INTRODUCTION TO THE STUDY OF HISTORY 2021-2022

GE1V16002

UU students dressed as ‘Philip van Artevelde and leading Flemish citizens in 1382’ for the
masquerade of 1861
(F. Kaijser, photograph of masquerade (1861), Utrecht Archives)

Course code GE1V16002

Number 7.5 ECTS
of ECTS
Level 1
Coordinator Dr Pieter Huistra (p.a.huistra@uu.nl; digital consultation hours:
Thursday, 4-5pm, via Teams)
 In advance: back to campus
We are very happy that the academic year 2021-2022 starts in real life. Seminar
teaching will take place on campus in the real classroom. To ensure our return to
campus teaching to be as safe as possible, and to prevent that we will have to return to
digital teaching, we ask the following from you:
- Before you come to the seminars, always do the coronacheck:
https://www.uu.nl/sites/default/files/2021%20-%20Corona
%20Checkkaart_EN_V6.pdf. You do not come to class if you have any symptoms,
if you are in quarantine, or if you suspect in any other way that you might have
been infected with Covid-19.
- To lower the threshold for not coming to a seminar, we offer a digital alternative.
Every seminar meeting is also offered in digital form, offering the possibility to
absentees to catch up.
- Perform regular self-tests, at least twice a week, just like your lecturers will do.
You can order free self-tests via https://www.zelftestonderwijs.nl/.
- Embrace the blessings of science and get yourself a vaccination – if you have not
already done so.

Introduction to the study of history

By enrolling for the Bachelor’s in History, you have chosen to study history at university
level for a minimum of three years. In the Introduction to the study of history course,
you will learn what ‘history at university level’ entails. The object of this course is to help
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you establish your position within the academic discipline of history. Therefore, the
central question for this course is as follows: what does the academic discipline of
history involve? We will seek the answer to this question via a two-pronged approach.
Firstly, by comparing the academic practice of history with other ways of viewing the
past and then identifying the difference between history at university and history
elsewhere. Secondly, by considering the (recent) history of the academic discipline of
history. This will enable you to familiarise yourself with the rich diversity of approaches
in the practice of history. Armed with this knowledge, you will be well placed to
establish your position as a future historian by the end of the course.

Learning objectives – What will you learn in this course?

(i) To realise that the academic practice of history is just one way to access the
past and that many other alternatives are possible too. Each has its own
methods, principles and presentation formats. As such, students will learn
that the methods, principles and presentation formats for the academic
practice of history are contingent, without falling into indifferent relativism.
(ii) To support learning objective (i): knowledge of a number of central but
esoteric concepts from the academic practice of history. For example, ‘source’,
‘history’ and ‘historiography’, etc.;
(iii) To gain a knowledge of the wealth of approaches possible in the recent
academic discipline of history – as regards sources, themes, theoretical
 approaches, the protagonists chosen and geographical demarcations, for
example;
(iv) To realise that the approaches referred to in (iii) are changeable and that a
change in approach or perspective in the practice of history leads to a
different view of the past. Thus, history is not one fixed given but many
changeable givens;
(v) To gain the realisation, ensuing from (iv), that many different views of the
past exist. The discussion that takes place between the proponents of these
different views is what characterises the academic discipline of history.
Students will be aware that this realisation extends to their own historical
works too. It is this awareness that will make them responsible historians:
they will make choices when studying the past, substantiate their choices and
not hide behind the past when doing so.

The course Introduction to the study of history is part of a longer first year learning
pathway, together with Research Lab I, Research Lab II and Big questions, big data. In
Introduction to the study of history you make an acquaintance with the discipline of
history in general; in Research Lab I you will work on a smaller, specific topic and you
will write a first research paper; in Research Lab II you will work with all kinds of
sources and the methods you can use to study these sources.

Teaching methods – How will you achieve these learning objectives?

