Why Bother with History?: Ancient, Modern and Postmodern Motivations.Why Bother With History? argues for an increasingly important role for a revitalised historical study. Examining the motivations of past historians, the author rejects the ancient aspiration to a 'history for its own sake' and argues that historians' importance lies in their own adoption of a moral standpoint, from which a story of the past can be told, that facilitates the attainment of a future we desire. Inevitably controversial, in that it challenges many of the assumptions of modernist history, this is an interdisciplinary book, which draws in particular on psychology and literature. |
Contents
1 History for historys sake | 1 |
2 History and historical examples | 19 |
identity memory and forgetting meaning and purpose | 36 |
4 History politics and power | 59 |
5 History and religion | 86 |
6 History and education | 112 |
7 Postmodernism history and values | 130 |
8 Postmodern history and the future | 149 |
| 170 | |
| 178 | |
Other editions - View all
Why Bother with History?: Ancient, Modern and Postmodern Motivations Beverley C. Southgate No preview available - 2014 |
Common terms and phrases
actually aspiration become believe bother with history Carlyle century Chapter Christian cited claim coherent concludes contemporary context continuing described detached E. P. Thompson early modern emotion emphasis end of history English Erich Heller example forget Francis Bacon future Geoffrey Elton happened Harmondsworth hero his historians historical study historiographical history's holocaust human ideal identity implies imposed inevitably intellectual J. H. Plumb J. M. Dent Jean Bodin John Keith Jenkins King later least less liberal lives London Lord Acton Lord Bolingbroke memory miracles moral motivations narrative nature Nietzsche oral Oxford past Penguin perspective philosophy political postmodern practical present Proust purpose purposeless question quotation quoted R. J. Hollingdale recently recognised record religion remains reports Richard Rawlinson Roman Routledge sake sceptical seems seen sense similarly social sort supposedly T. S. Eliot things Thomas tion tradition transl truth Untimely Meditations whole words writing written