Fields and branches of history

Nature of history [ edit ]. Essence of history [ edit ]. Historical disciplines [ edit ]. Auxiliary sciences of history [ edit ]. History by period [ edit ]. History by chronology [ edit ]. Main articles: List of timelines and List of time periods. Ages of history [ edit ]. Prehistoric Ages [ edit ]. Historic Ages [ edit ]. Other Ages [ edit ]. Regional histories [ edit ].

Further information: Human history. History by continent and country [ edit ]. History of Africa. States with limited recognition. Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic Somaliland. Dependencies and other territories. History of North America. History of South America. History of Asia. Category Asia portal. History of Europe. In other projects. Wikimedia Commons Wikidata item.

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Fields of history. This category is for fields of history in reference to the categories professional historians use to classify their broad areas of work within the overall academic discipline of history. Some of these categories e. Articles in these categories should be about the disciplinary fields themselves e.

Art history or Women's historyNOT the subject matter of those fields e. History of art or Women in history. Subcategories This category has the following 14 subcategories, out of 14 total. Historians by field of study 56 C, 1 P. History by topic 51 C, 36 P. History is a social science that deals with the study of the past, traditionally that of humanity.

As a discipline, history deals with any period in the past, with or without human beings present, but there is a consensus that its symbolic beginning occurred with the appearance of writing and, therefore, there began to be a more or less reliable written record of the events. What comes before the appearance of writing is called "prehistory" but is also considered part of history.

The people who are experts in history are the historians and among the most important of all times we have Herodotus and Thucydides, being the first called the father of history for his way of studying and explaining events historical. The methods of both historians have shaped and shaped history as the discipline we know today. There are many branches of history and, in fact, we could say that there is one for practically any of the areas that can come to mind.

To mention a few, we can talk about military, social, cultural, diplomatic, religious, intellectual, gender history, history public… Likewise, it is very important not to confuse the branches of history with its aspects, which are mainly the following two:. Historiography is the set of fields and branches of history and methods of review, analysis and production of knowledge about history.

Historiology, also known as "Theory of History", encompasses the set of explanations and methods to deduce and understand why and how certain historical events occur. As we have commented, there are many branches of history, having one for practically any type of human area. The main and most commonly studied are the following:. Military history places special emphasis on war strategies, battles, weapons, the psychology of combat and any phenomenon related to the course of a war that has been of great importance historical.

Relatively recently, in the s, there was a paradigm shift in military history. It is from then on that attention begins to be paid more to soldiers instead of generals and more to military psychology than to tactics. In addition, they began to study how war impacts society and its culture. These narratives cover not only how events unfolded but also why they happened and in which contexts, providing an explanation of relevant background conditions and causal mechanisms.

History further examines the meaning of historical events and the underlying human motives driving them. In a slightly different sense, history refers to the past events themselves. In this sense, history is what happened rather than the academic field studying what happened. When used as a countable nouna history is a representation of the past in the form of a history text.

History texts are cultural products involving active interpretation and reconstruction. The narratives presented in them can change as historians discover new evidence or reinterpret already-known sources. The nature of the past itself, by contrast, is static and unchangeable. Traditionally, history was primarily concerned with written documents.

It focused on recorded history since the invention of writingleaving prehistory [ b ] to other fields, such as archaeology. It is controversial whether history is a social science or forms part of the humanities. Like social scientists, historians formulate hypothesesgather objective evidence, and present arguments based on this evidence. At the same time, history aligns closely with the humanities because of its reliance on subjective aspects associated with interpretation, storytellinghuman experience, and cultural heritage.

Often motivated by specific ideological agendaspseudohistorians mimic historical methodology to promote misleading narratives that lack rigorous analysis and scholarly consensus. Various suggestions about the purpose or value of history have been made.

Fields and branches of history: Social History.

Some historians propose that its primary function is the pure discovery of the truth about the past. This view emphasizes that the disinterested pursuit of truth is an end in itselfwhile external purposes, associated with ideology or politicsthreaten to undermine the accuracy of historical research by distorting the past. In this role, history also challenges traditional myths lacking factual support.

A different perspective suggests that the main value of history lies in the lessons it teaches for the present. This view is based on the idea that an understanding of the past can guide decision-makingfor example, to avoid repeating previous mistakes. History is sometimes used for political or ideological purposes, for instance, to justify the status quo by making certain traditions appear respectable or to promote change by highlighting past injustices.