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This course consists of two types of education: receptive and productive. In receptive
education, students are presented with course material to listen to and read. The course
materials for receptive education are as follows:
- The handbook: Sarah Maza, Thinking About History (University of Chicago Press
2017);
- The reader containing extra texts; available on Blackboard [Course Content >>
Reader];
- The lecture clips recorded; available on Blackboard [Course Content >> Lecture
clips], broken down into three types:
o Exegesis of the handbook – Mastering Maza;
o Related case studies – Each part of the Maza handbook has a
corresponding case study that expands on and clarifies the course
material;
o A glossary with an explanation of key concepts from the practice of
history.
In productive education, students actively set to work with course material themselves,
by answering study questions, participating in discussions in tutorials and writing a
paper, etc. The course materials for productive education are as follows:
- Study questions about the handbook and reader; you will find these in the course
manual;
- The seminars – attendance and active participation are both compulsory;
 - The final assignment;
- The History Research Guide: https://ong.wp.hum.uu.nl/en/. This is an
indispensable aid when doing historical research.

Assessment formats – How will your achievement of the learning objectives

be assessed?
The assessment for the Introduction to the Study of History course consists of two parts:
(i) Exam. In Week 5 of the course, you will do a written exam about the course
material handled so far. The object of this exam is to assess your knowledge of
the academic discipline of history. As such, the exam relates to learning
objectives (i), (ii) and (iii). This assessment represents 40% of the final mark –
there is no retake for this exam.
(ii) Final assignment. You will apply the knowledge you gained in the first few
weeks of the course in the final assignment. It assesses your understanding of
the academic practice of history. In the assignment, you will be expected to
take a position in historical debate by developing the best approach to an
historical subject. As such, this assignment primarily ties in with learning
objectives (iv) and (v). Students will submit their finished assignments –
which represent 60% of the final mark – at the beginning of Week 9. Students
will only be able to retake the final assignment if the final mark attained for
the course is between 4.0 and 5.5. You have passed the course when your final
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grade is 5,5 or higher.

Skills
During this course, you will learn the following skills:
- Critical thinking. You will learn to reflect on history, the practice of history and
your own role as a historian;
- Studying. In your first course as a university student, you will learn how to study
the handbook and how to study for an exam;
- Academic writing: the final assignment will enable you to practise your use of
language and style;
- Research. The final assignment will help you learn to position yourself in a
historiographical debate.

Rules
Attendance rules: it is compulsory for you to both attend and prepare for the seminar
meetings. You will participate actively and the seminar lecturer will decide on the rules
for the lecture room (wearing facemasks, fixed positions in the seminar room, the use of
laptops and other devices, et cetera). You may only miss seminars due to circumstances
beyond your control and never more than two overall. You must provide the seminar
lecturer with written notifications of all absences in advance and you must also provide
evidence that the circumstances in question were beyond your control. If you miss more
than two seminars, your participation in the course will be terminated. If special
circumstances apply, contact the study advisors as soon as possible.
PLEASE NOTE: because of Covid-19 we ask students and lecturers to be extra
careful. You do not attend seminars when you have symptoms, if you are in
quarantine, if you are waiting for a test result, or if you suspect that you might be
infected with Covid-19 in any other way. Always do the coronacheck before
coming to the seminar: https://www.uu.nl/sites/default/files/2021%20-
%20Corona%20Checkkaart_EN_V6.pdf. Also perform regular self-tests, at least
twice a week, also if you have no symptoms. The lecturers, who have all been
vaccinated twice, will perform self-tests too. All information on the coronavirus
from Utrecht University can be found here: https://www.uu.nl/en/information-
coronavirus.
For students who cannot attend the seminar on campus, but who are able to take
the seminar, we offer a digital alternative. All seminar meetings will be offered in
a digital form as well. So, if you miss a meeting from your own seminar group, you
can catch up digitally.
If you are unable to attend the exam due to circumstances beyond your control, you
must notify the course coordinator in writing of this situation in advance. Always
observe the Guidelines exams missed due to illness or force majeure:
https://students.uu.nl/en/hum/history-ba/practical-information/academic-policies-
and-procedures/guideline-reporting-illness.
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Plagiarism
Plagiarism entails the copying of texts, thoughts or arguments created by an external
source and used without crediting. Students are expected to refer to their sources
without exception: one must not only cite a source, but show how the source has
shaped, related to or otherwise helped form one’s thesis or analysis. This applies to
both print as well as online sources.
Extra care must be taken in a group setting: copying peers’ work qualifies as
plagiarism as well. Plagiarism is considered fraud by the University’s Examination
Committee, and is punished severely. For more information on how plagiarism is
determined and handled at the University, see:
https://students.uu.nl/en/practical-information/policies-and-procedures/fraud-and-
plagiarism
 Schedule
Week Theme Page
1 6-10 September
1 Introduction to the course

