Historiography
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Historiography is the study of the history and methodology of the discipline of history. As such, it uses
semiotics to consider how knowledge of the past is obtained and transmitted.
(1) Formally, historiography examines the writing of history, the use of
historical methods, drawing upon authorship,
sources, interpretation,
style,
bias, and the reader; moreover,
historiography also denotes a body of historical work.
Scholars discuss historiography topically, i.e. the “historiography of
Catholicism,” the “
historiography of early Islam,” the “
historiography of China,” etc., and the approaches and
genres include
oral history and
social history. Beginning in the nineteenth century, at the ascent of
academic history, a corpus of historiography literature developed, including
What is History? (1961), by
E. H. Carr, and
Metahistory (1973), by
Hayden White.
Defining historiography
There are two basic issues involved in historiography. First, the study of the development of history as an academic discipline over time, as well as its development in different cultures and epochs. Second, the study of the academic tools, methods and approaches that have been and are being used, including the
historical method. The term "historiography" can also refer to a specific body of historical writing that was written at a specific time concerning a specific subject. For instance, a statement about "medieval historiography" would refer to some issue in the
academic discipline of Medieval History, and not to the
actual history of the Middle Ages or to historical works
written in that time (e.g., "during the last century, medieval historiography changed its focus from the study of political events to that of social and mental structures", or "medieval historiography has largely benefited from the recognition of the importance of parish records": that is, the discipline underwent some change).
Conal Furay and
Michael J. Salevouris define historiography as "the study of the way history has been and is written — the history of historical writing... When you study 'historiography' you do not study the events of the past directly, but the changing interpretations of those events in the works of individual historians."
(2) One should be cautious, however, that in the sense given in the previous paragraph when a historian
does historiography they are actually studying "the events of the past directly".
Questions studied
Some of the common questions of historiography are:
- Reliability of the sources used, in terms of authorship, credibility of the author, and the authenticity or corruption of the text. (See also source criticism).
- Historiographical tradition or framework. Every historian uses one (or more) historiographical traditions, for example Marxist, Annales School, "total history", or political history.
- Moral issues, guilt assignment, and praise assignment
- Revisionism versus orthodox interpretations
- Historical metanarratives
Issues engaged by
critical historiography include:
- What constitutes a historical "event"?
- In what modes does a historian write and produce statements of "truth" and "fact"?
- How does the medium (novel, textbook, film, theatre, comic) through which historical information is conveyed influence its meaning?
- How do historians establish their own objectivity or come to terms with their own subjectivity?
- What is the relationship between historical theory and historical practice?
- What is the "goal" of history?
- What does history teach us?
The history of written history
Understanding the past appears to be a universal human need, and the telling of history has emerged independently in civilisations around the world. What constitutes history is a philosophical question (see
philosophy of history). For the purposes of this article it is taken to mean written history recorded in a narrative format for the purpose of informing future generations about events.
Hellenic world
The earliest known systematic historical thought in the Western world emerged in
ancient Greece, a development which would be an important influence on the writing of history elsewhere around the
the Mediterranean region.
Greek historians greatly contributed to the development of historical methodology. The earliest known critical historical works were
The Histories, composed by
Herodotus of Halicarnassus (484 BC–ca.425 BC) who later became known as the 'father of history' (Cicero). Herodotus attempted to distinguish between more and less reliable accounts, and personally conducted research by travelling extensively, giving written accounts of various
Mediterranean cultures. Although Herodotus' overall emphasis lay on the actions and characters of men, he also attributed an important role to divinity in the determination of historical events.The generation following Herodotus witnessed a spate of local histories of the individual city-states (
poleis), written by the first of the
local historians who employed the written archives of city and sanctuary.
Dionysius of Halicarnassus characterized these historians as the forerunners of Thucydides
(3), and these local histories continued to be written into Late Antiquity, as long as the city-states survived. Two early figures stand out:
Hippias of Elis, who produced the lists of winners in the Olympic Games that provided the basic chronological framework as long as the pagan classical tradition lasted, and
Hellanicus of Lesbos, who compiled more than two dozen histories from civic records, all of them now lost.
