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Many theorists have agreed that a sociology that explains as well as describes must be a historical sociology. Historical sociology addresses directly the distinction between explanations based on structure and those based on agency. It has tended to focus on several major topics, in particular the growth of modernity in all its guises. This chapter focuses on Max Weber and his theories. Weber's model of social action was influential in the twentieth century. Michael Mann argued that societies and their histories were best described in terms of the interrelations of four sources of social power: ideological, economic, military, and political relationships. Theda Skocpol argued that social revolution was a conjuncture of three developments: the collapse or incapacitation of central administrative and military machineries; widespread peasant rebellions; and marginal elite political movements. The chapter shows some of the details of Skocpol's argument and examines the responses to her book.
From the late twentieth century, historians have combined theoretical perspectives to tackle new topics or to revisit the old. One such amalgamation occurred in the history of emotions, in which historians have integrated ideas derived from psychology, sociology, anthropology, linguistics, and cultural studies. Psychological theorists agree that emotion has multiple components. This chapter discusses three main models of emotions, such as natural kinds, cognitive appraisal and psychological constructionism, suggested by Kristen Lindquist. Three historians have been pre-eminent in the development of emotions history since the 1980s: Peter Stearns, William Reddy, and Barbara Rosenwein. The chapter also discusses the approaches and terms each has introduced and considers how other historians have expanded their work. It presents an excerpt from 'Confronting death' in which Rosenwein suggests that readers can see different emotional communities within the larger Christian community of pre-eighth-century Gaul.
Every piece of historical writing has a theoretical basis on which evidence is selected, filtered, and understood. This book explores the theoretical perspectives and debates that are generally acknowledged to have been the most influential within the university-led practice of history over the past century and a half. It advises readers to bear in mind the following four interlinked themes: context, temporal framework, causation or drivers of change, and subjectivities. The book outlines the principles of empiricism, the founding epistemology of the professional discipline, and explores the ways in which historians have challenged and modified this theory of knowledge over the past century and a half. It then focuses upon three important dimensions of historical materialism in the work of Marxist historians: the dialectical model at the basis of Marx's grand narrative of human history; the adaptations of Marxist theory in Latin America; and the enduring question of class consciousness. The use of psychoanalysis in history, the works of Annales historians and historical sociology is discussed next. The book also examines the influence of two specific approaches that were to be fertile ground for historians: everyday life and symbolic anthropology, and ethnohistory. The roles of narrative, gender history, radical feminism, poststructuralism and postcolonial history are also discussed. Finally, the book outlines the understandings about the nature of memory and remembering, and looks at key developments in the analysis and interpretation of oral histories and oral traditions.
This chapter focuses on four broad chronological periods of the study of black American history. The first era of scholarship in African American history lasted from 1882 down to 1909. The leading writers on black history in this period were African Americans. The second era of scholarship lasted from 1909 through to the mid-1930s. W. E. B. Du Bois was one of the leading figures of this period. The third era of African American scholarship lasted from the mid-1930s through to the end of the 1960s. In the late 1930s and early 1940s a new generation of black historians such as Benjamin Quarles and John Hope Franklin, began to take over academic leadership in African American history. The fourth era of scholarship in African American history dates from around 1970. The post-war Civil Rights Movement continued to have a profound influence on the development of African American historiography.
In this introduction, translator P.G. Maxwell-Stuart sets out the key themes and features of the three distinct parts of The Malleus Maleficarum, discussing he intellectual ambience of the Malleus, magic in the fifteenth century, and inquisitors Heinrich Institoris and Jakob Sprenger. The chapter concludes with a discussion of the later history of the Malleus, and it's various printings and translations into German, French, English, and Italian.
Both past and present are always intertwined in historical practice. Historians seek to understand people whose lives and sensibilities were very different to their own. One criticism often made of the historical profession is that the theorization upon which historical accounts are constructed is rarely made explicit. In the absence of explicit theorization in a historical text, it can be difficult to identify the theory or concepts upon which it rests. This chapter provides a detailed account of four interlinked themes: context, temporal framework, causation or drivers of change, and subjectivities. These themes will also enable readers to interrogate the assumptions and perspectives, theories and concepts upon which historians draw to analyse and interpret the past. The chapter also presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in this book.
The achievements of race leaders like Malcolm X and Stokely Carmichael generally took more subtle, less tangible, forms. These included community empowerment, heightened racial pride and consciousness, and a decolonization of the black ghetto mind, rather than specific political initiatives to address the physical problems of the inner cities. Thus scholars in the 1960s and 1970s concluded that the Black Power Movement was lacking in any true substance, meaning or accomplishments, and was therefore not worthy of serious study. Transcribed and edited with the assistance of African American journalist Alex Haley, The Autobiography of Malcolm X quickly became regarded as the authoritative account of his life and became an inspirational text for Black Power leaders of the late 1960s and early 1970s. By the 1970s and 1980s academics were beginning to make a welcome, if overdue, contribution to the understanding of Black Nationalism of the 1960s.
The Malleus Maleficarum is one of the best-known treatises dealing with the problem of what to do with witches. It was written in 1487 by a Dominican inquisitor, Heinrich Institoris, following his failure to prosecute a number of women for witchcraft, it is in many ways a highly personal document, full of frustration at official complacency in the face of a spiritual threat, as well as being a practical guide for law-officers who have to deal with a cunning, dangerous enemy. Combining theological discussion, illustrative anecdotes, and useful advice for those involved in suppressing witchcraft, its influence on witchcraft studies has been extensive.
The only previous translation into English, that by Montague Summers produced in 1928, is full of inaccuracies. It is written in a style almost unreadable nowadays, and is unfortunately coloured by his personal agenda. This new edited translation, with an introductory essay setting witchcraft, Institoris, and the Malleus into clear, readable English, corrects Summers’ mistakes and offers a lean, unvarnished version of what Institoris actually wrote. It will undoubtedly become the standard translation of this important and controversial late-medieval text.
This chapter outlines the materialist conception of history, commonly known as historical materialism, first developed by Karl Marx. It focuses upon three important dimensions of historical materialism in the work of Marxist historians: the dialectical model at the basis of Marx's grand narrative of human history; the adaptations of Marxist theory in Latin America; and the enduring question of class consciousness. The driving forces in Marx's conception of history are social classes, which arise from different economic roles in the productive process. In order to overthrow the dominant class, subordinate people must become aware of their oppression, and consequently the concept of human agency is critical to Marx's conceptual framework. Marx's theory, therefore, contains a kind of paradox: the dialectic of productive transformation (a consequence of the inner contradictions within the production process itself) is, nonetheless, dependent upon the consciousness and actions of men and women.
The historiography of the African American experience since 1980 is, for obvious reasons, less expansive than for earlier decades. The subject matter of the first studies of the African American experience in the last two decades of the twentieth century has been influenced by a number of factors. In common with early works on the Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s and 1960s there has been a tendency for researchers to concentrate primarily on nationally known leaders and major political and legislative developments. In a 1996 study, political scientist Robert C. Smith concluded that since the 1970s the black Civil Rights Movement had 'been almost wholly encapsulated into mainstream institutions; co-opted and marginalized'. A notable historiographical development of the late 1990s was a sudden proliferation of studies on Louis Farrakhan, leader of the black separatist organization the Nation of Islam.