History
History is often used as a generic term for information about the
past, such as in "geologic history of the Earth." When used as the name of a field of study,
history means
human history, which is the recorded memory of past human societies.
The term
history comes from the Greek
historia, "an account of one's inquiries," and shares that
etymology with the English word
story. Some feminist scholars instead use the term herstory for the word history.
Historians use many types of sources, including written or printed records, interviews (
oral history), and
archaeology. Different approaches may be more common in some periods than others, and the study of history has its fads and fashions (see
historiography and the
history of history). The events that occurred prior to human records are known as
prehistory.
Knowledge of history is often said to encompass both knowledge of past events and
historical thinking skills.
See also:
History of the world
Classifications
A very large amount of historical information is available in Wikipedia, and several different ways of classifying it are given below.
| \nHistory classified by location
|
History classified by date:
|
Academic classification
Miscellaneous classifications
\n(Not necessarily part of academic history studies)
\n* Cultural movements\n* Diaspora studies\n*
Economic history\n*
History of art\n*
History of cinema\n*
History of economic thought\n*
History of ideas\n*
History of individuals (biography)\n*
History of literature\n*
History of mathematics\n*
History of mental illness\n*
History of philosophy\n*
History of physics\n*
History of present-day nations and states\n*
History of religions\n*
History of theater\n*
Historiography\n*
History of extinct nations and states\n*
Legal history\n*
Microhistory\n*
Military history\n*
Philosophy of history\n*
Psychohistory\n*
History of the Pacific Islands
\n
Ideological classifications
\nAlthough certain amount of bias in history studies is inescapable, national bias being probably the most important, history can also be studied from a narrow
ideological perspective, perhaps one that the practitioners feel is usually ignored. For example:
- Marxist history;\n* Feminist history (also called herstory);
A form of historical speculation known commonly as
virtual history (also called "counterfactual history") been adopted by some historians as a means of assessing and exploring the possible outcomes if certain events had not occurred or had occurred in a different way to that which they did. This is somewhat similar to the
alternative history genre in fiction.
You may also want to see
dubious historical resources and
historical myths for a list of false beliefs and histories which were once or are now popular and widespread, but which are proven to be false or dubious.
Guidelines for history on Wikipedia can be found at Wikipedia:History.
See also
\n*Archaeology\n*
Evolution of Homo sapiens\n*
Social Change\n*
Historian\n*
List of historians\n*
List of historians by area of study\n*
List of historic travellers\n*
Futurology\n*
Psychohistory\n*
Pseudohistory for more about uncritical history.\n*
History painter
External links
\n* A history resource for kids\n*An attempt at NPOV history with a "Chronology of Events in History, Mythology, and Folklore":
http://www.b17.com/family/lwp/frameset/frameset.html\n*"Timelines of History," A collection of timelines organized by time, location and subject matter:
http://timelines.ws\n* Internet History Sourcebooks Collections of public domain and copy-permitted historical texts presented cleanly (without advertising or excessive layout) for educational use.\n*
World History Blog\n*
History Forum Simaqianstudio
Category:History
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