The Historian's Toolbox: A Student's Guide to the Theory and Craft of History

by Williams; Robert C

• ISBN13: 9780765610935
• ISBN10: 0765610930
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Nonspecific Binding
• Copyright: 2003-03-31
• Publisher: Routledge

Summary

What is history and how do we know it? How has our understanding of history changed and developed over the years? And how do historians and students actually go about "doing" history? This book introduces students to the theory, craft, and methods of history and provides a series of "tools" to help them read, research, and understand the past. History professors are always looking for short, readable guides that will excite and educate students on the importance of history. This "how-to" book fills this void, providing both a theoretical and practical overview. Written in an engaging and entertaining style, the first half of the book is a stimulating, philosophical introduction to the key elements of history -- evidence, narrative, judgment -- that explores how the study and concepts of history have evolved over the centuries.

Author Biography

Robert C. Williams is Vail Professor of History at Davidson College in North Carolina

Table of Contents

Illustrations and Tables	p. xi
History as Fun	p. xiii
The Craft of History
The Past	p. 3
Story	p. 7
History	p. 11
Metahistory	p. 20
Antihistory	p. 27
The Present	p. 33
The Future	p. 39
The Tools of History
Doing History: An Overview	p. 47
Choosing a Good Paper Topic	p. 47
Reading History	p. 48
Taking Notes	p. 51
How to "Write a Good History Paper	p. 52
Sources and Evidence	p. 56
Primary and Secondary Sources	p. 56
Primary Source: The Wannsee Protocol (1942)	p. 57
Secondary Source: Denying History: Who Says the Holocaust Never Happened and Why Do They Say It? (2000)	p. 57
Summary	p. 59
Documents	p. 59
A Revolutionary War Ancestor's Pension Application (1832)	p. 59
Maps	p. 61
Sebastian Munster's Map of the Americas, c. 1540	p. 61
Artifacts	p. 64
Digging Ancient Moscow	p. 64
Images	p. 66
Sharpshooter's Home or Photographer's Studio?	p. 66
Cliometrics: Using Statistics to Prove a Point	p. 70
The Black Population of Colonial America	p. 70
Genetic Evidence	p. 72
Welsh and Basques, Relatively Speaking	p. 72
Jefferson and Sally Hemings-What's My Line?	p. 73
Credit and Acknowledgment	p. 79
Footnotes	p. 79
Bibliography	p. 81
Styling Your Bibliography	p. 81
Types of Bibliographies	p. 82
A Selective, Annotated Bibliography	p. 82
Acknowledging Sources and Avoiding Plagiarism	p. 83
Professional Plagiarism: How Not to Do History	p. 86
Narrative and Explanation	p. 90
The Language of the Historian	p. 90
Paul Revere and the New England Village	p. 91
Chronology	p. 95
The Life of Margaret Fuller	p. 95
Narrative	p. 98
Pickett's Charge at Gettysburg	p. 98
Argument	p. 102
"Little Women" Who Helped Make This Great War	p. 103
Causation	p. 104
The Reasons Why	p. 106
Explaining the Mann Gulch Fire of August 5, 1949	p. 107
Interpretation	p. 110
Reviewing History	p. 110
Bellesiles's Arming America	p. 110
Historical Revision	p. 114
The Denmark Vesey Slave Conspiracy (1822)	p. 114
Historiography	p. 117
World War II	p. 118
Women's History: The Leo Frank Case	p. 121
Speculation	p. 126
Historical Speculation	p. 126
Will the Real Martin Guerre Please Get an Identity?	p. 126
History as Fiction	p. 128
The Soldier Who Never Was	p. 129
Conspiracies	p. 131
Who Really Really Killed Lincoln?	p. 131
Forgeries and Facsimiles	p. 134
Is a Document Genuine?	p. 134
Is a Collection of Documents Authentic?	p. 135
How Can Forgeries Influence History?	p. 136
Is a Newly Discovered Collection by a Well-Known Author Authentic?	p. 137
If It Is a Forgery, Who Is the Forger?	p. 137
Fiction as History	p. 138
Film as History: Fact or Fiction?	p. 141
Film Can Help the Historian Understand the Past	p. 141
Films Can Hinder Our Understanding of the Historical Past	p. 143
The Relevance of History
Everyday History	p. 149
Studying Ordinary People	p. 149
The Burgermeister's Daughter	p. 149
Everyone's a Historian	p. 151
Oral History	p. 154
The Perils of Memory	p. 154
Interviewees and Interviewers	p. 156
The WPA Slave Narratives	p. 157
Techniques of Oral History	p. 159
Material Culture	p. 161
Spirits in the Material World	p. 161
Richard Bushman and The Refinement of America	p. 162
Studying Material Culture	p. 164
Public History	p. 166
History Beyond the Ivory Tower	p. 166
History and the Public	p. 167
The Enola Gay Controversy	p. 168
Event Analysis	p. 172
History in Real Time	p. 172
The Iraq War: Munich, Mukden, or Mexico?	p. 173
History on the Internet	p. 177
Using the Internet: Promises and Pitfalls	p. 177
Wikipedia and "Wikiality"	p. 179
Blogging the Past (and Present)	p. 181
Glossary	p. 183
Selected Bibliography	p. 191
Index	p. 195
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