2 13-17 September
2-A The history of whom?
2-B The history of where?

3 20-24 September
3-A The history of what?
3-B How is history produced? (i)

4 27 September – 1 October
4-A How is history produced? (ii)
4-B Meanings and causes

5 4-8 October
5-A Recapitulation of Weeks 1-4
5-B Exam: Thursday 7 October, 11.30am
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6 11-15 October
6-A Work on final assignment
6-B Work on final assignment

7 18-22 October
7-A Work on the final assignment independently
7-B Feedback session on the final assignment

8 25-29 October
Work on the final assignment independently

9 1-5 October
9 Submit final assignment: Monday 1 November, 1pm.

Seminar groups
Group Lecturer
1 Dr. Rachel Gillett
2 Dr. Rachel Gillett
3 Dr. Martijn Lak
 4 Dr. Martijn Lak
Digital* Dr. Carine van Rhijn

*The digital seminar group is meant for students who are not able to attend the regular,
physical seminar, because they (suspect to) have caught the coronavirus, have
symptoms, are in quarantine; or because they are unable to come to class because of
their physical condition, or of the physical condition of close relatives.
For students who will not be able to come to the on-campus seminar once or a few
times, there is the following procedure: to be allowed in the digital seminar, send one
email, addressed to both your own seminar lecturer and the seminar lecturer for the
digital seminar, in which you explain what your reasons are not to come to the on-
campus seminar. Your own seminar lecturer will then give you permission to go digital.
For students who have to attend the digital seminar more structurally: they have to
contact the study advisors for the department of history first. It will be the study
advisors who give permission to become regulars at the digital seminar.
The digital seminar takes place through Teams, on Tuesday 15.15-17.00 and Friday
11.00-12.45.

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 Week 1
(6-10 September)

Introduction days
During the introduction days, you will familiarise yourself with the History programme
and receive information about what you will need to have done before the first seminar
for the Introduction to the Study of History course.

Introduction to the course – independent study

There will be no teaching in Week 1 because of the extended introduction. This means
that you will need to do some independent study to prepare yourself for the first
seminar in Week 2. This will involve reading two very short texts, watching a number of
lecture clips and answering the questions below. The texts and clips in question will
prepare you for the Introduction to the Study of History course. You will receive
information about a number of practical course-related matters. For example: what will
be expected of you in lectures, how the handbook works, exactly what the assessment
involves and what you will need to do for it and when.
You will also make a start on the content of the course, the central question for which is
as follows: what does the academic discipline of history involve? To be able to answer
this question, we first need an idea of what ‘history’ actually is and how it is different to
‘the past’. We will also consider ‘historiography’ (the history of history): What is it?
What can we do with it? How does it benefit us?
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Naturally, you will be given the opportunity to revisit this course material in Week 2, in
the tutorials and in a digital Q & A (via Teams, Monday 13 October, 9-10am).

To read and watch:

- Maza, Thinking About History, ‘Introduction’ (pp. 1-9) (read)
- Lecture clip: ‘Explanation of the course’ (watch)
- Pieter Geyl, ‘The argument without end’, Napoleon. For and against (London
1964) 15-16 (read).
- Lecture clip: ‘Pieter Geyl’ (watch)
- Glossary: ‘history and the past’, ‘historiography’, ‘empirical science’ (watch)

Questions:
1) Maza asks: ‘What is special then, about history as a discipline?’ (p 1). Why is it so
difficult to define the discipline of history?

