HISTORY 2015
HISTORIOGRAPHY
Spring 2005
Alejandro de la Fuente
Tuesdays 6.00-8.30
WWPH 3700
Office Hours (3509 WWPH): T. 2-4, Th. 12-1
DESCRIPTION AND GOALS
"History", the discipline devoted to the study of the past, has its own history. The questions historians ask and the methods and sources they use have changed dramatically during the last few decades. Retrieving or understanding the past has never been simple or straightforward. This process has always been mediated by the historian/author, who plays an active role in constructing a vision of the past. Historians bring their own assumptions, political inclinations, and cultural biases to this process. They participate in the construction of the past through their narratives, which frequently provide a false sense of order and coherence to past events and through their sources, which are by definition incomplete and fragmentary. They determine what constitutes acceptable evidence and the questions and topics that are worth investigating.
This seminar looks at our own discipline and studies how historians have written about the past during the last few decades. We will study how the historians’ questions, their methods, and the amount and quality of their evidence have changed over time. We will probe their assumptions, hypotheses, and arguments. We will pay close attention to their writing and to their narratives strategies. The seminar seeks to introduce students to the main developments in historiography since the mid-20th century and to recent debates concerning our discipline. It should also help them define consciously which historiographic tradition is closer to their own interests and to assess its possibilities and shortcomings. We begin our explorations in the post-World War Two years, with the highly influential French School of the Annales and finish with the heated debates concerning post-modernism, a theme that continues to divide the historical profession. Along the way, we will have the opportunity to read some of the best work ever produced by historians.
REQUIREMENTS
1. This is a graduate seminar. Mastery of weekly readings and readiness to discuss them is not just required, but expected. There will be a package with book chapters for the students to copy. Journal articles are available online and can be downloaded. The books that can be purchased at the book store are listed below.
2. Three papers of no more than five (5) typed, double-space pages, due in class on January 18th, February 15th, and March 15th. The questions for each paper are defined below.
3. One final paper of no more than ten (10) typed, double-space pages, due on April 26th, at noon. I will provide instructions for this paper in early April.
Books available at the book store:
Georg G. Iggers, Historiography in the Twentieth-Century: From Scientific Objectivity to the Postmodern Challenge (Middletown: Wesleyan University Press, 1997)
Fernand Braudel, The Mediterranean and the Mediterranean World in the Age of Philip II (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1996 [1949]), 2 vols
E.P. Thompson, The Making of the English Working Class (New York: Vintage Books, 1966 [1963])
Robert Fogel and Stanley Engerman, Time on the Cross: the Economics of American Negro Slavery (New York: W.W. Norton, 1995 [1974]). Vol.1
Herbert Gutman, Slavery and the Numbers Game: a Critique of Time on the Cross (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2003)
Immanuel Wallerstein, World-Systems Analysis: an Introduction (Durham: Duke University Press, 2004)
Emmanuel LeRoy Ladurie, Montaillou (New York: Vintage Books, 1979 [1975]).
Carlo Ginzburg, The Cheese and the Worms: the Cosmos of a Sixteenth-Century Miller (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1992 [1976])
Natalie Z. Davis, The Return of Martin Guerre (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1983)
Michel Foucault, Discipline and Punish: the Birth of the Prison (New York: Vintage Books, 1995 [1975]).
Joan W. Scott, Gender and the Politics of History (New York: Columbia University Press, 1999 [1988]
James Goodman, Stories of Scottsboro (New York: Vintage Books, 1994)
Bryan D. Palmer, Descent into Discourse: the Reification of Language and the Writing of Social History (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1990)
GRADING
Final grades will be calculated as follows: oral participation will count for 40 percent, papers for 60 percent. Except for a true personal emergency, I will not give incompletes for this class.
SCHEDULE OF READINGS AND MEETINGS
January 11
Introduction
January 18
Overview: Trends in Recent Historiography
Georg G. Iggers, Historiography in the Twentieth-Century: From Scientific Objectivity to the Postmodern Challenge (Middletown: Wesleyan University Press, 1997).
Michael Bentley, Modern Historiography: an Introduction (New York: Routledge, 1999), chapter 14 “The History of the Present,” 137-48.
Lynn Hunt, “Introduction: History, Culture, and Text,” in The New Cultural History, ed. Lynn Hunt (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1989), 1-22.
Victoria E. Bonnell and Lynn Hunt, “Introduction,” in Beyond the Cultural Turn: New Directions in the Study of Society and Culture (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1999), 1-32.
Social Science Approaches
January 25
The Annales School (Second Phase)
Fernand Braudel, The Mediterranean and the Mediterranean World in the Age of Philip II (Berkeley and L.A.: University of California Press, 1996 [1949]), 2 vols. Vol. 1: “Preface to the first edition”, pp. 17-22, Part 1, chapters 4 and 5, Part 2, chapter 1, section 3 (“Is it possible to construct a model of the Mediterranean economy?”) 231-354, 418-61; Vol. 2: Part 2, chapter 5, Part 3, chapter 4, section 1 (“The Battle of 7th October, 1571”), and Conclusion, 704-56, 901-03, 1088-1106, 1238-44.
Peter Burke, The French Historical Revolution: the Annales School 1929-89 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1990), 32-53.
February 1
Marxist Historians
E.P. Thompson, The Making of the English Working Class (New York: Vintage Books, 1966 [1963]): Preface, chapters 5,6,10, and 16, 9-14, 102-212, 314-49, 711-832.
Ellen Kay Trimberger, “E. P. Thompson: Understanding the Process of History,” in Vision and Method in Historical Sociology, ed. Theda Skocpol (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1984), 210-43.
