History

This important new textbook provides an evaluation and overview of the state of history as it is imagined, conceptualised and practised today. Written by one of the leading 'postmodern historians' working today, the book represents a provocative re-thinking of our engagement with the past.
From its explicit postmodern position the book addresses the significance of the difference between ?the past? and ?history?.

• An introductory textbook aimed at the biggest single market in history - suitable for all history and theory/introduction to history courses.
• Provides an up-to-the-minute survey of conventional history thinking and practice - relevant and useful for students and would-be historians.
• Offers the first detailed analysis of historical thinking and practice from a 'postmodern' perspective - radical and provocative.
• Takes a highly unusual approach - the first book to bring the philosophy of history into everyday considerations of historical thinking and practice.

Introduction: What is History?

Section One: Epistemology and Historical Knowing

1. The History of Historical Thinking

2. Inference, Causation, Agency and Meaning

Section Two: Referentiality, Evidence and Practice

3. Evidence, Reality and Correspondence

4. Objectivity, Truth and Relativism in History

Section Three: Theory and Concept

5. The History of Social Theory

6. Constructing Histories

Section Four: Writing the Past as History

7. Narrative and Representation

8. History as Historiography

Conclusion

Guide to Further Reading

Notes

Historiography [LONGMAN UK IMPORTS] (Historiography)

Alun Munslow is editor of the journal Rethinking History. He is the author of 3 history books already, and is one of the big names in History and Theory in the UK

The notion of ?history? has always been one strenuously debated by both academics and the wider population. This deeply provocative re-thinking of our engagement with the past by one of the world?s leading post-modern historians takes that debate one step further.

Alun Munslow re-assesses history in the light of post-modernism and other intellectual challenges which have questioned the primacy of the modernist epistemology of empiricism. In an original and stimulating vision of history that will intrigue all those seriously interested in the subject, Munslow argues that history is not only about the sources, but a literary construction.

Munslow concludes that history, as a cultural narrative about the past can never tell us what the past really means. This far reaching conclusion is based on the radical idea that the content of history is defined as much by the nature of the language used to represent and interpret that content as it is by research into the sources. This suggests that history does not produce the most likely meaning of the past but rather can only generate alternative meanings.

The lead volume in a major new series on historical thinking and practice, this is an accessible yet absorbing study that breaks new ground in discussing the stage history is at now, and perhaps most engagingly, the direction it will take in the future.

Alun Munslow is Professor of History and Historical Theory at the University of Staffordshire. He is the author of Deconstructing History, The Routledge Companion to Historical Studies and is the UK Editor of Rethinking History: The Journal of Theory and Practice.

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This title is a member of the History: Concepts,Theories and Practice, which also contains the titles below . You can also visit the History: Concepts,Theories and Practice page.

This book looks at the changes that caused the crisis in the study of class and shows how new, vibrant theories have appeared that will drive forward our understanding of history and sociology.

Dworkin traces contemporary understanding of social class and argues that claims about its lack of importance in modern society are incorrect. He works to discuss its status as an explanatory concept for historians, sociologists and those studying culture. In doing so, he examines contemporary discussions and debates to assess the position of class now and through history.

 

• Class Struggles
  Dworkin
  © 2007 | Longman | Paper; 272 pages | Instock
  ISBN-10: 1405801387 | ISBN-13: 9781405801386
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To deal with film is to deal with a historical game pretty much outside the control of historians.This book provides a broad historical and theoretical overview to the rapidly growing field of history and film. It introduces the varieties, types, and traditions of historical films made in Hollywood, Europe, and the rest of the world and the various and changing ways historians and other public critics (reviewers, teachers, politicians, historical actors) have greeted, evaluated, and debated the way particular historical events and history in have been presented on the screen.

 

Rosenstone argues that historical films utilize specific codes of conventions, visual, aural and dramatic, to engage us with and alter and complexify our view of the past. This allows film to create a sort of new history, one that we must approach with new conceptual tools if we are to evaluate its contribution to our understanding of the past.

 

Suitable for undergraduate history and film studies students studying history and film.
• History on Film/Film on History
  Rosenstone
  © 2006 | Longman | Paper; 200 pages | Instock
  ISBN-10: 0582505844 | ISBN-13: 9780582505841
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Barbara Bush has taken up a remarkable challenge. Through significant case studies, she has produced a strikingly original and formidably wide-ranging examination of the conceptual and theoretical approaches which help us to understand the forms of imperial authority that have shaped our world. The cumulative effect is indeed impressive, and the book will be invaluable to all those who wish to understand globalization and the power relationships which underlie it.

Professor John MacKenzie, Professor Emeritus of Imperial History, Lancaster University

This account of imperialism explores recent intellectual, theoretical and conceptual developments in imperial history, including interdisciplinary and post-colonial perspectives. Exploring the links between empire and domestic history, it looks at the interconnections and comparisons between empire and imperial power within wider developments in world history, covering the period from the Roman to the present American empire.

The book begins by examining the nature of empire, then looks at continuity and change in the historiography of imperialism and theoretical and conceptual developments. It covers themes such as the relationship between imperialism and modernity, culture and national identity in Britain.

Suitable for undergraduates taking courses in imperial and colonial history.

• Imperialism and Postcolonialism
  Bush
  © 2006 | Longman | Paper; 304 pages | Instock
  ISBN-10: 0582505836 | ISBN-13: 9780582505834
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This important new textbook provides an evaluation and overview of the state of history as it is imagined, conceptualised and practised today. Written by one of the leading 'postmodern historians' working today, the book represents a provocative re-thinking of our engagement with the past.
From its explicit postmodern position the book addresses the significance of the difference between ?the past? and ?history?.


• The New History
  Munslow
  © 2004 | Longman | Paper; 248 pages | Instock
  ISBN-10: 0582472822 | ISBN-13: 9780582472822
  Brief Description | Buy from myPearsonStore
  
  

Pearson Higher Education offers special pricing when you choose to package your text with other student resources. If you're interested in creating a cost-saving package for your students contact your Pearson Higher Education representative.