2) What is the difference between the past, history and historiography?

3) Is history an empirical science? Explain why it is and why it is not.

4) History is ‘what the present needs to know about the past’ (p 6). Explain what Maza
means, using Pieter Geyl as an example.
5) What is the point of studying historiography?

6) How is Maza’s handbook coloured by her background?

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 Week 2
(13-17 September)

2-A. The history of whom?

The key question for this seminar is to whom history actually belongs. This question is
ambiguous and encapsulates both the question of who history is about – who the
protagonists of history actually are – and by whom history is written. These questions
are always connected: the person writing about history also decides who is included in
the history s/he is writing about. As the old adage says: ‘History is written by the
victors’.
The above also means that new (groups of) historians will write about history
from their own perspectives. This has happened repeatedly in the last century. As such,
the history you write about will depend on the position you take in the present, which
also determines what your perspective on the past will be. This is both a limitation and a
precondition for history: a perspective causes you to view the past in a certain way;
without a perspective, you will not see anything at all.

To read and watch:

- Maza, Thinking About History, ‘1. The history of whom?’ (pp. 10-44)
- Lecture clip: ‘Maza, Chapter 1’
- Gerda Lerner, ‘Why History Matters’, in: id., Why History Matters. Life and
Thought (New York etc. 1997) 199-211.
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- Lecture clip: ‘Whose history?: Gerda Lerner’;
- Glossary: ‘perspective’, ‘engagement’.

Questions
1) For many years, history focused mainly on great men and the odd great woman. Maza
says that the Great Man view of history goes hand in hand with a focus on political
history and that this focus implies a ‘set of assumptions’ (p. 13). Which assumptions is
Maza referring to? Why do they always accompany a focus on political history and the
Great Man view of history?

2) Maza says that the advent of social history has led to the use of new quantitative
approaches. Why is this? What are the advantages and disadvantages of quantitative
approaches?

3) A common thread throughout this chapter of Maza’s book is the broadening of the
concept of politics in history. Explain what this entails, using Thompson and women’s
history to explain your answer.

4) What do historians mean by ‘agency’ and which ‘implicit ideal’ (p. 33) does this notion
apply?
5) What is gender history? How is gender history different to women's history? Use
Gerda Lerner as an example to explain the connection between these two historical
specialisations.

6) Considering this chapter as a whole, Maza says that she wants to do more than just
outline the impressive way in which the ‘who?’ aspect of history has been expanded. She
also wants to show broader changes in historiography. To show ‘that the practice of
history itself and the questions historians ask are transformed and renewed every time
a new set of actors lays claim to its past’ (p. 44). Use the history of sexuality to explain
what Maza means.

2-B. The history of where?

As we saw in the last lecture, an historian’s personal background matters. The same
applies for the geographical framework: this too determines how we know history and
which history we know. This framework is often the national framework and is less self-
evident than it might seem. These frameworks are often adopted implicitly and
unconsciously and must be made explicit so that we know why we write the history we
write. This is even more important because the geographical frameworks and principles
chosen engender all kinds of other ideas – about time and modernity, for example.

To read and watch

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- Maza, Thinking About History, ‘2. The history of where?’ (pp. 45-82)
- Lecture clip: ‘Maza, Chapter 2’
- Lecture clip: ‘Time in ancient history’
- Glossary: ‘time’, ‘modernity’ and ‘periodisation’

Questions
1) Maza discusses how historians have stripped the national framework of its self-
evidence and ‘denaturalised’ the nation. They have done this by revealing the
constructed nature of the nation. Use the concepts of ‘imagined community’ and
‘memory’ to explain how historians have done this.

2) ‘If you carve out space differently or redirect your gaze from the obvious places you
are likely to come up with different actors and different stories’, Maza writes on p. 65 of
her book. Describe two ways in which you could carve out spaces differently and explain
how history would be different as a result.

