HISS2001 History of history (5–10 cr)

Introduction to historical thought, including historiography, the debate in the student’s own field and the philosophy of history.

After completing the course, the student will:

• be familiar with the most important trends and the most important representatives of historiography
• be able to evaluate the historiographies of different periods and countries in their own contexts and recognise the interpretative nature of historical research
• be familiar with the key features of historical interpretation and inference and identify the methods, theory and source material used
• understand the ethical issues related to historical research
• be able to analyse period-specificity and change in historical knowledge
• be able to analyse the lines of development in the philosophy of history and to understand its impact on historical research
• have an understanding of the various theoretical approaches to history research
• understand how the subject of their thesis relates to historical debate. 

Completion methods

• Taught course (including book exam if any) 5 cr
• Assignments related to their own area of research 5 cr

The book exam must be agreed separately with the responsible teacher:  

• Haapala, Pertti, Jalava, Marja, Larsson, Simon (eds.), Making Nordic historiography. Connections, Tensions and Methodology, 1850–1970 (2017)  
• Iggers, Georg G., Edward Wang & Supriva Mukherjee, A Global History of Modern Historiography (2016)  
• Karonen, Petri (toim.), Tiede ja yhteiskunta (2019)  
• Popkin, Jeremy, From Herodotus to H-Net (2015)  
• Tucker, Aviezer, A Companion to the Philosophy of History and Historiography (2010)  
• Woolf, Daniel, A Concise History of History: Global Historiography from Antiquity to the Present (2019)