WHAT TYPE OF HISTORIAN? CONCEPTUAL HISTORY AND THE HISTORY OF CONCEPTS: A COMPLEX LEGACY AND A RECENT CONTRIBUTION

Javier Fernández Sebastián's edited collections of essays, Political Concepts and Time, is both a critical homage to the monumental work of Reinhart Koselleck (1923–2006) and an important contribution to the methodology of history‐writing. Centered on the polysemic nature of concepts, which are read as “‘vehicles for thought’” studied in their pragmatic and communicative applications in society, Political Concepts and Time provides a stimulating analysis of the role, weight, and future of conceptual history. Its thirteen essays offer an account of problems, questions, and debates on the interplay of words and concepts, meaning and historical change, context and discourse. They endeavor to clarify the complicated and perennially unresolved relationship between theory and practice. In order to do so, Fernández Sebastián has assembled a scholarly composite and broadly international group of specialists from a variety of disciplines and research fields. With the intellectual legacy of Koselleck's Begriffsgeschichte looming large, this book rethinks the ways in which not just historians but also social scientists and philosophers study the past as the expression of contingent, ever‐changing, and revocable semantic units shaping the culturally plural worlds we inhabit. Informed by the idea that history is porous, Political Concepts and Time also deals with the perhaps obvious but no less challenging issue of our approach to time as everyday experience and through its representation(s). Together with exploring the volume's specific historical topics, this essay will highlight some of its limitations and, above all, will respond to its criticism of intellectual history. The following pages will thus argue the case for the latter methodological perspective by reflecting on the type of historian it delineates. Claiming that in their investigation of past meanings intellectual historians make use of creative imagination, the essay will suggest that this model of history‐writing leads to a better understanding of multiple sources and that it might ultimately help overcome some of the inconsistencies and often simplistic divisions between various branches of the historiographical tree. In particular, a small proposal to reconcile conceptual and intellectual history will be advanced.     

THE TWILIGHT OF THE GODS? GENOMIC HISTORY AND THE RETURN OF RACE IN THE STUDY OF THE ANCIENT MEDITERRANEAN

This article discusses the impact of genomic history, a subdiscipline that emerged in the study of the ancient Mediterranean in the 2010s. In 2014, scientists first published a method for extracting genetic material, which they christened aDNA (ancient DNA), from ancient human remains in hot climates. After a decade of research, genomic history is now poised to transform our understanding of Mediterranean premodernity, centering migration and conflict as the key mechanisms for cultural change. Despite years of critique, aDNA researchers have failed to seriously examine the bioessentialist assumptions implicit in their work—a failure that has led many to deploy language that is strikingly evocative of pre-World War II racialism. Even worse, some genomic historians continue to make troubling overtures toward the ethnonationalist Right, which has been ascendant across Europe and North America since the 2010s. This article traces the intellectual genealogy of genomic history from World War II to the present, examines recent attempts to answer criticism from the humanities and social sciences, and suggests paths for responsible use of aDNA in historical and prehistorical scholarship.     

A HISTORY OF THE SPECIES?1

By rejecting the old divide between prehistory and history, the group of scholars behind Deep History opens a new window on the problem of the unity and diversity of human experience over the very long run. Their use of kinship metaphors suggests not only a link between modern society and the deep past, but also perhaps a way to imagine the common legacy of the human species. But what emerges from Deep History is hardly a sunny story about the distant origins of social justice and ecological harmony. The other central metaphor of the book—the fractal—uncovers the slow prelude to the Anthropocene. Rather than seeing a sharp break in the Industrial Revolution from an “organic” to a fossil fuel‐burning economy, these scholars stress the history of environmental destruction that has accompanied human expansion. My critical reading presents an alternative understanding of deep history as an arena for a new politics of species. Here a cornucopian understanding of human adaptation clashes with a new pessimism about the climatic fragility of Neolithic civilization.     

COMPARISON AND TRANSFER – A FRUITFUL APPROACH TO NATIONAL HISTORY?

The aim of this article is to discuss how a combined comparative and transnational approach can widen our understanding of historical change. By using examples from the first wave of the women's movement in Sweden and Canada we argue that exploring national differences, investigating differences in class and political culture and finally even tracing the transfer of resources and ideas could open up for new perspectives in gender history. Comparisons of women's organizing in different countries, but within the same international organizations, could help us to discern common structures that otherwise tend to be regarded as unique in one national context. In addition, such an approach can help to highlight specific national opportunities, cultures or strategies influencing the outcome of women's organizing.     

THE “RUSSIAN LAND” AND THE FORMATION OF THE TERRITORY OF THE ANCIENT RUSSIAN STATE

The author retraces, on the basis of extensive written sources, the formation of the territory of the ancient Russian “independent semi-states” on the vast expanse of the Eastern European Plain. His conclusions, which show that the problem of the study of the formation of state territory is not at all the same as the study of ethnic territory, particularly colonization, confirm that the territory of the ancient Russian state was formed not with the appearance in Kiev of Oleg and Igor but as a result of a long internal process that commenced long before that event and continued for centuries after. (The translation was prepared by James R. Gibson of York University, Toronto.)     