Thucydides largely eliminated divine causality in his account of the war between Athens and Sparta, establishing a rationalistic element which set a precedent for subsequent Western historical writings. He was also the first to distinguish between cause and immediate origins of an event, while his successor
Xenophon (ca. 431–355 BC) introduced autobiographical elements and character studies in his
Anabasis. The proverbial
Philippic attacks of the Athenian orator
Demosthenes (384-322 BC) on
Philip II of Macedon marked the height of ancient political agitation. The now lost history of Alexander's campaigns by the
diadoch Ptolemy I (367-283 BC) may represent the first historical work composed by a ruler.
Polybius (ca. 203–120 BC) wrote on the rise of Rome to world prominence, and attempted to harmonize the Greek and Roman points of view.The
Chaldean priest
Berossus (fl. 3rd century{{Clarify|date=September 2009}}) composed a Greek-language
History of Babylonia for the
Seleucid king
Antiochus I, combining
Hellenistic methods of historiography and
Mesopotamian accounts to form a unique composite. Reports exist of other near-eastern histories, such as that of the Phoenician historian
Sanchuniathon; but he is considered semi-legendary and writings attributed to him are fragmentary, known only through the later historians
Philo of Byblos and
Eusebius, who asserted that he wrote before even the
Trojan war.
China
missing image!
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upFirst page of the Shiji
In
China, the
Classic of History is one of the
Five Classics of
Chinese classic texts and one of the earliest narratives of China. The
Spring and Autumn Annals, the official chronicle of the State of Lu covering the period from 722 BCE to 481 BCE, is among the earliest surviving Chinese historical texts to be arranged on
annalistic principles. It is traditionally attributed to
Confucius. The
Zuo Zhuan, attributed to
Zuo Qiuming in the 5th century BCE, is the earliest Chinese work of narrative history and covers the period from 722 BCE to 468 BCE.
Zhan Guo Ce was a renowned ancient Chinese historical compilation of sporadic materials on the
Warring States Period compiled between the 3rd and 1st centuries BCE.
Sima Qian (around 100 BCE) was the first in China to lay the groundwork for professional historical writing. His written work was the
Shiji (
Records of the Grand Historian), a monumental lifelong achievement in literature. Its scope extends as far back as the 16th century BCE, and it includes many treatises on specific subjects and individual biographies of prominent people, and also explores the lives and deeds of commoners, both contemporary and those of previous eras. His work influenced every subsequent author of history in China, including the prestigious Ban family of the
Eastern Han Dynasty era.Traditionalist Chinese historiography describes history in terms of dynastic cycles. In this view, each new dynasty is founded by a morally righteous founder. Over time, the dynasty becomes morally corrupt and dissolute. Eventually, the dynasty becomes so weak as to allow its replacement by a new dynasty.
Roman world
The Romans adopted the Greek tradition, becoming the first European people to write history in a non-Greek language{{Citation needed|date=September 2009}}. While early Roman works were still written in Greek, the
Origines, composed by the Roman statesman
Cato the Elder (234–149 BC), was written in Latin, in a conscious effort to counteract Greek cultural influence. It marked the beginning of Latin historical writings. Hailed for its lucid style,
Julius Caesar's (100 BC–44 BC)
Bellum Gallicum may represent the earliest autobiographical war coverage.{{Citation needed|date=July 2008}} The politician and orator
Cicero (106–43 BC) introduced rhetorical elements in his political writings.
Strabo (63 BC–c. AD 24) was an important exponent of the Greco-Roman tradition of combining geography with history, presenting a descriptive history of peoples and places known to his era.
Livy (59 BC–AD 17) records the rise of
Rome from city-state to world dominion. His speculation about what would have happened if
Alexander the Great had marched against Rome represents the first known instance of
alternate history.
(4)Biography, although popular throughout antiquity, was introduced as a branch of history by the works of
Plutarch (c. 46-127) and
Suetonius (c.69-after 130) who described the deeds and characters of ancient personalities, stressing their human side.
Tacitus (c.56–c.117) denounces Roman immorality by praising
German virtues, elaborating on the
topos of the
Noble savage.
