070166 VO Theories and Methods of Global History (2011S)

WHY GLOBAL HISTORY - WHICH GLOBAL HISTORY? A CRITICAL INTRODUCRION

1. Description
2. Detailed program and required reading

DESCRIPTION:

Writing global history builds on long historical traditions, and has been based on as many concepts, frameworks, interests, and perspectives as other branches of historical writing such as - for example - national political history, cultural history, or local history. Some major concerns, however, have been different in conceptualizing, writing, and teaching global history; scholarly debate, in part, has been focusing on a different set of core themes and problems; there are a number of more or less distinct "schools"; of global history, built on competing concepts of how to do global historiography, and on their implicit or explicit relations with other branches and concepts of writing history; and finally, positioning and status of global history has varied in different periods, countries and traditions of historical writing.

Throughout the term we will engage in critical exploration and discussion of complex and multi-layered assumptions and perspectives shaping global and transnational historical writings, and methodological as well as intellectual consequences for these global and transnational histories. We will discuss these assumptions and consequences in relation to the readings, the lecutres, and other material.

PROGRAM AND REQUIRED READING:

NB:
Students may buy the reader containing the required reading and the syllabus (as available; otherwise it may be ordered and will be produced soon) in the copy shop at Schwarzspanierstraße 10, 1090 Wien, from the beginning of the semester.
Please note that the reader is available in two versions:
1. English only.
2. English-German (in this version a few texts appear in German).

10 March
General introduction
Required reading (to be read for the following meeting):
Heather Sutherland, The Problematic Authority of (World) History. In: Journal of World History 18 (2007) 4, 491-522.
Marnie Huges-Warrington, Shapes. In: M. Huges-Warrington (ed.), World Histories, Houndsmills 2005, (extracts) 118-129.

I. Why global history - which global history? Critical approaches

17 March
Why global history - which global history?
Required reading (to be read for the following meeting):
Fernando Coronil, Beyond Occidentalism: Toward Nonimperial Geohistorical Categories. In: Cultural Anthropology 11 (1996), 51-87.

24 March
Equalizing regional traditions: Eastern Europe, India, and the West as examples
Required reading (to be read for the following meeting):
Thomas M. Bohn, Writing World History in Tsarist Russia and in the Soviet Union. In: Benedikt Stuchey, Eckhardt Fuchs (eds), Writing World History 1800 – 2000, Oxford 2003, 197-212.
Vinay Lal, Provincializing the West: World History from the Perspective of Indian History. In: Benedikt Stuchey, Eckhardt Fuchs (eds), Writing World History 1800 - 2000, Oxford 2003, 271-289.
Georg G. Iggers, Q. Edward Wang, with contributions from Supriya Mukherjee, A Global History of Modern Historiography, Harlow 2008, 9, 15-17, 19-21.

31 March
Why global gender history - which global gender history?
Required reading (to be read for the following meeting):
Judit P. Zinser, Gender. In: Marnie Huges-Warrington (ed.), World Histories, Houndsmills 2005, 189-214.
Mrinalini Sinha, Complicating the Categories of "Western" and "Non-Western" Feminisms. In: The Social Justice Group (ed.), Is Academic Feminism Dead? Theory in Practice, New York University Press 2000, 168-186.

7 April
Why global labour history - which global labour history?
Required reading (to be read for the following meeting):
Marcel van der Linden, Globalizing Labour Historiography. The IISH Approach, IISH, Amsterdam, 2002 (http://www.iisg.nl/publications/globlab.pdf)
Alessandro Stanziani, Serfs, Slaves, or Wage Earners? The Legal Status of Labour in Russia from a Comparative Perspective, from the Sixteenth to the Nineteenth Century. In: Journal of Global History 3 (2008) 2, 183 - 202.

II. Masterly classics in context - a critical reading of selected traditions

14 April
Ibn Kaldhun
Required reading (to be read for the following meeting):
Ibn Kaldhun, An Introduction to History. The Muqaddimah, London 1967 (short extracts)
Aziz Al-Azmeh, Ibn Kaldhun. An Essay in Reinterpretation [1982], Budapest 2003 (extracts)

5 May
Voltaire and the varieties of universal history
Required reading (to be read for the following meeting):
Voltaire: Candide or Optimism, West Drayton etc. 1947 (extracts)

12 May
From Hegel to Marx: Europe and the world in 19th century historical thinking
Required reading (to be read for the following meeting):
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Philosophy of History, [German original 1837], "Introduction" (extracts), New York 1956
Ranajit Guha, History at the Limit of World-History, New York 2002, 39-47

26 May
W.E.B. Du Bois and the varieties of Black visions of history beyond (and underneath) the nation state
Required reading (to be read for the following meeting):
W.E.B. Du Bois, The Soul of White Folks [1920] and The Suppression of the African Slave-Trade [1896] (extracts), both reprinted in W.E.B. Du Bois, Writings, New York 1986

9 June
William McNeill and other 20th century attempts of writing world histories (from the West)
Required reading (to be read for the following meeting):
William McNeill, The Rise of the West: A History of the Human Community, Chicago 1963 (extracts)

16 June
Immanuel Wallerstein and the varieties of a critical reading of the global in global capitalism
Required reading (to be read for the June 30 session):
Fernando Henrique Cardoso, Enzo Faletto, Dependency and Development in Latin America, Berkeley 1979 (extracts)
Arif Dirlik, Confounding Metaphors, Inventions of the World: What is World History For? In: Benedikt Stuchey, Eckhardt Fuchs (eds), Writing World History 1800-2000, Oxford 2003, 91-133.

Between 16 and 30 June (evening hours, details TBA)
Free discussion session

30 June
Histories and conceptualizations of writing the global: a reappraisal of current debates

30 June: First examination date (evening hours, details TBA)