591 Theorizing History, Historicizing Theory (Prochaska) R 1 - 2:50 pm

Any good work of history arguably raises the question of what history is all about: what is it that historians do when they "do" history? We can agree that after reading and researching, historians write up their results, they present their results in a narrative format, that is, they construct a narrative. But where do these narrative constructs come from? In this course we will plot a cognitive map of history and interpretive communities; together we will construct a genealogy of historical studies today by successively inquiring into the intellectual and political fields in which historians practice their craft. Topics include Marxism in theory and practice, Weber in theory and practice, the now old 'new' social history and the French Annales school, Geertz and interpretive anthropology, the now middle-aged 'new' cultural history, Foucault and poststructuralism, women and gender, history after the 'linguistic turn,' postcolonial studies, and history and postmodernism.