Christendom
The growth of
Christianity and its enhanced status in the Roman Empire after
Constantine I led to the development of a distinct Christian historiography, influenced by both Christian theology and the nature of the Bible, encompassing new areas of study and views of history. The central role of the Bible in Christianity is reflected in the preference of Christian historians for written sources, compared to the classical historians' preference for oral sources and is also reflected in the inclusion of politically unimportant people. Christian historians also focused on development of religion and society. This can be seen in the extensive inclusion of written sources in the
Ecclesiastical History written by
Eusebius of Caesarea around 324 and in the subjects it covers.
(5) Christian theology considered time as linear, progressing according to divine plan. As God's plan encompassed everyone, Christian histories in this period had a universal approach. For example, Christian writers often included summaries of important historical events prior to the period covered by the work.
(6)missing image!
- Beda Petersburgiensis f3v.jpg -
upA page of Bede's Ecclesiastical History of the English People
Writing history was popular among Christian monks and clergy in the
Middle Ages. They wrote about the history of Jesus Christ, that of the Church and that of their patrons, the dynastic history of the local rulers. In the
Early Middle Ages historical writing often took the form of
annals or
chronicles recording events year by year, but this style tended to hamper the analysis of events and causes.
(7) An example of this type of writing is the
Anglo-Saxon Chronicles, which were the work of several different writers: it was started during the reign of
Alfred the Great in the late 9th century, but one copy was still being updated in 1154. Some writers in the period did construct a more
narrative form of history. These included
Gregory of Tours, and more successfully
Bede who wrote both
secular and
ecclesiastical history and is known for writing the
Ecclesiastical History of the English People.
(8) Biruni is considered the father of
Indology for his detailed studies on
Indian history.
(9)Archaeology in the Middle East began with the study of the
ancient Near East by Muslim historians in the medieval
Islamic world who developed an interest in learning about pre-Islamic cultures. In particular, they most often concentrated on the archaeology and history of
pre-Islamic Arabia,
Mesopotamia and
ancient Egypt. In
Egyptology, the first known attempts at deciphering
Egyptian hieroglyphs were made in
Islamic Egypt by
Dhul-Nun al-Misri and
Ibn Wahshiyya in the 9th century, who were able to at least partly understand what was written in the ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs, by relating them to the contemporary
Coptic language used by
Coptic priests in their time.
(10) Muslim historians such as Abu al-Hassan al-Hamadani of
Yemen (d. 945),
Abdul Latif al-Baghdadi (1162–1231) and Al-Idrisi of
Egypt (d. 1251) developed elaborate archaeological
methods which they employed in their excavations and research of ancient archaeological sites.
(11)
Islamic historical writing eventually culminated in the first detailed critical studies on the subject of historiography itself and the first critiques of
historical methods in the works of the
Arab Muslim historian and historiographer
Ibn Khaldun (1332-1406), who published his critical historiographical studies in the
Muqaddimah (translated as
Prolegomena) and
Kitab al-I'bar (
Book of Advice).
(12) Among many other things, his
Muqaddimah laid the groundwork for the observation of the roles of
state,
communication,
propaganda and
systematic bias in history,
(13) and he discussed the rise and fall of
civilizations. He also developed a
scientific method for the study of history, and is thus considered to be the founder of historiography,
(14)(15) or the "father of the
philosophy of history".
(16) In the preface to the
Muqaddimah, Ibn Khaldun warned of seven mistakes that he thought historians often committed. In this criticism, he approached the past as strange and in need of interpretation. The originality of Ibn Khaldun was to claim that the cultural differences of another age must govern the evaluation of relevant historical material, to distinguish the principles according to which it might be possible to attempt the evaluation, and lastly, to consider the need for experience, in addition to rational principles, in order to assess a culture of the past. Ibn Khaldun often criticized "idle
superstition and uncritical acceptance of historical data." As a result, he introduced a
scientific method to the study of history, which was considered something "new to his age", and he often referred to it as his "new science", now associated with historiography.