3) ‘World history’ sounds like an impossible task: writing the history of the whole world.
However, there are historians who have made this their specialism. What is their chosen
approach and why is the book by Kenneth Pomeranz that Maza mentions – The Great
Divergence. Europe, China, and the Making of the Modern World Economy – a good
example of this approach?
4) In recent decades, there has been a lot of criticism of the Eurocentrism that has
infiltrated academic history. This criticism goes beyond the complaint that there is too
much European history on the programme. According to post-colonial thinkers like
Dipesh Chakrabarty, much non-European history is actually European history too. How
can this be?

5) Ideas about time are subject to change. Compare the ‘modern’ conception of time to
ideas about time in ancient history writing.

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 Week 3
(20-24 September)

3-A. The history of what?

Exactly what do historians study? Yes, the past – of course – but what exactly? This
question is more difficult to answer than you might first think. Do they study people’s
actions (and, if so, how do you ‘record’ them), the people themselves or their ideas? Or
do historians also study animals, objects, mountains and oceans? In this lecture, we will
see that historians have hugely expanded the scope of the field in recent decades. By
doing this, historians have proved themselves to be imperialists: everything that has
happened in the past and of which traces remain today is worth studying, in principle.

To read and watch

- Maza, Thinking About History, ‘3. The history of what?’ (pp. 83-117)
- Lecture clip: ‘Maza, Chapter 3’
- Jane Caplan, ‘‘Indelible memories’. The tattooed body as a theatre of memory’, in:
Karin Tilmans, Frank van Vree and Jay Winter (eds.), Performing the Past.
Memory, History, and Identity in Modern Europe (Amsterdam: Amsterdam
University Press, 2010) 119-146. (e-book in UL).
- Lecture clip: ‘tattoos as history’
- Glossary: ‘footnote’
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Questions
1) According to David Armitage, quoted by Maza on p. 91 of her book, the history of
ideas is no longer ‘history from the neck up’. Explain what David Armitage means and
say what has changed about the history of ideas.

2) Thomas Kuhn’s work has led to drastic changes in the history and philosophy of
science. Explain how the new ‘constructivist’ approach has caused academic views to
become far more historic.

3) On p. 106 of her book, Maza writes: ‘But is it really the case, historians have recently
been asking, that the relation between people and things works only one way?’ Her
question is a rhetorical one: the answer is no. Give an example of two types of
historiography: one in which the people-things relationship is one-way and another in
which the relationship is two-way.

4) Environmental historians focus on more than people alone and also consider non-
human actors. Why are non-human actors important? Answer this question aided by
examples from historiography.

5) Why would a historian want to study tattoos? Also: Are the tattoos in the article by
Caplan a form of historiography explain why (not)?
 3-B. How is history produced? (I)
The academic discipline of history does not have a monopoly on the past; the practice of
history has been around far longer than universities and the majority of the production
and – certainly – consumption of history still takes place outside academia to this very
day. For the sake of convenience, we group together all of these other views of the past
under the umbrella of ‘public history’. But what exactly is public history and how is it
different to the academic practice of history? If a clear distinction is possible, it is
certainly not the difference between truth and fable, objective and subjective, or
suchlike. Instead, the difference is more likely to lie in the way in which historical
subjects are approached, the public at which it is aimed and the form in which history is
presented.

To read and watch

- Maza, Thinking About History, ‘4. How is history produced?’ (pp. 118-137)
- Lecture clip: ‘Maza, Chapter 4, part one’
- Lecture clip: ‘LGBT history as public history’
- Glossary: ‘science’, ‘academic’

Questions
1) ‘Today the word 'historian' brings to mind a history professor’ (p. 119), but that
hasn’t always been the case, Maza says. Identify changes in the nineteenth century that
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made history the professional academic discipline we still know today.
Was nineteenth-century academic, objectivist historiography free of political
influence?

2) What is the difference between ‘popular’ and ‘academic history’? Name the different
characteristics that Maza ascribes to ‘popular history’ and the criticism that the various
manifestations of ‘popular history’ (books, documentaries and heritage sites) have been
subject to from academics.

