History
Encyclopedias
Historicism by Call Number: MyilibraryISBN: 0203426282Publication Date: 2003-07-23Historicism is the essential introduction to this crucial concept in literary studies. This edition has been fully revised and includes a new glossary of critical terms, fully updated bibliography, clear suggestions for additional reading, as well as new discussion of Historicism's relation to the globalization debate.
Historicism:
*explains the theory and practice of historicism
*presents the history of the term and its uses
*introduces key thinkers in the field, from ancient Greece to the present
*considers historicism in relation to contemporary debates, such as post-colonialism, feminism and globalization.
This compact, yet comprehensive guide enables students to understand and apply historicist approaches in their own studies.
Philosophies of History by Call Number: D 16.7 P45 2000ISBN: 9780631212362Publication Date: 2000-09-21This important book charts the development of philosophical thinking about history over the past 250 years, combining extracts from key texts with new explanatory and critical discussion.
Philosophy of History by Call Number: MyilibraryISBN: 9780203380239Publication Date: 2003-03-27Philosophy of History is an essential introduction to a vast body of writing about history, from classical Greece and Rome to the modern world. M.C. Lemon maps out key debates and central concepts of philosophy of history, placing principal thinkers in the context of their times and schools of thought. Lemon explains the crucial differences between speculative philosophy as an enquiry into the content of history, and analytic philosophy of history as relating to the methods of history. The first two parts of the book trace each of these traditions, whereas the third part revisits both in the light of recent contributions to the discipline. This guide provides a comprehensive survey of historical thought since ancient times. Its clear terminology and lucid argument will make it an invaluable source for students and teachers alike.- Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy - "Philosophy of History" byPublication Date: First published Sun Feb 18, 2007; substantive revision Tue Apr 19, 2011Welcome to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (SEP). From its inception, the SEP was designed so that each entry is maintained and kept up to date by an expert or group of experts in the field. All entries and substantive updates are refereed by the members of a distinguished Editorial Board before they are made public. Consequently, our dynamic reference work maintains academic standards while evolving and adapting in response to new research. You can cite fixed editions that are created on a quarterly basis and stored in our Archives (every entry contains a link to its complete archival history, identifying the fixed edition the reader should cite). The Table of Contents lists entries that are published or assigned. The Projected Table of Contents also lists entries which are currently unassigned but nevertheless projected.
Key Concepts
- Causal Mechanisms (from the Encyclopedia of Social Science Research Methods)A causal mechanism is a sequence of events or conditions, governed by lawlike regularities, leading from the explanans to the explanandum.
- Counterfactual (from the Encyclopedia of Social Science Research Methods)In understanding and assessing [a counterfactual] statement, we are asked to consider how the world would have been if the antecedent condition had obtained.
- Determinism (from the Encyclopedia of Social Science Research Methods)Determinism is a term usually used pejoratively to describe an argument or methodology that simplistically reduces causality to a single set of factors acting more or less directly to produce outcomes.
- Dialectic (from the Encyclopedia of Social Theory)Dialecticians take a relational view of the social world. Their focus is not on any one aspect of that world in isolation, but rather on the relationships among and between various elements, as well as on the totality of social relations and its relationship to those components.
- Epistemology (from the Encyclopedia of Social Science Research Methods)In philosophy, epistemology refers to a Theory of knowledge, a theory of how human beings come to have knowledge of the world around them—of how we know what we know. Epistemology provides a philosophical grounding for establishing what kinds of knowledge are possible and for deciding how knowledge can be judged as being both adequate and legitimate. I
- Historicism (from the Encyclopedia of Social Theory)Multiple (and contradictory) meanings:
- that ideal, cultural, and social realities cannot be described and explained by means of general theories and therefore cannot be assessed by universal norms either;
- that the process of history is throughout determined by general laws and that any science of history must therefore rely on these laws in its explanations and predictions;
- a radical rejection of an “objective” historical knowledge. [and instead belief in the] historical constructedness of ideas and beliefs. - Modernity (from the Encyclopedia of Human Geography )[T]he culture of modernity is characterized by a growing belief in the power of reason, rationality, and truth as well as a faith in the ability of science and technology to harness the powers of humans and nature for the betterment of society.
- Observer Bias (from the Encyclopedia of Social Science Research Methods)Observer bias may arise out of unconscious assumptions or preconceptions harbored by the researcher. In some cases, these preconceptions take the form of ethnocentrism—the unreflective acceptance of the values, attitudes, and practices of one's own culture as somehow normative, leading to the inability to see, let alone to understand, behaviors that do not conform to that norm.
- Postmodernism (from the Encyclopedia of Social Theory)In writing about this historical moment, the [historian] understands that there is no privileged position of absolute spectator, for how can the postmodern self write about itself when the very postmodern stuff it is made of conditions what it says, sees, feels, and hears? Of course, any hint of objectivity predicated on the privileged position of the absolute spectator must be relinquished. As an observer of the postmodern scene, I must recognize that I am grafted into every action and situation I write about.
- Realism (from the Encyclopedia of Human Geography)[The belief that] an ordered reality of objects and events exists independently of our perception of it and that, in principle, we can gain accurate knowledge of that world.
- Reflexivity (From the Encyclopedia of Social Science Research Methods)argued that researchers are always part of the social world they study; they can never step above it in order to gain an Olympian perspective or move outside it to get a “view from nowhere.” It is taken to follow from this that they should continually reflect on their own role in the research process and on the wider context in which it occurs.
- Teleology (from the Encyclopedia of Anthropology)[Teleology] presuppose in general that a final state of affairs in future explains or predetermines the movement from previous states to final ones.
Library of Congress Subject Headings
Selected Journals
- History and Theory: Studies in the Philosophy of HistoryHistory and Theory publishes articles, review essays, and summaries of books principally in these areas: critical philosophy of history; speculative philosophy of history; historiography; history of historiography; historical methodology; critical theory; time and culture; and history and related discipline