Global Perspectives on Global History
Theories and Approaches in a Connected World

Discusses global historical research as a global and diverse movement. Case studies focus on China, Germany and the United States.

Dominic Sachsenmaier (Author)

9781107001824, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 4 August 2011

340 pages
22.9 x 15.2 x 2.1 cm, 0.62 kg

'… a valuable contribution to current discussions of history as a way of knowing and an intellectual discipline.' American Historical Review

In recent years, historians across the world have become increasingly interested in transnational and global approaches to the past. However, the debates surrounding this new border-crossing movement have remained limited in scope as theoretical exchanges on the tasks, responsibilities and potentials of global history have been largely confined to national or regional academic communities. In this groundbreaking book, Dominic Sachsenmaier sets out to redress this imbalance by offering a series of new perspectives on the global and local flows, sociologies of knowledge and hierarchies that are an intrinsic part of historical practice. Taking the United States, Germany and China as his main case studies, he reflects upon the character of different approaches to global history as well as their social, political and cultural contexts. He argues that this new global trend in historiography needs to be supported by a corresponding increase in transnational dialogue, cooperation and exchange.

Introduction: neglected diversities
1. Movements and patterns: environments of global history
2. A term and a trend: contours in the United States
3. On the margins of a troubled nation - approaches in Germany
4. Another world? Thinking globally about history in China
Epilogue: global history in a plural world
Bibliography
Index.

Subject Areas: General & world history [HBG], Historiography [HBAH]