(17) The
Muqaddimah is also the earliest known work to critically examine
military history, criticizing certain accounts of historical battles that appear to be exaggerated, and takes
military logistics into account when questioning the exaggerated sizes of historical armies reported in earlier sources.
(18)Franz Rosenthal wrote in the
History of Muslim Historiography:
Modern era
Modern historiography began with
Ranke in the 19th century, who was very critical on the sources used in history. He was opposed to analyses and rationalizations. His motto was to write history the way it was. He wanted
eyewitness accounts and wanted an emphasis on the point of view of the eyewitness.
Hegel and
Marx introduced the changes in society to history. Former historians had focused on cyclical events of the rise and decline of rulers and nations. A new discipline,
sociology, emerged in the late 19th century and analyzed and compared these perspectives on a larger scale. The French
Annales School radically changed history during the 20th century.
Fernand Braudel wanted history to become more scientific and less subjective, and demanded more quantitative evidence. Furthermore, he introduced a socio-economic and geographic framework to historical questions. Other French historians, like
Philippe Ariès and
Michel Foucault, described the history of everyday topics such as death and sexuality. They wanted history to cover every possible topic and answer every question.
Foundation of important historical journals
The historical journal, a forum where academic historians could exchange ideas and publish newly discovered information, came into being in the 19th century. The early journals were similar to those for the physical sciences, and were seen as a means for history to become more professional. Journals also helped historians to establish various historiographical approaches, the most notable example of which was
Annales. Économies. Sociétés. Civilisations., a publication instrumental in establishing the
Annales School.Some historical journals are as follows:
Approaches to history
{{Cleanup-section|date=August 2009}}The question of how a historian approaches historical events is one of the most important questions within historiography. It is commonly recognised by historians that, in themselves, individual historical facts are not particularly meaningful. Such facts will only become useful when assembled with other historical evidence, and the process of assembling this evidence is understood as a particular historiographical approach. Some of the more common historiographical approaches are:
See also
{{Too many see alsos}}
Tertiary source — compilations of other source material
References
-
["What History Is Good For" book review by David M. Kennedy in The New York Times July 16, 2009]
-
[(The Methods and Skills of History: A Practical Guide, 1988, p. 223, ISBN 0-88295-982-4)]
-
[Dionysius, On Thucydides, 5.]
-
[Livy's History of Rome: Book 9]
-
[Historiography, Concordia University Wisconsin , retrieved on 2 November 2007]
-
[Warren, John (1998). The past and its presenters: an introduction to issues in historiography, Hodder & Stoughton, ISBN 0-340-67934-4, p. 67-68.]
-
[Warren, John (1998). The past and its presenters: an introduction to issues in historiography, Hodder & Stoughton, ISBN 0-340-67934-4, p. 78-79.]
-
Islamic world
{{See also|Muslim historians|Prophetic biography|Biographical evaluation|Science of hadith}}Muslim historical writings first began to develop in the 7th century, with the reconstruction of the Prophet Muhammad's life in the centuries following his death. With numerous conflicting narratives regarding Muhammad and his companions from various sources, it was necessary to verify which sources were more reliable. In order to evaluate these sources, various methodologies were developed, such as the "science of biography", "science of hadith" and "Isnad" (chain of transmission). These methodologies were later applied to other historical figures in the Islamic civilization. Famous historians in this tradition include Urwah (d. 712), Wahb ibn Munabbih (d. 728), Ibn Ishaq (d. 761), al-Waqidi (745-822), Ibn Hisham (d. 834), Muhammad al-Bukhari (810-870) and Ibn Hajar (1372-1449).Historians of the medieval Islamic world also developed an interest in world history. The historian Muhammad ibn Jarir al-Tabari (838-923) is known for writing a detailed and comprehensive chronicle of Mediterranean and Middle Eastern history in his History of the Prophets and Kings in 915. Until the 10th century, history most often meant political and military history, but this was not so with Persian historian Biruni (973-1048). In his Kitab fi Tahqiq ma l'il-Hind (Researches on India) he did not record political and military history in any detail, but wrote more on India's cultural, scientific, social and religious history. He expanded on his idea of history in another work, The Chronology of the Ancient Nations.[M. S. Khan (1976). "al-Biruni and the Political History of India", Oriens 25, p. 86-115.]
