Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    Unavailable
    Other Pasts, Different Presents, Alternative Futures
    Unavailable
    Other Pasts, Different Presents, Alternative Futures
    Unavailable
    Other Pasts, Different Presents, Alternative Futures
    Ebook361 pages23 hours

    Other Pasts, Different Presents, Alternative Futures

    By Jeremy Black

    4/5

    ()

    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this ebook

    What if there had been no World War I or no Russian Revolution? What if Napoleon had won at Waterloo in 1815, or if Martin Luther had not nailed his complaints to the church door at Wittenberg in 1517, or if the South had won the American Civil War? The questioning of apparent certainties or "known knowns" can be fascinating and, indeed, "What if?" books are very popular. However, this speculative approach, known as counterfactualism, has had limited impact in academic histories, historiography, and the teaching of historical methods. In this book, Jeremy Black offers a short guide to the subject, one that is designed to argue its value as a tool for public and academe alike. Black focuses on the role of counterfactualism in demonstrating the part of contingency, and thus human agency, in history, and the salutary critique the approach offers to determinist accounts of past, present, and future.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherIndiana University Press
    Release dateAug 3, 2015
    ISBN9780253017062
    Unavailable
    Other Pasts, Different Presents, Alternative Futures
    Author

    Jeremy Black

    Jeremy Black is Professor of History at the University of Exeter, UK, and a Senior Fellow at the Center for the Study of America and the West at the Foreign Policy Research Institute in Philadelphia, USA.

    Read more from Jeremy Black

    Related to Other Pasts, Different Presents, Alternative Futures

    Related ebooks

    History For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      The West’s Hollow Words

      Mar 13, 2022

      Putin and Khrushchev; Ukraine and Hungary; 2022 and 1956 – I can’t help but see parallels. I arrived in New Zealand with my parents a few years before the Hungarian uprising. We followed events there closely and with concern. Students with hopes for

      7 min read

    • Article

      Letters

      Oct 29, 2020

      I read with interest about Captain Francis Grose and his contribution to the English language (My History Hero, November). However, Captain Grose also had a hand in creating one of Scotland’s most famous literary figures, Tam O’Shanter by Robert Burn

      6 min read

    • Article

      The Enemy Within

      Apr 30, 2020

      The Enemy Within
      5 min read

    • Article

      A Culture Of Fear

      Jul 7, 2022

      A Culture Of Fear
      2 min read

    • Article

      A Culture Of Fear

      Jul 7, 2022

      A Culture Of Fear
      2 min read

    • Article

      Letters

      Mar 14, 2024

      I wanted to write in to say how moved I was by Hannah Skoda’s article on the history of breastfeeding (An Act of Love, February). I became a mum myself quite recently, and wasn’t ready for how breastfeeding can feel lonely, frustrating, beautiful and

      4 min read

    • Article

      We Have No Nuclear Strategy

      Jun 1, 2022

      We Have No Nuclear Strategy
      10 min read

    • Article

      The West Will Survive Trump

      Jul 11, 2018

      The West Will Survive Trump
      8 min read

    • Article

      The Cold War Hasn’t Ended. It May Have Only Just Begun

      Mar 18, 2024

      The excellent, multiple Academy Award-winning movie Oppenheimer depicts the creation and testing of the world’s first nuclear weapon at the Alamogordo bombing range in New Mexico. The ‘Trinity Test’ was a turning point in human history. Days after th

      3 min read

    • Article

      Interview Matthew Naylor The Legacy of World War I

      Sep 4, 2018

      Matthew Naylor, president and CEO of the National World War I Museum and Memorial [theworldwar.org] in Kansas City, Mo., also sits on the U.S. World War I Centennial Commission [worldwar1centennial.org], which since its establishment by Congress in 2

      4 min read

    • Article

      Countering Cancel Culture

      May 9, 2021

      That the Featherston Book-town cancelled a Harry Potter quiz because of JK Rowling’s supposed transphobia is the height of both stupidity and ignorance (“Off the guest list”, May 1). Shame on the organisers for not having examined for themselves what

      9 min read

    • Article

      'Enlightenment Now' Says Human Progress Is Real, Remarkable, And Yet Often Unacknowledged

      Feb 27, 2018

      Steven Pinker marshals data from detailed studies that show the stirring extent of progress human beings have achieved since the 18th century.

      4 min read

    Reviews for Other Pasts, Different Presents, Alternative Futures

    4/5

    2 ratings1 review

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

    • 4/5
      Somewhere between an extended essay and a survey of how counterfactual history has been handled over time, Black champions asking the question "what if" as a means of unpacking one's own assumptions, as his general feeling is that the academic practice of history has become too set in its assumptions of authority for its own good, and needs reintroduced to notions of narrative and contingency. On the other hand, Black also has little use for the rhetorical cry "if only" that tends to be the foundation of alternative history for the losers; one learns no lessons going down that path.