The Historian's Toolbox: A Student's Guide to the Theory and Craft of History

by Robert C. Williams

Overview

The Historian's Toolbox introduces students to the theory, craft, and methods of history and equips them with a series of tools to research and understand the past. Written in an engaging and entertaining style, and filled with fascinating examples, this best-selling "how to" book opens up an exciting world behind historical research and writing.

This fourth edition expands the repertory of tools and techniques available to students entering the workshop of history. These include materials on the Kennedy assassination, the litigation of Van Gogh's Night Café, local town histories, contemporary history, Twitter, and the contemplation of the end of history as well as the Sixth Extinction in a new epilogue. The book demonstrates the relevance and expanding possibilities of the study of history in our cacophonous information age of tweetstorms and fake news; it emphasises the increasing value of critical thinking, facts and evidence in the face of political lies and conspiracy theories. Material added to the fourth edition will resonate with a new generation of computer-literate readers in the face of climate change.

The Historian's Toolbox continues to be a seminal text for supporting students throughout their study of history and an accessible teaching tool for instructors.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781032755977
Publisher:	Taylor & Francis
Publication date:	10/03/2024
Edition description:	5th ed.
Pages:	228
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x (d)

About the Author

Robert C. Williams is Vail Professor of History Emeritus at Davidson College. He has taught Russian, European and American history at Williams and Bates Colleges and at Washington University in St. Louis. He is the author of numerous books and articles, including Russian Art and American Money (1980), nominated by Harvard University Press for the Pulitzer Prize.

Table of Contents

3312 7 The Future 391

Part II The Tools of

8 Doing History: An

4713 8.

Choosing a Go

47

8.2 Reading Histor

4813 8.3 Taking N

5113 8.4 How t

5212 9 Sources and Evid

5613 9.1 Primary and Secondar

5614 Primary Source: The Wan

5714

Summary 5913 9.2 Documents 591

A Revolutionary War Ancestor's Pension Applicatio

5913 9.3 Maps 6114 Sebastian Munster's Map of the Americas, c. 1540 6113 9.4 Artifacts 641

Digging Ancie

6413 9.5

6614 Sharpshooter's Home or Photographer's Studio? 671

9.6 Cliometric

7014 The Black Po

7013 9.7 Genetic Evid

7014 Welsh a

7314 Thomas Jeffers

7412 10 Credit and

7913 10.1 Notes 7913 10.2

8114 Styling Y

8214 Types of Bibliographie

8214 A Selective, Annotated Bibliography 8213 10.3

8313 10.

Professional Plagiarism:

8612 11

911

11.1 The Language of the Historian 911

Paul Revere and the New England Village 9213 11.2 Chr

9514 The Life of Margaret Fuller 9713 11.3 Nar

10014 Pickett's Charge at Ge

10013 11.4 Argument 10414 "L

10

11.5 Causation 10

11.6 The Reasons Why 10814

10912 12 In

11213 12

Reviewing History 11214 Bellesiles's Arming Ameri

11313 12.2 Histori

11614 The Denma

11613 12.3 Historiogr

11914 World War II

12.4 Women's History: Th

12412 13 Specula

12813 13.1 Historical Spec

12814 Will the Real Martin Guerre Please

12813 13.

History as Fiction

The Soldier Who Never Was 13113 13.3 C

13314 Who

13313

Forgeries and Facsimiles 13614 Is a Document Genuin

13614 Is a Collection of Doc

13814 How Can

13814 Is a Newly Discovered Collection

1391

If It Is a Forgery, Who Is th

13913 13.5 Fiction as History 141

13.6 Film as History: Fact or Fiction? 1

Films Can Help the Historian Understand the Past 14414 Films Can H

Part III The Relevance of

14 Everyday History 15113 14.1

15114 The Burgermeister's Daug

15113 14.2 Everyone's a Historian 15312 15 Oral Histor

15613 15.1 The Perils of Memory

15.2 Interviewees and

15814 The WPA Slave Nar

15913 15.3 Techniques of O

16112 16 Material Cult

16413 16.1 Spirits

16514 Rich

16

16.2 Studying Material Cult

16712 17 Public History 17013 1

History Beyond the Ivory

17013 17.2 History and the Public

The Enola Gay Controversy 17212 18 Event An

17713 18.1 History in Real Tim

11114 The Iraq War: Mun

17812 19 New Tools

18213 19.1 Spatial H

18213 19.2 Killer Ap

18412 20 History on the Internet 18713 2

Using the Internet: Promises an

18713 20.2 Wikipedia and "Wikiality" 18913 20

Blogging the Past (and Present) 19112 21 TMI: Too Much

19313 21.1 History as

19313 21.2 Hacking History: The Deluge o

19613 21.3 Private Parts:

19912 22 Epilogue

20201 G

20501 Selected Bibliography

21301 Index 219