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Based on the assumption that reality, reference and representation work together, Narrative and History explains and illustrates the various ways in which historians write the past as history. The first edition brought together for the first time the full range of leading narrative theorists such as Paul Ricoeur, Hayden White, Frank Ankersmit, Seymour Chatman and Gérard Genette, explaining the narrative-making choices all author-historians make when creating historical explanations.
Narrative and History:
- considers the range of author-historian decisions through key concepts such as epistemological and aesthetic choice, ethics and ideology, employment and argument
- defines and illustrates the functions of narrating and narration, authorial voice, characterisation and the timing of the text
- explores in detail the consequences for truth, objectivity, meaning, the role of experimental history, and history representation beyond the textual in film, TV, public history, performance and digitization.
Combining theory with practice, Alun Munslow expands the boundaries of the discipline and charts a new role for unconventional historical forms and modes of expression.
New for this edition:
-New and updated glossary entries
-Updated bibliography
-New material on the legacy of 'the literary turn'
This second edition of Alun Munslow’s groundbreaking 2007 text offers an essential introduction to historiography students.
List of contents
Acknowledgements
Introduction
Narrating the Past
History as Content/Story
Narrating and Narration
History as Expression
The Past, the Facts and History
Understanding [in] History
The Oar in Water
Conclusion
Glossary
Notes
Further Reading
Index.
About the author
Alun Munslow is founding and UK Editor of Rethinking History: The Journal of Theory and Practice. He is Visiting Professor of History and Historical Theory at the University of Chichester, UK.
Summary
Based on the assumption that reality, reference and representation work together, this introductory textbook explains and illustrates the various ways in which historians write the past as history. For the first time, the full range of leading narrative theorists such as Paul Ricoeur, Hayden White, Frank Ankersmit, Seymour Chatman and Gérard Genette have been brought together to explain the narrative-making choices all author-historians make when creating historical explanations. Combining theory with practice, Alun Munslow expands the boundaries of the discipline and charts a new role for unconventional historical forms and modes of expression.
Clear but comprehensive, this is an ideal resource for undergraduate and postgraduate students taking courses on history and theory, history and method, and historiography.
Additional text
Alun Munslow lucidly explains how the poetics of historical writing confers meanings on the past, rather than proclaims truths about it—showing, in other words, why it is through history's narrative mastery that the past becomes real in the reader’s imagination.
