Oral history studies in contemporary China

The rise of oral history is a new trend in historical studies in China that began in the late twentieth century. This promising tendency has so far achieved important results in two areas: theoretical exploration and oral interviews. This article proposes the theory of oral history’s four realities and three curtains and by so doing preliminarily clarifies the relations among historical memories, historical narratives, and the authenticity of oral history. These theories represent the current understanding of the discipline of contemporary Chinese history in regard to the core questions of oral history. Oral history in China has currently reached a new phase of self-conscious disciplinary construction and has the following tentative plans: to strengthen the study of basic theories and methods of oral history; to intensify the training of talented scholars and to establish a professional group of oral historians; to promote the general implementation of oral history projects; to create new oral history websites and academic journals, and to prepare for the establishment of oral history archives in China.     

Oral tradition updated: Current perspectives on gleaning history from its various forms

Vansina, Jan. Oral Tradition as History. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1985. xv + 258 pp. including notes, bibliography, and index. $22.50 cloth, $7.95 paper.     

Words,songs and books. Oral history in Italy. A review and discussion

Abstract

This short article aims to do three things. First, tell the ‘history of Italian oral history’ — a history which begins on the Left and in the south, and then slowly moves towards the city and the big questions of conemporary Italian history: Fascism, the Resistance, 1968, gender studies. Second, the article examines some of the most important methodological debates concerning the collection, use and interpretation of oral historical material, and the links which have been made with other disciplines. Third, there is a discussion of the possible didactic uses of oral history in schools and universities. The piece also highlights some of the main ‘schools’ which have emerged within the discipline over the last fifty years and the possible trends for the future of oral history. In addition, the bibliography and notes bring together the most important (and sometimes obscure) works of oral history produced since the war.     

学习历史研究历史

获悉<安徽史学>杂志即将迎来复刊20周年,我非常高兴,衷心地祝愿<安徽史学>杂志今后越办越好,努力成为全国一流的史学刊物.我在省社会科学院工作过一段时间,对<安徽史学>杂志有所了解,知道他们在较为艰苦的条件下,以弘扬民族文化、传播人类文明为己任,兢兢业业地工作,经过长期努力,取得了较好的成绩,先后被评为全国中文核心期刊、中国人文社会科学核心期刊、华东地区优秀期刊,并创出了一些既有地方特色、又具有全国影响的栏目,如徽州学研究、淮系集团研究、北洋皖系集团研究、陈独秀胡适研究等,为我省精神文明建设做出了积极的贡献.     

Very long term history and people's history

Often William Blake and Isaac Newton are positioned as “opposites”: Newton the great systematizer, Blake the visionary artist. (Blake himself, in fact, seemed to have set up this direct opposition.) However, this opposition is perhaps too simple and overlooks the intricacies of each thinker's work. Further, this straightforward “opposition” fails to account for the pressure that scholarship itself, always occurring from a particular subjective position, applies to shape its objects of study; that is, it creates a useful “Newton” and a useful “Blake” with which to work. Here I employ spatial theorist Henri Lefebvre's technique of “critical thirding” (as Edward Soja has called it), or accounting for “an-Other” position in the dialectic of “Blake” and “Newton”. I consider where Blake and Newton were perhaps more similar than has been suggested in the scholarly literature, and, more crucially, how scholarship itself mobilizes (or indeed “creates”) its own, subjectively useful, “Blake” and “Newton” in order to make particular arguments.     

Queer history

Book reviewed in this article:
Queer Fictions of the Past: History, Culture, and Difference . By Scott Bravmann     

Women's history and gender history: The Italian experience

Since the early nineteenth century political opposition became a central concept of political representation in constitutional monarchies. While this concept marked the political language of unified Italy on the national level, in local administration the legitimacy of political opposition remained an issue of dispute, as illustrated in this analysis of the political language in Bologna's city council. Local perceptions of national events, like Garibaldi's unsuccessful Mentana-campaign, assumed a significant symbolic meaning and challenged traditional understandings of local administration by introducing notions of political opposition. In Bologna, the second city of the former Papal State, the Moderates were able to form a political hegemony after the Unification of Italy and remained the predominant political force also after the parliamentary revolution of 1876 and the electoral reforms of the 1880s. Due to its limited influence on the local administration, Bologna's Left defined its ideological profile earlier and more clearly than the Left in other parts of Italy and integrated issues of national importance into local political discourse. Illustrating the relationship between central administration and the periphery, the article analyses the development of political language and changing meanings of political representation on the local level between Unification and World War One.     

从环境的历史到环境史——关于环境史研究的一种认识

By and large, there are three kinds of research on environment: the history of environment as a field of natural history studies, the history of environment as within the scope of history of society studies, and environmental history as the study of the relationship between human and nature. The methodological perspective of the relationship between humanity and environmental distinguishes the third from the previous two. From this perspective, when we probe the mutual effects between human and nature, we will stress on their interactions. The new era and the realities of contemporary society foster the rise of environmental history, which has not only theoretical values but also practical significance. Translated from Xueshu Yanjiu 学术研究 (Academic Research), 2006, (9):12–22     

Catholic church history

Patrick O'Farrell: The Catholic Church in Australia, A Short History: 1788–1967, Nelson, Sydney, 1968, pp. 294, $1.75.     

夏扎家史

翻阅20世纪前半叶的西藏历史,我们的意识会被戏剧般的生活所吸引。从吐蕃到20世纪前半叶这段历史。是一种延续的渐进过程。贵族家族经历了形成、巩固、发展的漫长历史。这一切有如一幅长长的画卷,由远到近,最终清晰可见。家族正是生活在近代西藏社会中最高的和最受瞩目的家族。如“多仁”、“吞巴”,“帕拉”、“拉鲁”、“桑颇”、“擦绒”、“霍康”、“夏扎”、“索康”、“赤门”等等。这些家族正是依托制度,演绎各自家族的历史。