approaches to the world as a whole. Each part is introduced, setting it in context and explaining the impact of its subject matter on the discipline, as well as the relations between the texts and their place in the overall development of global history.

The balance of power is one of the most influential ideas in international relations, yet it has never been systemically and comprehensively examined in pre-modern or non-European contexts. This book redresses this imbalance. The authors present eight new case studies of balancing and balancing failure in pre-modern and non-European international systems. The collective, multidisciplinary and international research effort yields an inescapable conclusion: much of the conventional wisdom about the balance of power does not survive intact with non-European evidence.

This book provides a fresh perspective on the familiar belief that memory policies are successful in building peaceful societies. Whether in a stable democracy or in the wake of a violent political conflict, this book argues that memory policies are unhelpful in preventing hate, genocide, and mass crimes. Since the 1990s, transmitting the memory of violent pasts has been utilised in attempts to foster tolerance and fight racism, hate and antisemitism. However, countries that invested in memory policies have overseen the rise of hate crimes and populisms instead of growing social cohesion. Breaking with the usual moralistic position, this book takes stock of this situation. Where do these memory policies come from? Whom do they serve? Can we make them more effective? In other words, can we really learn from the past? At a time when memory studies is blooming, this book questions the normative belief in the effects of memory.

England is remarkable for the wealth and variety of its archival heritage - the records created and preserved by institutions, organisations and individuals. This is the first book to treat the history of English records creation and record-keeping from the perspective of the archives themselves. Beginning in the early Middle Ages and ending in modern times, it draws on the author's extensive knowledge and experience as both archivist and historian, and presents the subject in a very readable and lively way. Some archives, notably those of government and the Established Church, have remarkably continuous histories. But all have suffered over time from periods of neglect and decay, and some have come to sudden and violent ends. Among the destructive episodes discussed in the book are the Viking raids of the Anglo-Saxon period, the Norman Conquest, the Peasants' Revolt, the dissolution of the monasteries and the bombing raids of the Second World War. Archivists and historians have a shared interest in the protection and study of the country's surviving records. This book has been written for members of both professions, but also for every reader who cares about the preservation of England's past.

Karl Leyser's intuitive and imaginative historical writing drew on deep reading in the primary sources and, above all, on an intimate knowledge of the major historians of the period displayed in this collection of his work. It was his contention that only through an understanding of the minds of such historians as Nithard, Regino of Prum, Widukind of Corvey and Thietmar of Merseburg, and a reconstruction of their outlook on the world, can we appreciate the aristocratic worlds which these historians depicted in their works.