-
[Zafarul-Islam Khan, At The {{sic|Threshhold}} Of A New Millennium – II, The Milli Gazette.]
-
[Dr. Okasha El Daly (2005), Egyptology: The Missing Millennium: Ancient Egypt in Medieval Arabic Writings, UCL Press, ISBN 1844720632. (cf. Arabic Study of Ancient Egypt, Foundation for Science Technology and Civilisation.)]
-
[{{citation|title=Egyptology: The Missing Millennium : Ancient Egypt in Medieval Arabic Writings|first=Okasha|last=El Daly|publisher=Routledge|year=2004|isbn=1844720632|pages=45–7}}]
-
[S. Ahmed (1999). A Dictionary of Muslim Names. C. Hurst & Co. Publishers. ISBN 1850653569.]
-
[H. Mowlana (2001). "Information in the Arab World", Cooperation South Journal 1.]
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[Salahuddin Ahmed (1999). A Dictionary of Muslim Names. C. Hurst & Co. Publishers. ISBN 1850653569.]
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[{{citation|title=Ibn Khaldun: His Life and Works|first=Muhammed Abdullah|last=Enan|publisher=The Other Press|year=2007|isbn=9839541536|page=v}}]
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[Dr. S. W. Akhtar (1997). "The Islamic Concept of Knowledge", Al-Tawhid: A Quarterly Journal of Islamic Thought & Culture 12 (3).]
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[Ibn Khaldun, Franz Rosenthal, N. J. Dawood (1967), The Muqaddimah: An Introduction to History, p. x, Princeton University Press, ISBN 0691017549.]
-
[Ibn Khaldun, Franz Rosenthal, N. J. Dawood (1967), The Muqaddimah: An Introduction to History, pp. 11-2, Princeton University Press, ISBN 0691017549.]
Bibliography
Theory and philosophy
- Frank Ankersmit (ed), A New Philosophy of History, 1995, ISBN 0-226-02100-9
- Michael Bentley, Modern Historiography: An Introduction, 1999 ISBN 0-415-20267-1
- Marc Bloch, The Historian's Craft [1940?]
- Peter Burke, History and Social Theory, Polity Press, Oxford, 1992
- David Cannadine (editor), What is History Now, Palgrave Macmillan, 2002
- Gardiner, Juliet (ed) What is History Today...? London: MacMillan Education Ltd., 1988.
- E. H. Carr, What is History? 1961, ISBN 0-394-70391-X
- R.G. Collingwood, The Idea of History, 1936, ISBN 0-19-285306-6
- Geoffrey Elton, The Practice of History, 1969, ISBN 0-631-22980-9
- Richard J. Evans In Defence of History, 1997, ISBN 1862071047
- David Hackett Fischer, Historians' Fallacies: Towards a Logic of Historical Thought, Harper & Row, 1970.
- Keith Jenkins, Rethinking History, 1991, ISBN 0-415-30443-1
- Keith Jenkins, ed. The Postmodern History Reader (2006)
- Arthur Marwick, The Nature of History, 1970, ISBN 0-333-10941-4
- Joyce Appleby, Lynn Hunt & Margaret Jacob, Telling the Truth About History. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1994.
- Alun Munslow. The Routledge Companion to Historical Studies (2000)
- Roger Spalding & Christopher Parker, Historiography: An Introduction, 2008, ISBN 0719072859
- John Tosh, The Pursuit of History, 2002, ISBN 0-582-77254-0
- W.H. Walsh, An Introduction to Philosophy of History, 1951.
- Hayden White, The Content of Form: Narrative Discourse and Historical Representation, Johns Hopkins, 1987, ISBN 0-8018-4115-1
- Hayden White, The Fiction of Narrative: Essays on History, Literature, and Theory, 1957-2007, Johns Hopkins, 2010. Ed. Robert Doran
Histories of historical writing
- Geoffrey Barraclough, History: Main Trends of Research in the Social and Human Sciences, (1978)
- Michael Bentley (ed.), Companion to Historiography, Routledge, 1997, ISBN 0-415-28557-7 990pp; 39 chapters by experts
- Ernst Breisach, Historiography: Ancient, Medieval and Modern, 3rd edition, 2007, ISBN 0-226-07278-9
- Adam Budd (ed.). The Modern Historiography Reader: Western Sources. London: Routledge, 2009.