Guest discussant: Marcus Rediker
February 8
Cliometrics
Robert Fogel and Stanley Engerman, Time on the Cross: the Economics of American Negro Slavery (New York: W.W. Norton, 1995 [1974]). Vol.1, Prologue, Chapters 1, 3-4, 6, and Epilogue.
Herbert Gutman, Slavery and the Numbers Game: a Critique of Time on the Cross (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2003 [1975]), xi-xx, 1-87, 165-76.
Theodore Rabb, “The Development of Quantification in Historical Research,” Journal of Interdisciplinary History 13:4 (Spring 1983), 591-601.
Guest discussant: Werner Troesken
February 15
World Systems Analysis
Immanuel Wallerstein, World-Systems Analysis: an Introduction (Durham: Duke University Press, 2004).
Charles Ragin and Daniel Chirot, “The World System of Immanuel Wallerstein: Sociology and Politics as History”, Vision and Method in Historical Sociology, ed. Theda Skocpol (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1984), 276-312.
Steve Stern, “Feudalism, Capitalism, and the World-System in the Perspective of Latin America and the Caribbean,” AHR 93:4 (October 1988), 829-72.
Wallerstein, “Comments on Stern’s Critical Tests,” Ibid, 873-85. Stern, “Reply: Ever More Solitary,” Ibid, 886-97.
Postmodernism and the Revival of Narrative
A. The Anthropological Turn:
February 22
The Annales School (Third Phase)
Emmanuel LeRoy Ladurie, Montaillou (New York: Vintage Books, 1979 [1975]).
Leonard Boyle, “Montaillou Revisited: Mentalite and Methodology,” in Pathways to Medieval Peasants, ed. J. Raftis (Toronto: PIMS, 1981), 119-40.
Burke, The French Historical Revolution, 65-93.
March 1
Microhistory
Carlo Ginzburg, The Cheese and the Worms: the Cosmos of a Sixteenth-Century Miller (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1992 [1976]).
Giovanni Levi, “On Microhistory”, in New Perspectives on Historical Writing, ed. Peter Burke (University Park: Penn State University Press, 2001), 97-119.
Dominick LaCapra, “The Cheese and the Worms: the Cosmos of a Twentieth-Century Historian”, in his History and Criticism (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1985), 45-69.
March 8.
SPRING BREAK
March 15.
“Thick Descriptions”
Natalie Z. Davis, The Return of Martin Guerre (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1983)
Robert Finlay, “The Refashioning of Martin Guerre,” AHR 93:3 (June 1988), 553-71.
Davis, “On the Lame,” Ibid., 572-603.
Also of interest, but not required:
Clifford Geertz, “Thick Description: Toward an Interpretive Theory of Culture,” in his The Interpretation of Cultures: Selected Essays (New York: Basic Books, 2000 [1973]), 3-32.
B. The Linguistic Turn and the New Cultural History:
March 22
Foucault
Michel Foucault, Discipline and Punish: the Birth of the Prison (New York: Vintage Books, 1995 [1975]).
Patricia O’Brien, “Michel Foucault’s History of Culture,” in The New Cultural History, ed. Lynn Hunt (Berkeley & Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1989), 25-46
March 29
Gender
Joan W. Scott, Gender and the Politics of History (New York: Columbia University Press, 1999 [1988]).
Laura Lee Downs, “If "Woman" is Just an Empty Category, Then Why Am I Afraid to Walk Alone at Night? Identity Politics Meets the Postmodern Subject,” CSSH 35:2 (April 1993), 414-437.
Scott, “The Tip of the Volcano,” Ibid. 438-43.
Downs, Reply to Joan Scott, Ibid. 444-451.
Guest discussant: Lara Putnam
April 5 History and Narrative
James Goodman, Stories of Scottsboro (New York: Vintage Books, 1994).
Karen Halttunen, “Cultural History and the Challenge of Narrativity,” in Beyond the Cultural Turn, eds. Victoria Bonnell and Lynn Hunt (Berkeley & Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1999), 165-81.
Sarah Maza, “Stories in History: Cultural Narratives in Recent Works in European History,” AHR 101:4 (December 1996), 1493-1515.
April 12
New Voices: Subaltern Studies
Ranajit Guha, "The Prose of Counter-Insurgency", in Selected Subaltern Studies, ed. R. Guha and Gayatri Spivak (N.Y.: Oxford, 1988), 45-86.
Dipesh Chakrabarty, “Conditions for Knowledge of Working-Class Conditions: Employers, Government and the Jute Workers of Calcutta, 1890-1940,” Ibid., 179-230.
Dipesh Chakrabarty, Provincializing Europe: Postcolonial Thought and Historical Difference (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2000), chapters 1-4, pp. 27-113.
Florencia Mallon, “The Promise and Dilemma of Subaltern Studies: Perspectives from Latin American History,” AHR 99:5 (Dec. 1994), 1491-1515.
John Beverley, Subalternity and Representation: Arguments in Cultural Theory (Durham: Duke University Press, 1999), chapter 1, pp. 25-40.
Guest discussant: John Beverley (Hispanic Languages and Literatures)
April 19.
Postmodernism: Critiques and Debates
Bryan D. Palmer, Descent into Discourse: the Reification of Language and the Writing of Social History (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1990), 3-86, 187-218.
Gertrude Himmelfarb, “Telling It as You Like It: History and the Flight from Fact,” in The Postmodern History Reader, ed. Ketih Jenkins (New York: Routledge, 1997), 158-74.
Neville Kirk, “History, Language, Ideas and Postmodernism: a Materialist View,” in The Postmodern History Reader, 314-40
Patrick Joyce, “The end of Social History”? in The Postmodern History Reader, 341-65.
Sumit Sarkar, “Postmodernism and the Writing of History,” in his Beyond Nationalist Frames: Postmodernism, Hindu Fundamentalism, History (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2002), 154-94.
April 26
Final Papers Due