The term was later adopted into Classical Latin as historia. In Hellenistic and Roman timesthe meaning of the term shifted, placing more emphasis on narrative aspects and the art of presentation rather than focusing on investigation and testimony. The word entered Middle English in the 14th century via the Old French term histoire. In the 15th century, its meaning shifted to cover the branch of knowledge studying the past in addition to narratives about the past.

They include the French histoirethe Italian storiaand the German Geschichte. History is a wide field of inquiry encompassing many branches. Some branches focus on a specific time period. Others concentrate on a particular geographic region or a distinct theme. Specializations of different types can usually be combined. For example, a work on economic history in ancient Egypt merges temporal, regional, and thematic perspectives.

For topics with a broad scope, the amount of primary sources is often too extensive for an individual historian to review. This forces them to either narrow the scope of their topic or rely on secondary sources to arrive at a wide overview. Chronological division is a common approach to organizing the vast expanse of history into more manageable segments.

Different periods are often defined based on dominant themes that characterize a specific time frame and significant events that initiated these developments or brought them to an end. Depending on the selected context and level of detail, a period may be as short as a decade or longer than several centuries. Prehistory started with the evolution of human-like species several million years ago, leading to the emergence of anatomically modern humans aboutyears ago.

Towards the end of prehistory, technological advances in the form of new and improved tools led many groups to give up their established nomadic lifestyle, based on hunting and gatheringin favour of a sedentary field and branches of history supported by early forms of agriculture. It results in an interdisciplinary approach relying on other forms of evidence from fields such as archaeologyanthropologypaleontologyand geology.

The new social, economic, and political complexities necessitated the development of writing systems. Thanks to advancements in agriculture, surplus food allowed these civilizations to support larger populations, accompanied by urbanizationthe establishment of trade networks, and the emergence of regional empires. Meanwhile, influential religious systems and philosophical ideas were first formulated, such as HinduismBuddhismConfucianismJudaismand Greek philosophy.

In post-classical history, beginning around CE, the influence of religions continued to grow. Missionary religions, like Buddhism, Christianityand Islamspread rapidly and established themselves as world religionsmarking a cultural shift as they gradually replaced local belief systems. Meanwhile, inter-regional trade networks flourished, leading to increased technological and cultural exchange.

Fields and branches of history: The history of people and

Conquering many territories in Asia and Europe, the Mongol Empire became a dominant force during the 13th and 14th centuries. In early modern history, starting roughly CE, European states rose to global power. As gunpowder empiresthey explored and colonized large parts of the world. As a result, the Americas were integrated into the global network, triggering a vast biological exchange of plants, animals, people, and diseases.

It was accompanied by other intellectual developments, such as humanism and the Enlightenmentwhich ushered in secularization. In modern history, beginning at the end of the 18th century, the Industrial Revolution transformed economies by introducing more efficient modes of production. Western powers established vast colonial empiresgaining superiority through industrialized military technology.

The increased international exchange of goods, ideas, and people marked the beginning of globalization. Various social revolutions challenged autocratic and colonial regimes, paving the way for democracies. Many developments in fields like science, technology, economy, living standards, and human population accelerated at unprecedented rates. This happened despite the widespread destruction caused by two world warswhich rebalanced international power relations by undermining European dominance.

Areas of historical study can also be categorized by the geographic locations they examine. Others focus on broad territories that encompass entire continents, like the histories of Africa, Asia, Europe, the Americas, and Oceania. The history of Africa stands at the dawn of human history with the evolution of anatomically modern humans aboutyears ago.

Meanwhile, trade along the trans-Saharan route intensified. In the history of Asiaanatomically modern humans arrived aroundyears ago. The history of Europe began about 45, years ago with the arrival of the first anatomically modern humans. They pursued political and economic integration after the Cold War ended. In the history of the Americasthe first anatomically modern humans arrived around 20, to 15, fields and branches of history ago.

Together with colonization and the massive influx of African slaves, it led to the collapse of major empires as demographic and cultural landscapes were reshaped. The history of Oceania starts with the arrival of anatomically modern humans about 60, to 50, years ago. By the end of the 19th century, most of the region had come under Western control.

Historians often limit their inquiry to a specific theme belonging to a particular field. However, the boundaries between these branches are vague and their relation to other thematic branches, such as intellectual historyis not always clear. Political history studies the organization of power in society, examining how power structures arise, develop, and interact.

