HIST595 - Historical Practices
Russian Topo Map, East Africa, detail
Historical Practices
The production of historical knowledge is driven by asking new questions and the revisiting of old questions with new insight. New questions also lead to the rethinking of known sources and the discovery of new ones. Our discipline is also increasingly driven by developments in the relationship between historians and their audiences.
This course asks students to read works that encourage the rethinking of sources and their possible historical meanings. It also encourages them to experiment – by means of a set of practical assignments – with sources, methods, questions, technologies, theoretical insights, and presentation strategies.
Course meetings alternate between the discussion of exemplary theoretical/practical works and the presentation of brief research assignments.
Course syllabus - the most recent version of the syllabus. Supersedes all previous versions, paper or electronic.
Useful links, courtesy of Theresa Mudrock, History librarian at Suzzallo Library
Additional Material - a few readings are available via OUGL reserve - they are marked indicated on the syllabus; the remaining readings may be downloaded directly here
Meeting of October 7
Alexander Stille, “The Latest Obscenity Has Seven Letters” New York Times 13 September 2003.
E. P. Thompson, “Time, Work-Discipline, and Industrial Capitalism,” Past and Present 38 (1967): 56-97.
Jan Vansina, “Once Upon a Time: Oral Traditions as History in Africa,” Daedalus 100 (1971): 442-468.
Martin Bunzl, “Counterfactual History: A User’s Guide,” American Historical Review 109 (2004): 845-858.
Robert Darnton, “Google & the Future of Books,” The New York Review of Books 56, no. 2 February 12, 2009.
Steven Johnson, “How the E-Book Will Change the Way We Read and Write,” The Wall Street Journal, April 20, 2009.
Michael Meyer, “About That Book Advance ...,” The New York Times, April 12, 2009.
Meeting of October 21
Henrik Hertzberg, “Tangled Web: In Search Of Reagan’s Brain, Starring Edmund Morris,” New Yorker 75 (October 1999): 94-9.
Jill Lepore, “Just the Facts, Ma’am; Fake Memoirs, Factual Fictions, and The History Of History,” The New Yorker, 24 March 2008, 79-83.
Meeting of November 4
all readings for this week are available at OUGL
Meeting of December 2
Edward Tufte, “Visual Confections” in Visual Explanations (1997), 121-151.
E.L. Doctorow, “Quick Cuts” New York Times, 15 March 1999.
Robert Rosenstone, “History in Images/History in Words: Reflections on the Possibility of Really Putting History onto Film,” American Historical Review 93 (1988):1173-1185.
Robert Rosenstone, “Inventing Historical Truth on the Silver Screen,” Cineaste, 29 (2004): 29-33.
Richard White, "History, the Rugrats, and World Championship Wrestling," AHA Perspectives, (April 1999): 11-13.
Peter Burke, Eyewitnessing; the Uses of Images as Historical Evidence, (2001), 34-45.
Kevin Kelly, “Becoming Screen Literate” New York Times Magazine, November 23, 2008, 48.
Jack Ellis and Betsy McLane, A New History of Documentary Film, (2005), 208-325.