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Historical Inquiry (historical + inquiry)
Selected AbstractsSome Afterthoughts on Culture and Explanation in Historical InquiryHISTORY AND THEORY, Issue 3 2000Chris Lorenz I argue here that the articles in this forum contain basic agreements. All three reject naturalism, reductionism, and monism while retaining causality as an explanatory category, and all three emphasize the role of time and argue for a view in which culture is regarded as both structured and contingent. The differences among the explanatory proposals of Hall, Biernacki, and Kane are as important as the similarities: while Hall favors a Weberian approach, Biernacki argues for a primarily pragmatic explanation of culture, and Kane for a primarily semiotic explanation. I argue that all three positions face immanent problems in elucidating the exact nature of cultural explanation. While Hall leaves the problem of "extrinsic" ideal-typical explanation unsolved, Biernacki simply presupposes the superiority of pragmatic over other types of cultural explanation, and Kane does the same for semiotic explanation. Hints at cultural explanation in the form of narrative remain underargued and are built on old ideas of an opposition between "analysis" and "narrative." This is also the case with the latest plea for "analytic narratves." I conclude that a renewed reflection on this opposition is called for in order to come to grips with cultural explanation and to get beyond the old stereotypes regarding the relationship between historical and social-scientific approaches to the past. [source] Psychodynamic and Neurological Perspectives on ADHD: Exploring Strategies for Defining a PhenomenonJOURNAL FOR THE THEORY OF SOCIAL BEHAVIOUR, Issue 4 2001Adam Rafalovich This article is a discourse analysis of two historical inquiries into what clinici-ans today call attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Of primary con-cern in this regard are psychodynamic perspectives towards ADHD symptoms, championed by psychoanalysts and psychologists, and neurological perspectives towards ADHD, which continue to favor a purely physiological approach to understanding the disorder. Those within the psychodynamic camp are inclined to view ADHD as an interactional difficulty between self and social environment - a condition best remedied by psychotherapy. Those within the neurological camp see ADHD as a specific brain process, whose effective treatment depends upon adequate psychopharmacology. This essay argues that both psychodynamic and neurological perspectives towards ADHD have strategized to legitimate one perspective through the expulsion of the other. Within the current era of ADHD nomenclature and treatment it is clear that neurological perspectives dominate the debate. However, neurological perspectives continue to be haunted by a considerable amount of skepticism, both nationally and internationally. Because of this it would be difficult to assert that neurological perspectives, though winning the "legitimation race" in contemporary understandings of ADHD, are entirely monolithic sources of ADHD knowledge. [source] EXPLICATION, EXPLANATION, AND HISTORYHISTORY AND THEORY, Issue 2 2008CARL HAMMER ABSTRACT To date, no satisfactory account of the connection between natural-scientific and historical explanation has been given, and philosophers seem to have largely given up on the problem. This paper is an attempt to resolve this old issue and to sort out and clarify some areas of historical explanation by developing and applying a method that will be called "pragmatic explication" involving the construction of definitions that are justified on pragmatic grounds. Explanations in general can be divided into "dynamic" and "static" explanations, which are those that essentially require relations across time and those that do not, respectively. The problem of assimilating historical explanations concerns dynamic explanation, so a general analysis of dynamic explanation that captures both the structure of natural-scientific and historical explanation is offered. This is done in three stages: In the first stage, pragmatic explication is introduced and compared to other philosophical methods of explication. In the second stage pragmatic explication is used to tie together a series of definitions that are introduced in order to establish an account of explanation. This involves an investigation of the conditions that play the role in historiography that laws and statistical regularities play in the natural sciences. The essay argues that in the natural sciences, as well as in history, the model of explanation presented represents the aims and overarching structure of actual causal explanations offered in those disciplines. In the third stage the system arrived at in the preceding stage is filled in with conditions available to and relevant for historical inquiry. Further, the nature and treatment of causes in history and everyday life are explored and related to the system being proposed. This in turn makes room for a view connecting aspects of historical explanation and what we generally take to be causal relations. [source] Cultural Meanings and Cultural Structures in Historical ExplanationHISTORY AND THEORY, Issue 3 2000John