Topics of Interest

For the first week of class we were required to type up a small statement on a topic of research that interested us and then list five sources from AMPU's online library that could be used in researching that topic. Anyone who has known me for any length of time will tell you that there is nothing like a good revolution to get me going. It is often a toss up as to whether I am a historian or a revlutionary, but I like to see myself as a revolutionary historian.

When I say I am interested in revolutionary history, I truly mean revolutionary with a small r, it is not a typo. I enjoy the study of all revolutions, not so much the actual fighting and war often associated, but the causes of the revolution in the first place as well as the effects they have on society following the upheaval. To look at a revolution from an economic or religious point of view and try to determine what exactly was the trigger, to study the changes in society leading up to the revolution helps give more insight than simply reading about who fought who where and who won in the end. Then this insight can be used to gage the health and well-being of the world around us in an effort to predict and, to a certain degree, control revolutions in today’s society.

There was also a bit of a disscussion going on about the nature of historical texts, how they could be boring and difficult to read. First, as a former history teacher, I agree, history texts, as in text books, are boring beyond all belief, but I disagree in the statement made that students are not interested in history. Over the years I have had several high school students, often co-workers, tell me that history is one of their favorite subjects, if only it were presented better in school. Second and this is where it gets tricky, I disagree, old history texts are great to read and I love them. I find too much of modern history is defined by politics, and while I know that politics influenced historians of the past, they still wrote clear and concise accounts of events that often happened within a couple generations of their lifetime. In regards to the language they wrote in, how easy would it be for Gibbons to read Max Hastings’ account of the Falklands War.

I will gladly admit however, that like all historians, I am biased. As an Ancient and Classical History Major, I enjoy nothing more than spending half my day having to look up Latin or Greek phrases that the historians of the day used at random, or trying to wrap my head around an account of a Viking raid written in Old English.