3) Do museums offer a reliable presentation of the past? Maza says that visitors believe
they do, because museums create the illusion of direct contact with the past and give the
impression that visitors themselves are able to judge the past. However, Maza also
expresses clear reservations. Which reservations are they? Give examples to
substantiate your answer.

4) Explain how the development of LGBT historiography relativises the distinction that
Maza makes between academic history and public history.
 Week 4
(27 September – 1 October)

4-A. How is history produced? (II)

Historical issues regularly prompt strong debate in society today. In the Netherlands,
this happens in respect of the Second World War, the decolonisation of Indonesia and
the country's slave-trading past, amongst other historical events. Debates like this make
it very clear that different views on the past still exist side by side in society and, as such,
in academia too, to this very day. We must not regard these debates as a shortcoming of
a historiography that is unable to establish the truth once and for all. Instead, these
debates are an indication of the viability of historiography: the practice of history is still
generating new interpretations, new visions on the past. The conflict between these
visions moves history forward, because of which historiography has already been
characterised by some as an ‘argument without end’.
At the same time, the ongoing discussion and constant new interpretations do not mean
that each interpretation and vision is legitimised – good historiography must meet
certain epistemic, methodological and moral standards. For example, historians must
handle sources in a careful and transparent manner.

To read and watch

- Maza, Thinking About History, ‘4. How is history produced?’ (pp. 137-156)
- Lecture clip: ‘Maza, Chapter 4, part two’
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- Lecture clip: ‘The Dutch slave-trading past’
- Glossary: ‘historiographical debate’, ‘source’, ‘archive’

Questions
1) In the title of the third paragraph of Chapter 4, Maza uses the terms ‘orthodoxy’ and
‘revisionism’. Explain what she means by them, illustrate your answer with an example
from historiography.

2) Maza says that debate and differences of opinion are not problematic. She believes
that the advancement of the practice of history depends on it. Why is historiographical
debate so important? When answering this question, also mention why we should not
limit ourselves to an ‘old-fashioned, zero-sum view of scholarship’ in historiographical
debate (p. 146).

3) Sources are the essential raw material that underlie the practice of history but never
speak for themselves. Maza says that the historian ‘makes’ the source: what does she
mean?

4) Sources are stored in repositories, the archives, which makes these archives essential
for historians. However, here too historians must be on their guard. Why aren’t archival
repositories neutral? How can historians circumvent their shortcomings?
 4-B. Causes and meanings
Should history describe what has happened in the past or explain it? Or both? Can the
two actually be combined? Historiography involves a number of different approaches
and objectives. On the one hand, there are historians that see it as their top priority to
present the past as the historical actors would have experienced it – they are in search of
meanings. On the other hand, there are historians who believe that historiography must
use the benefit of hindsight and interpret the causal link between the past and the
current day – they are in search of causes and consequences. This contrast is not
absolute but does show two important different orientations within historiography: an
interpretative orientation focused on the humanities on the one hand and a more
explanatory, social-science orientation on the other hand.

To read and watch

- Maza, Thinking About History, ‘5. Causes and meanings’ (pp. 157-198);
- Lecture clip: ‘Maza, Chapter 5’
- Johan Huizinga, ‘The violent tenor of life’, The Waning of the Middle Ages (New
York 1954) 9-17.
- Lecture clip: ‘Huizinga’s Herfsttij’;
- Glossary: ‘causality’, ‘interpretation’, ‘discourse’
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Questions
1) Maza says that history is not a science but does show an affinity with the social
sciences. Here too, Maza observes important differences between the historical and
social-science approaches. What are these differences?

2) How have Marxist approaches and the Annales school influenced the practice of
history?

3) What is the difference between cause and event and the difference between structure
and event? Finally: why has there been a ‘return of the event’ (p. 171)?

4) What is a microhistory? Why should historians embrace this genre?