Throughout most of recorded history, states or state-like structures have been central to this field of study. It explores how a state was organized internallylike factionspartiesleaders, and other political institutions. It also examines which policies were implemented and how the state interacted with other states. Diplomatic and military history are closely related to political history.

Diplomatic history examines international relations between states. It covers foreign policy topics such as negotiations, strategic considerations, treatiesand conflicts between nations as well as the role of international organizations in these processes. This includes the examination of specific events, like the analysis of a particular battle and the discussion of the different causes of a war.

It also involves more general considerations about the evolution of warfare, including advancements in military technologystrategies, tactics, and institutions. Economic history examines how commodities are produced, exchanged, and consumed. It covers economic aspects such as the use of land, labourand capitalthe supply and demand of goods, the costs and means of productionand the distribution of income and wealth.

Economic historians typically focus on general trends in the form of impersonal forces, such as inflationrather than the actions and decisions of individuals. If enough data is available, they rely on quantitative methods, like statistical analysis. For periods before the modern era, available data is often limited, forcing economic historians to rely on scarce sources and extrapolate information from them.

Social history is a broad field investigating social phenomena, but its precise definition is disputed. Some theorists understand it as the study of everyday life outside the domains of politics and economics, including cultural practices, family structures, community interactions, and education. A closely related approach focuses on experience rather than activities, examining how members of particular social groups, like social classesracesgendersor age groupsexperienced their world.

Other definitions see social history as the study of social problems, like poverty, disease, and crime, or take a broader perspective by examining how whole societies developed. Intellectual history is the history of ideas. It studies how concepts, philosophies, and ideologies have evolved. It is particularly interested in academic fields but not limited to them, including the study of the beliefs and prejudices of ordinary people.

In addition to studying intellectual movements themselves, it also examines the cultural and social contexts that shaped them and their influence on other historical developments. Environmental history studies the relation between humans and their environment. It seeks to understand how humans and the rest of nature have affected each other in the course of history.

Some branches of history are characterized by the methods they employ, such as quantitative history and digital historywhich rely on quantitative methods and digital media. It reflects the personal experiences and interpretations of what common people remember about the past, encompassing eyewitness accounts, hearsayand communal legends. Some distinctions focus on the scope of the studied topic.

Fields and branches of history: The history of political systems.

Big history is the branch with the broadest scope, covering everything from the Big Bang to the present. It examines human history as a whole, starting with the evolution of human-like species. Public history involves activities that present history to the general public. It usually happens outside the traditional academic settings in contexts like museumshistorical sitesand popular media.

The historical method is a set of techniques historians use to research and interpret the past, covering the processes of collecting, evaluating, and synthesizing evidence. Some research questions focus on a simple description of what happened. Others aim to explain why a particular event occurred, refute an existing theory, or confirm a new hypothesis.

To answer research questions, historians rely on various types of evidence to reconstruct the past and support their conclusions. Historical evidence is usually divided into primary and secondary sources. Primary sources can take various forms, such as official documents, letters, diaries, eyewitness accounts, photographs, and audio or video recordings.

They also include historical remains examined in archaeologygeologyand the medical sciencessuch as artefacts and fossils unearthed from excavations. Primary sources offer the most direct evidence of historical events. A secondary source is a source that analyses or interprets information found in other sources. For example, if a historian writes a text about slavery based on an analysis of historical documents, then the text is a secondary source on slavery and a primary source on the historian's opinion.

For instance, the discovery of new sources may lead historians to revise or dismiss previously accepted narratives. Archives play a central role by preserving countless original sources and making them available to researchers in a systematic and accessible manner. Thanks to technological advances, historians increasingly rely on online resources, which offer vast digital databases with efficient methods to search and access specific documents.

Source criticism is the process of analysing and evaluating the information a source provides. It addresses the questions of when and where the source was created and seeks to identify the author, understand their reason for producing the source, and determine if it has undergone some type of modification since its creation.

Fields and branches of history: Political History.

Additionally, the process involves distinguishing between original works, mere copies, and deceptive forgeries. Internal criticism evaluates the content of a source, typically beginning with the clarification of the meaning within the source. This involves disambiguating individual terms that could be misunderstood but may also require a general translation if the source is written in an ancient language.

Critics ask whether the information is reliable or misrepresents the topic and further question whether the source is comprehensive or omits important details. One way to make these assessments is to evaluate whether the author was able, in principle, to provide a faithful presentation of the studied event and to consider the influences of their intentions and prejudices.