- H. Floris Cohen, The Scientific Revolution: A Historiographical Inquiry, Chicago, 1994, ISBN 0-226-11280-2
- Mark T. Gilderhus, History an Historiographical Introduction, 2002, ISBN 0-13-044824-9
- Georg G. Iggers, Historiography in the 20th Century: From Scientific Objectivity to the Postmodern Challenge (2005)
- Susan Kinnell, Historiography: An Annotated Bibliography of Journal Article, Books and Dissertations, 1987, ISBN 0-87436-168-0
- Lloyd Kramer and Sarah Maza, eds. A Companion to Western Historical Thought Blackwell 2006. 520pp; ISBN 978-1-4051-4961-7.
- Arnaldo Momigliano, The Classical Foundation of Modern Historiography, 1990, ISBN 9780226072838
- Philippe Poirrier, Aborder l'histoire, Paris, Seuil, 2000.
- Philippe Poirrier,Les enjeux de l'histoire culturelle, Paris, Seuil, 2004.
- Philippe Poirrier, Introduction à l'historiographie, Paris, Belin, 2009.
- Daniel Woolf, Historiography, in New Dictionary of the History of Ideas, ed. M.C. Horowitz, New York, Scribner, 2005, vol. I.
Feminist historiography
- Mary Ritter Beard, Woman as force in history: A study in traditions and realities
- Gerda Lerner, The Majority Finds its Past: Placing Women in History, New York: Oxford University Press 1979
- Bonnie G. Smith, The Gender of History: Men, Women, and Historical Practice, Harvard UP 2000
- Mary Spongberg, Writing women's history since the Renaissance, Palgrave Macmillan, 2002
- Julie Des Jardins, Women and the Historical Enterprise in America, University of North Carolina Press, 2002
- Judith M. Bennett, History Matters: Patriarchy and the Challenge of Feminism, University of Pennsylvania Press, 2006
Thematic and regional
- Cappel,Constance. "The Smallpox Genocide of the Odawa Tribe at L'Arbre Croche, 1763: The History of a Native American People". The Edwin Mellen Press,(2007)
- John Ernest. Liberation Historiography: African American Writers and the Challenge of History, 1794-1861. University of North Carolina Press, 2004
- Frank Farrell. Themes in Australian History: Questions, Issues and Interpretation in an Evolving Historiography (1990)
- Marc Ferro, Cinema and History, Wayne State University Press, 1988
- R. Darcy and Richard C. Rohrs, A Guide to Quantitative History (1995)
- Hudson, Pat. History by Numbers: An Introduction to Quantitative Approaches (2002)
- James W. Loewen, Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong, Touchstone Books 1996
- Tessa Morris-Suzuki, The Past Within Us: Media, Memory, History, 2005, ISBN 1-85984-513-4
- Gary Nash, Charlotte Crabtree, and Ross Dunn. History on Trial: Culture Wars and the Teaching of the Past, (2000)
- Peter Novick, That Noble Dream: The "Objectivity Question" and the American Historical Profession (1988), ISBN 0-521-34328-3
- Uri Ram, The Future of the Past in Israel - A Sociology of Knowledge Approach, in Benny Morris, Making Israel, the University of Michigan Press, 2007.
- Thomas Söderqvist. The Historiography of Contemporary Science and Technology (1997)
- Sommer, Barbara W. The Oral History Manual (2003)
- Jan Vansina, "Oral Tradition as History," University of Wisconsin Press, Madison, 1985
- Yerushalmi, Yosef Hayim. Zakhor: Jewish History and Jewish Memory (1982)
- Keita, Maghan. Race and the Writing of History. Oxford UP (2000)
- Dawidowicz, Lucy S. The Holocaust and Historians. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1981.
Journals
External links
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