5) The work of non-historians like Clifford Geertz and Michel Foucault has had a major
influence on the development of recent cultural history. What does Maza mean when she
says that culture is not an ‘object’ in Geertz’ work but a ‘context’ (p. 186)? Give an
example to explain what Maza means when she says that, according to cultural
historians, 'no aspect of the world, they argued, exists prior to, or separate from, its
cultural construction' (p. 187)?
6) According to Maza, the tension in Chapter 5 is between ‘description versus
interpretation, synchronic description (…) versus diachronic analysis (…) or ‘meaning
versus causality’ (p. 158) or, in other words, between history from the perspective of the
participant versus history from the perspective of the observer. Explain what this
contrast entails and how it corresponds with opposing views on the purpose of the
discipline of history. Use the work of Johan Huizinga as an example.

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 Week 5
(4-8 October)

This week will focus on the exam. You will take one more look at the course material
from previous weeks and then revise for the exam in the second part of the week.

5-A. Recapitulation of Weeks 1-4

To watch
- Lecture clip: overview of the last four weeks.

Questions:
- Before the tutorial, you will prepare a number of questions that you would like to
ask. You can pose these questions to your seminar lecturer, before or during the
last seminar, and to the course coordinator (by Friday 1 October, noon, at the
latest, so he will be able to answer them in the final lecture clip).

5-B. Exam
The exam will take place at 11:30 on Thursday 7 October 2021.

There will be no second seminar in this week.

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 Week 6
11-15 October

From Week 6 onwards, you will work full-time on the final assignment for the
Introduction to History Studies course (for an explanation of the assignment, see the
back of this course manual). The assignment and feedback on your draft version of it will
both be explained to you in the tutorials. However, you will mainly work on it
independently.

6-A. Work on the assignment

Preparation
- Research the topic of your assignment, which has been attributed to you in week
4. Find and read literature and think about an approach for your assignment.
Make sure that you have studied at least one relevant title for your topic.

During the seminar, your lecturer will discuss the assignment once more and will
answer your questions regarding the assignment. For the rest of the seminar, you and
your partner will look for relevant literature and work on an approach for the
assignment.

6-B. Work on the assignment

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During this seminar, you will work on your assignment independently. The lecturer is
present to answer your questions.
The deadline for submitting your outline is at the beginning of week 7, Monday 18
October, 1pm (through Blackboard).
 Week 7
(18-22 October)

7-A. No seminar
The first seminar of this week will not go ahead, giving you time to work on your
assignment. You will submit your draft assignment and receive feedback from your
lecturer on it at the end of the week.
Deadline for the outline: Monday 18 October, 1pm.

After submitting this outline, you will have time to study for the Antiquity exam in the first
half of Week 8 (Tuesday 26 October).

7-B. Feedback session

The lecturer will give feedback on the draft assignments, both with the group as a whole
and with the individual student pairs. The tutorial lecturer will schedule this session
well in advance, on Thursday or Friday of this week, digitally or physically. Note that this
session does not necessarily take place in the regular timeslot of the seminar.

Week 8
(25-29 October)
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You will sit the Antiquity exam in the first half of Week 8. This will give you time to revise
your assignment in the second half of Week 8.

Week 9
(1-5 November)

