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Preliminary reflections and assumptions

Over the past decades, what might be called the ‘first generation’ of scholars in history didacticshas worked with enthusiasm and patience on the development of core theories/ theoretical frameworks and a basic set of analytic terms and methodological tools for describing and analyzing the field of history didactics/historical learning and teaching. 

Starting in the 1970s the joint efforts for a profound understanding of ‘historical learning’, ‘historical thinking’ and ‘historical consciousness’ were motivated by the idea of developing an adequate theory – and culture - for history education in democratic societies. 

In the background of these theoretical and methodological debates additional fields of interest for history didactics and history education emerged in the ensuing years. ‘Historical consciousness’ and ‘historical thinking’ were identified as an educational and cultural challenge in general, beyond the history courses at school and university. 

As a consequence, historical sense-making (historische Sinnbildung), and historical identity became relevant questions for the various forms and manifestations of ‘historical culture’ of society, whether they appeared in history museums, in memory culture, in political debate, or whether they appeared in the wider field of public history, TV, film, video, internet, and computer games.

The dynamics of the digital revolution with its innovative forms of communication, interaction and media have provoked new relations and thus new perspectives on the idea of ‘historical consciousness’, ‘historical thinking’ and ‘historical culture’, but they have also caused new uncertainties and ambiguities. Historical narratives, whether they appear in classroom, university courses, history museums, or in the public sphere are written, communicated and performed in multiple forms. Although, the impact of the auditive and visual communications and narratives on historical sense-making and identity building of the ‘social subject(s)’ are just at the beginning of scientific debate and reflection. 

In view of the accelerated cultural change, right now seems to be a good moment in history didactics to revise and renew the theoretical debate on ‘historical consciousness’, ‘historical thinking’ and ‘historical culture’. The Graz Conference aims to make some steps forward in this direction by putting more emphasis on the comparative, transnational and global aspects and dimensions of these concepts and their terminology.

Challenges in history didactics/historical education today consist in creating and maintaining a sound theoretical basis 

  • for working with historical narratives in a sustainable global environment, 
  • for establishing democratic cultures of historical debate and reflection in multicultural societies, and 
  • for communicating, constructing, performing, staging, negotiating and questioning historical narratives in the digital societies (and their ‘clouds’).

Key concepts in history didactics such as ‘historical consciousness’, ‘historical thinking’ and ‘historical culture’ have been the subject of various approaches and definitions in the past decades.[1]However, when applying a comparative approach, the actual terminology is still grounded in the national and/or regional networks and schools of history didactics, e.g. the German speaking community, the British community, the Canadian community, or the community in the United States[2]. New networks arise and develop in a lively discourse on history education, such as the communities in Australia, Brazil, Chile, China, Indonesia, Japan, or in the South and North of Africa[3].The convergences and differences in the theoretical bases and the understanding of the concept among these various groups have been discussed to a certain extent within the various communities - which remain strongly oriented towards the respective regional and/or national ‘historical consciousness’ - but they have not been discussed extensively or compared systematically in a transnational or global discourse. 

Nevertheless, there is a growing interest in comparative, internationally-oriented research and debate among the above-mentioned scientific communities. Recent publications (Seixas 2017; Carretero, Berger & Grever 2017; Clark & Peck 2019) raised the discussion in a more comparative perspective, asking e.g. how Jörn Rüsen’s understanding of historical consciousness as a fundamental way of thinking about ourselves and “making sense of the past” by “interpreting the past for the sake of understanding the present and anticipating the future” (Rüsen 2001) has been adopted in the various communities and discourses, or how it relates to the idea, first discussed by Hans-Georg Gadamer and Paul Ricoeur, that we as human beings are immersed in history a/o encounter the historicity of humanity.

The Graz Conference will respond to these demands and offers an opportunity for deepening the theoretical discussions in an intercultural, global perspective.

To be applied in the transnational and globally oriented discourse, the terminology of history didactics demands a more coherent and sustainable communication. Such communication cannot be based just on a competitive academic debate. It demands a culture of mutual understanding, a culture of scientific cooperation, where those who participate and create this global culture are willing to understand each other and are able to compare what comes from one side of the debate with the results and reflections of the other side.

Clarification and comparison is needed and welcome in this global discourse. 

Empirical research and intercultural comparison have just started. The debate at the Graz conference will give impulses for innovative research and lead, as we hope, to the conception of research projects on the intercultural, transnational dimensions of the core concepts of history didactics. 

[1] Stearns et al (2000); Rüsen (2001); Seixas (2004); Rüsen (2005); Straub (2005); Lukacs (2009).

[2] Seixas, P. 2015, 2017.

[3] Carretero, Berger & Grever (Eds.) (2017); Clark & Peck (Eds.) (2019).

 

Conference Office

Univ.-Prof.i.R. Mag. Dr.phil.

Alois Ecker

Institute of History
Heinrichstraße 26/II
8010 Graz


Institute of History
Heinrichstraße 26/II
8010 Graz

Benjamin Ecker

Institute of History
Heinrichstraße 26/II
8010 Graz


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