What Is History For?
by Robert Gildea
Description
“History”, suggests Robert Gildea, “is a battlefield.” Questions of power, rights, identity and nationhood always have an ancient and modern historical dimension and countries still go to war over their interpretation of history. Yet accounts of history are just as prone to fabrication as fake news, so how can we tell good history from bad? How can history be critical, learning from the past and righting wrongs, rather than divisive, such as riding roughshod over the rights of others? In this passionately argued book, Gildea suggests that the more people who really understand what good history entails, the more likely history is to triumph over myth. He sees positive signs in public history, citizen historians and community projects, among other developments. And he debunks claims that ‘you cannot rewrite history’, arguing that good history that’s attuned to its times must be rewritten time and again.
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Rights Information
Global rights available
Author Biography
Robert Gildea is Professor Emeritus of Modern History at the University of Oxford, and a specialist on French and European history in the 19th and 20th centuries. In 2003 he won the Wolfson Prize for History
Copyright Information
© Bristol University Press 2023
Bristol University Press
View all titlesBibliographic Information
- Publisher Bristol University Press
- Publication Date March 2024
- Orginal LanguageEnglish
- ISBN/Identifier 9781529230512
- Publication Country or regionUnited Kingdom
- FormatPaperback
- Primary Price 8.99 GBP
- Pages160
- ReadershipGeneral
- Publish StatusUnpublished
- Original Language TitleEnglish
- Original Language AuthorsEnglish
- Edition1
- Copyright Year2023
- Dimensions203 x 127 mm
- SeriesWhat is it for?
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