R. Hall One way to recast the problem of cultural explanation in historical inquiry is to distinguish two conceptualizations involving culture: (1) cultural meanings as contents of signification (however theorized) that inform meaningful courses of action in historically unfolding circumstances; and (2) cultural structures as institutionalized patterns of social life that may be elaborated in more than one concrete construction of meaning. This distinction helps to suggest how explanation can operate in accounting for cultural processes of meaning-formation, as well as in other ways that transcend specific meanings, yet are nonetheless cultural. Examples of historical explanation involving each construct are offered, and their potential examined. [source] When Does World History Begin? (And Why Should We Care?)HISTORY COMPASS (ELECTRONIC), Issue 1 2003David Northrup Advances in evidence and understanding challenge the conventional view that history begins with written records. Nonliterate societies and unlettered social classes, not just the literate élite, are now standard subjects of historical inquiry. Moreover, advances in archaeology and other disciplines have made ,prehistory' knowable. Advocates of ,Big History' start history with the Big Bang, but a less radical beginning is the point at which humans first began to display modern esthetic and intellectual traits , a point that now seems to coincide with the evolution of biologically modern humans. [source] Negotiating Historical Narratives: An Epistemology of History for History EducationJOURNAL OF PHILOSOPHY OF EDUCATION, Issue 1 2010JON A. LEVISOHN Historians typically tell stories about the past, but how are we to understand the epistemic status of those narratives? This problem is particularly pressing for history education, which seeks guidance not only on the question of which narrative to teach but also more fundamentally on the question of the goals of instruction in history. This article explores the nature of historical narrative, first, by engaging with the seminal work of Hayden White, and second, by developing the critique of White by David Carr. The picture of historical inquiry that emerges is one in which the fundamental cognitive activity is one of negotiating among narratives. Students, like historians, like any of us, come to the work of historical inquiry in possession of prior narratives, which are then thrown into an encounter with other narratives of varying size and scope. Good historians enact the negotiation among narratives responsibly and well, demonstrating the virtues of historical interpretation. History education, therefore, ought to help students improve their historical interpretations at the same time as it fosters those qualities that make them good interpreters. [source] The role of the YMCA in the origins of U.S. nonprofit management educationNONPROFIT MANAGEMENT & LEADERSHIP, Issue 3 2010Mordecai Lee The given narrative of the origins of nonprofit management education tends to begin in the 1970s or 1980s, recognizing earlier efforts that were limited to individual professional disciplines, such as social work administration. This historical inquiry examines whether the origins of generic nonprofit management education can be traced further back. It identifies the 1911 bachelor of association science degree from the Chicago YMCA College as at least a proto-nonprofit management degree and a 1935 text by Ordway Tead, issued by the YMCA's publishing house, as a contender for the first text in generic nonprofit management. [source] Saving the world one patient at a time: Psychoanalysis and social critiquePSYCHOTHERAPY AND POLITICS INTERNATIONAL, Issue 3 2009Jennifer Tolleson Ph.D Abstract In contrast to its revolutionary beginnings, the psychoanalytic discourse has abandoned its potential as a critical, dissident force in contemporary life. It is imperative, in our efforts to engage in socially responsible clinical practice, that we restore the sociocritical function to our professional mandate, and that we apply such critique to our symbiosis with the dominant organizing social and economic order. In our close encounter with the tragedies and profundities of the human subject, we are uniquely poised to inhabit a critical, dissident and ardent sensibility in relation to the larger political world. Our immersion in human subjectivity makes possible a vivid and poignant perspective on human experience in contemporary life, and yet our valorization of the subjective and the individual, and our difficulty looking beyond the dyad as the site of human suffering and human transformation occludes a broader social and historical inquiry. So, too, does our preoccupation with holding onto our professional legitimacy, staying viable in the marketplace, which tempts us in morally dubious directions and dampens our freedom to elaborate a more oppositional, or dissident, sensibility. Arguably the profession has a responsibility to make a contribution, practical and discursive, clinical and theoretical, to human rights and social justice. A contribution along these lines requires tremendous courage as we push back against the gains afforded by our conformity to the status quo. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] | |||||||||||||