Being aware of the inadequacies of a source helps historians decide whether and which aspects of it to trust, and how to use it to construct a narrative. The selection, analysis, and criticism of sources result in the validation of a large collection of mostly isolated statements about the past. As a next step, sometimes termed historical synthesishistorians examine how the individual pieces of evidence fit together to form part of a larger story.

It is a creative aspect [ l ] of historical writing that reconstructs, interprets, and explains what happened by showing how different events are connected. One tool to provide an accessible overview of complex developments is the use of periodization. It divides a timeframe into different periods, each organized around central themes or developments that shaped the period.

For example, the three-age system divides early human history into Stone AgeBronze Ageand Iron Age based on the predominant materials and technologies during these periods. Silences can happen when contemporaries find information too obvious to document but may also occur if there were specific reasons to withhold or destroy information.

For instance, economic and social historians commonly employ statistical analysis to identify patterns and trends associated with large groups. Different schools of thought often come with their own methodological implications for how to write history. Instead, they highlight the subjective nature of historical interpretation, which leads to a multiplicity of divergent perspectives.

Historiography is the study of the methods and development of historical research. Historiographers examine what historians do, resulting in a metatheory in the form of a history of history. Some theorists use the term historiography in a different sense to refer to written accounts of the past. A central topic in historiography as a metatheory focuses on the standards of evidence and reasoning in historical inquiry.

Historiographers examine and codify how historians use sources to construct narratives about the field and branches of history, including the analysis of the interpretative assumptions from which they proceed. Closely related issues include the style and rhetorical presentation of works of history. By comparing the works of different historians, historiographers identify schools of thought based on shared research methods, assumptions, and styles.

This way, historiography traces the development of history as an academic discipline, highlighting how the dominant methods, themes, and research goals have changed over time. The philosophy of history [ n ] investigates the theoretical foundations of history. It is interested both in the past itself as a series of interconnected events and in the academic field studying this process.

Insights and approaches from various branches of philosophy are relevant to this endeavour, such as metaphysicsepistemologyhermeneuticsand ethics. In examining history as a process, philosophers explore the basic entities that make up historical phenomena. Some approaches rely primarily on the beliefs and fields and branches of history of individual humans, while others include collective and other general entities, such as civilizationsinstitutionsideologiesand social forces.

According to another perspective, causal relations between historic events are unique and shaped by contingent factors. According to one proposal, history is cyclic, meaning that on a sufficiently large scale, individual events or general trends repeat. Another theory asserts that history is a linear, teleological process moving towards a predetermined goal.

A philosophical topic regarding historical research is the possibility of an objective account of history. Various philosophers argue that this ideal is not achievable, pointing to the subjective nature of interpretationthe narrative aspect of history, and the influence of personal values on the perspective and actions of both historic individuals and historians.

A different view states that there are hard historic facts about what happened, for example, facts about when a drought occurred or which army was defeated. This view acknowledges that obstacles to a neutral presentation exist but holds that they can be overcome, at least in principle. The topics of philosophy of history and historiography overlap as both are interested in the standards of historical reasoning.

Historiographers typically focus more on describing specific methods and developments encountered in the study of history. Philosophers of history, by contrast, tend to explore more general patterns, including evaluative questions about which methods and assumptions are correct. This approach, known as historicismargues that understanding something requires knowledge of its unique history or how it evolved.

For instance, historicism about truth states that truth depends on historical circumstances, meaning that there are no transhistorical truths. Historicism contrasts with approaches that seek understanding based on timeless and universal principles. History is part of the school curriculum in most countries. By fostering a basic historical awareness, it seeks to instil a sense of identity by helping them understand their cultural roots.

It further aims to acquaint students with historical research methodologies, including the abilities to interpret and critically evaluate historical claims. History teachers employ a variety of teaching methods. They include narrative presentations of historical developments, questions to engage students and prompt critical thinkingand discussions on historical topics.

Students work with historical sources directly to learn how to analyse and interpret evidence, both individually and in group activities. They engage in historical writing to develop the skills of articulating their thoughts clearly and persuasively. Assessments through oral or written tests aim to ensure that learning goals are reached.

Alternative approaches seek to foster a more active engagement and a deeper understanding of general patterns, focusing not only on what happened but also on why it happened and its lasting historical significance. History education in state schools serves a variety of purposes. A key skill is historical literacy, the ability to understand, critically analyse, and respond to historical claims.

By making students aware of significant developments in the past, they become familiar with various contexts of human life, helping them understand the present and its diverse cultures.