THE TINY PAINTINGS OF THE BUDDHIST WORLD——A RECORD OF LIU ENJUN AND HIS TSAKA PAINTINGS

<正>EDITOR'S COMMENTARY This special column consists of devoted fans of Tibetan culture. They have spent their life,their energy and their finances to eagerly collect and preserve unique Tibetan traditional culture while virtually also enjoying the spiritual and material happiness which those treasures bring to them.From now on,this journal is going to invite Chen Dan to contribute her detailed and delicate stories about collectors of Tibetan artifacts one by one,     

THE SUPERB CRAFTSMANSHIP OF TIBETAN SILVER AND GOLDSMITHS——ON THE GOLD AND SILVERWARE OF TUBO

Inhis groundbreaking work The Golden Peaches of Samarkand of Tang Exotics,American scholar Edward H.Schafer extolled Tibetan silver and goldsmiths;it appears that Tibet must also be given an important place among the nations whose craftsmen contributed     

IS THE MACROSCOPIC CLASSIFICATION OF FLINT USEFUL? A PETROARCHAEOLOGICAL ANALYSIS AND CHARACTERIZATION OF FLINT RAW MATERIALS FROM THE IBERIAN NEOLITHIC MINE OF CASA MONTERO*

Casa Montero is a mining complex located outside Madrid (Spain), dated from the Early Neolithic (c. 5400–5000 cal bc ). An area of some 4 ha has been investigated and some 4000 shafts recorded, of which 324 have been excavated. The characterization of its raw flint materials and the establishment of its diagnostic features are indispensable in the reconstruction of the distribution of the mine's products beyond the immediate site. This work reports the geological study of the mine's Miocene flint layers and their petrological characterization. Archaeological samples from the mine's shafts were classified according to macroscopic features and petrological characteristics.     

IRONIC CORRELATIONS AND SCEPTICISM IN THE JOY STATEMENTS OF QOHELETH?

This is the second instalment of a two part study examining scepticism and ironic correlations in the joy statements of Qoheleth. In this article, the concept of irony is examined in relationship to Gattungen and scepticism in order to discern irony's literary effect. It provides a historical overview of the concept of irony in philosophical context - as well as looking at the role of context in interpreting irony - and whether or not irony is compatible with scepticism. The essential elements and definition of irony are then provided followed by a critical assessment of the above. The article then moves on to examine possible ironic interpretations of the joy statements illuminated by some ironic commentaries of Qoheleth. The article then runs the joy statements through a series of possible ironic Gattungen in order to interpret them followed by a critical assessment. Finally, the article draws some conclusions regarding ironic correlations and scepticism in the joy statements of Qoheleth.     

A VENGEFUL EDUCATION? URBAN REVANCHISM,SEX WORK AND THE PENAL POLITICS OF JOHN SCHOOLS

This article considers how useful the urban revanchism thesis is in helping us understand the John School, a “mobile” educational programme that has been rolled out in the United States, Canada, the UK and South Korea which teaches those arrested for soliciting for the purposes of buying sex the negative consequences of their actions. The article begins by unpacking the urban revanchism thesis and bringing it into dialogue with ideas on punishment. It then draws on a case study of one English John School in the anonymized town of Redtown. It demonstrates that the operations and rationales of the Redtown John School have traces of revanchism and that they are also infused by ideas and practices of care. As a result it argues that the urban revanchism thesis illuminates some important aspects of the Redtown John School while silencing or misreading others. The article concludes therefore by calling for future research to think more broadly about punishment (rather than revanchism) in the city and its entanglements with care.     

LAST CALL BEFORE THE UNDERTAKER: A COMMUNITY’S PERCEPTION OF THE LOCAL WORKHOUSE AND OLD PEOPLE’S CARE BEFORE AND AFTER THE INCEPTION OF THE WELFARE STATE

Abstract

Workhouses were no doubt the first old people’s homes. Sick old people without social or financial resources had no alternative other than admission to one of these state institutions . These institutions instilled fear in local communities and admission represented a failure in society. Due to medical advances and improved social conditions, people lived for longer and during the 20th century the majority of the inmates were old people. After the inception of the welfare state institutional care for older people was mainly in buildings inherited from the poor law. Consequently, even after I948, for many old people admission to an institution still carried a stigma. By using oral histories of relatives and professionals who cared for old people during this time, alongside documentary sources, this article examines how the process of transition from poor law to welfare state affected families in Oxford. This first-hand perspective, missing from most studies on the history of ageing, explores how caring for old people at a time of great social change was influenced by the local workhouse.     

STAYING TRUE TO THE CAUSE AND GATHERING THE POWER OF LOVE——A RECORD OF THE ONE HEART PROJECT AFTER THE WENCHUAN EARTHQUAKE

正May 12,2008,is a day that surely lives on in infamy in the minds of many.The story of the Wenchuan earthquake,however,did not end when the rumbling stopped.People from all walks of life and all over China came together as one,doing everything necessary to provide assistance and rebuild the county from the rubble.At that time,Wenchuan was the epicenter of not only an earthquake,but also of the Chinese heart,and like a seed     

WHAT ATTRACTS KNOWLEDGE WORKERS? THE ROLE OF SPACE AND SOCIAL NETWORKS

The aim of this paper is to identify the determinants of the geographical mobility of skilled individuals, such as inventors, across European regions. Among a large number of variables, we focus on the role of social proximity between inventors’ communities. We use a control function approach to address the endogenous nature of networks, and zero‐inflated negative binomial models to accommodate our estimations to the count nature of the dependent variable and the high number of zeros it contains. Our results highlight the importance of physical proximity, job opportunities, social networks, as well as other relational variables in mediating this phenomenon.