Reddit mentions of A Global History of Modern Historiography

This is something that takes a lot of practice, and many schools don't or can't teach it. Fear not, it's easier than it sounds.

First, some background:

http://www.amazon.com/Global-History-Modern-Historiography/dp/0582096065

This will introduce you to most of the historical method used today. It's quite boring, but if you're going to study history, you'll need to get used to reading some pretty dry material.

For a styleguide, use Diana Hacker's:
http://www.amazon.com/Pocket-Style-Manual-Diana-Hacker/dp/0312542542/

It will teach you everything you need to know about citations.

As far as getting better at source analysis, that's something that comes with time in class and practice with primary and secondary source documents. If you're just going into college, it's something you're going to learn naturally.

However, I do have some tips.
-The main goal of a piece of historiography is to bring you to a thesis and then clearly support that argument. All REAL historiography asks a historical question of some sort. I.E. not when and where, but a more contextual why and how.

-Real historiography is produced 99.9% of the time by a university press, NOT A PRIVATE FIRM. If a celebrity wrote it, it's probably not history.

-Most, if not all real historiography is going to spell out the thesis for you almost immediately.

-A lot of historiography is quite formulaic in terms of its layout and how it's put together on paper:

A. Introduction -- thesis statement and main argument followed by a brief review of past historiography on the subject.

B Section 1 of the argument with an a,b, and c point to make in support.

C just like B

D just like B again, but reinforces A a little more

E Conclusion, ties all sections together and fully reinforces A.

Not all works are like this, but almost every piece you will write in college is or should be.

Some history books that do real history (by proper historians) and are easy to find arguments in, just off the top of my head:

http://www.amazon.com/Wages-Whiteness-American-Working-Haymarket/dp/1844671453

http://www.amazon.com/Economists-Guns-Authoritarian-Development-U-S--Indonesian/dp/0804771820/

http://www.amazon.com/Lost-Battalions-Crisis-American-Nationality/dp/0805081380

For the primer on social histories, read Howard Zinn:
http://www.amazon.com/Peoples-History-United-States-Present/dp/0060838655/

What you're going to come across MORE often than books is a series of articles that make different (sometimes conflicting) points about a historical issue: (I can't really link the ones I have because of copyright [they won't load without a password], but check out google scholar until you have access to a university library)

Virtually any subject can be researched, you just have to look in the right place and keep an open mind about your thesis. Just because you've found a source that blows away your thesis doesn't mean it's invalid. If you find a wealth of that kind of stuff, you might want to rethink your position, though.


This isn't comprehensive, but I hope it helps. Get into a methods class AS FAST AS POSSIBLE and your degree program will go much, much smoother for you.

As others have noted, you could want to focus on historiography, which is the study of history as a scientific discipline. Because while there have been various approaches to historical research, there have never been any major changes in its main goal since the modern discipline was founded in the 19th century. So all the methodological trends that have emerged have all sought to find better ways to interpret historical sources, and new ways to approach history (women's history is an example of the latter).

Philosophy of history is separate from historical methodology and historiography (although many historians have changed their methodology to fit more or less philosophical convictions), and is rather difficult to pin down exactly. I suggest you find an introductory book that deals with the various approaches. It's useless to jump right into Hegel or Nietzsche without knowing their broader contexts.

After looking through the contents, this book looks like a good starting point if you want to get into historiography: http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/0582096065/ref=sib_dp_pt#reader-link.

When it comes to philosophy of history, this seems like a good starting point: http://www.amazon.com/Philosophy-History-M-C-Lemon/dp/041516205X. It covers the pre-Hegel thinkers, Hegel, Marx, the analytics, the postmodernists, Fukuyama, as well as some general questions related to philosophy of history.

If you really want to find a way to combine history and philosophy in a meaningful way, you might want to focus on the more general topic of hermeneutics. It relates to history in an indirect way, and my experience is that many historians and archaeologists are familiar with it. There are both "analytic" and "continental" approaches to hermeneutics, and as far as I know it's a relatively active field. You can read about it here: http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/hermeneutics/

Another approach entirely is to use your philosophy major to focus on the history of ideas / history of philosophy, rather than the philosophy of history. I think this is a better idea if you are already historically inclined.

Finally, there's no real reason to try to combine your two majors unless you have a particular interest in philosophy of history. It probably won't make you a better historian. On the other hand, having a firm grasp on the history of ideas would probably make you a better historian.

Good books for this sort of meta-history:

Georg Iggers: Historiography in the Twentieth Century: From Scientific Objectivity to the Postmodern Challenge and A Global History of Modern Historiography.

There's also the short, but excellent, but German book Geschichtswissenschaft im Zeitalter der Extreme: Theorien, Methoden, Tendenzen von 1900 bis zur Gegenwart (Historiography in the Age of Extremes: Theories, Methodology, Tendencies from 1900 untill Today) by Lutz Raphael. He concludes that global history is increasing, i.e. less national history, more foreign professors in history departments, the rise of former third world countries' historiography and their proponents will make history increasingly multi-polar, which, coupled with more and more diverse fields of history (gender history, history of sub-cultures, etc) will increasingly diversify and fracture historiography. I tend to agree.

Addendum: This is, I think, especially eminent in the European Union, as professors' and students' mobility increases, and even school children are introduced into a transnational way of looking at the world and at history. For example, there is a history school book that includes French and German perspectives and can be used in both countries (translated into the appropriate language, but with no changes of content).