Deadline for submission of the assignment: 13:00 on Monday 1 November 2021

(through Blackboard).
 Final assignment
Background
In the first five weeks of the course, you will have familiarised yourself with
historiography by studying a range of subjects, concepts and approaches. You will have
learned that each historical work is the result of a series of choices made by the
historian that produced it. These are methodological choices (which sources you will use
and how you will study them?), theoretical choices (which concepts will you use for your
analysis?), moral and political choices (which determine, for example, which subject you
choose and from which perspective?) and a whole range of other choices. All these
choices together determine the perspective on the past. As such, each historical work is
a distortion of the past in its own way. Or, to put it better: each historical work is a
shaping of the past.
This realisation that each historical work is the result of historical choices is
sometimes confused by the uninformed with an argument or even a call for non-
judgemental relativism. The idea is that if we are unable to know the full truth about the
past, all historical representations are of equal value. Naturally, this makes no sense at
all. Firstly, the fact that we are unable to achieve a sound consensus and a definitive
history is a good thing, because historians will always have plenty of work (there is
always something new to say about the past, from a new perspective). Secondly, by
clarifying which choices we are making, we are able to debate and discuss which choices
are the best. And that is what you will do in this assignment too.
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Assignment – what will you do?
You will write a double paper in pairs. The tutorial lecturer will give each student pair a
theme and it will be up to you to put arguments forward on the best approach to adopt
to it. So, you will not write a history of slavery, for example, but explain the best way to
study the subject of slavery. In other words: which choices the historian ought to make.
You will base these choices on what you have seen in the first part of the course. So, you
will position yourself at some point in the development of historiography. You will do
this with the other person in your student pair but also in debate with each other.
Therefore, each paper will contain two arguments, side by side.
The following three general rules apply:
- You cannot choose everything. Even if you make a synthesis, you will need to
substantiate it and you will be expected to focus on selected information;
- You must argue why your approach is the best. However, the argument that your
approach simply shows the past as it was will not be acceptable. Refer to the
entirety of the previous course in this respect.
- You will need to have a different opinion to your partner, even if he/she is your
soulmate or identical twin sibling. You do not need to be diametrically opposed to
each other, but the differences must be clear.

Assignment – why are you going to do this?

 - As an exercise for a responsible historian: you must be able to recognise,
acknowledge and justify the choices you make in your work;
- To utilise the knowledge you gained about the academic practice of history in the
first few weeks of the course. You must be able to reproduce developments in the
historiography and apply them yourself too;
- Because the academic practice of history involves debate. The History
programme is not about gaining a knowledge of the past but about continually
relating your own work to the work of other historians;
- As a springboard to the next course in this learning pathway, Research Lab I, in
which you will position yourself in historiography with a capital ‘H’ (the
development of the discipline as a whole); in Research Lab II, you will position
yourself in historiography with a little ‘h’ (what has been written about one
specific subject). Just as in this assignment, you will be required to position
yourself in historiographic debate again in Research Lab I.

Assignment – which format will you use?

What is a double paper? Which format will you use when writing it? Specifically: two
columns side by side, in which the two of you present the different approach each of you
have to the same subject. This does not mean that you will present two assignments
together in the same file. The two different approaches must enter into debate with each
other and the two of you must respond to each other. This interplay will sharpen your
argumentation and clarify the choices you have made. You will receive one grade.
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You must answer the following questions in your paper:
- What is the subject?
- Who?
- Where?
- What?
- Observer or participant?

Other than this, you are free to decide on the structure of the paper yourselves. Although
you could use the questions above as a guideline, you do not have to.

At the end of your paper you will have to give account of the cooperation between you as
pair. How did you approach this cooperation and how did it turn out in practice?

You must draw on literature in your research (a minimum of four titles):

- The handbook written by Maza – to position yourself in the historiography;
- One of the historical works mentioned by Maza – this must be a work that is not
about your subject but does serve as a source of inspiration for your approach;
- Two other historical works (books or articles) about your subject.

Your paper must be approximately 3,000 words long.

 Assessment
You will be assessed on the following points:
- Your processing of the knowledge of historiography you gained in the first part of
the course; (25%)
- The extent to which you have been able to present a clearly-reasoned approach;
(25%)
- The dialogue between the two approaches; (25%)
- Your processing of feedback on the outline; (25%)
- Two formal requirements (pass/fail – if you do meet these rerquirements, you
have automatically failed the assignment)
o Language and style.
o Literature (see the demands above).

The assignment may only be retaken if the final mark for the course is between 4 and
5.5.

Time schedule
Week 3, seminar B: first explanation of assignment.

Week 4, seminar A: further explanation of assignment, allocation of subjects. 23

Week 6: work on the assignment.

Week 7: 1pm on Monday 18 October: submit outline for assignment.

End of week 7: feedback on assignment.

Week 9: 1pm on Monday 1 November: submit final version.

You will have five working days after the date on which you receive your assessment to
do the retake.