History and Cultural Theory

Book excerpt: In recent times there has been recognition of the growing influence of cultural theory on historical writing. Foucault, Bourdieu, Butler and Spivak are just some of the thinkers whose ideas have been taken up and deployed by historians. What are these ideas and where do they come from? How have cultural theorists thought about 'history'? And how have historians applied theoretical insights to enhance their own understanding of events in the past? This book provides a wide-ranging and authoritative guide to the often vexed and controversial relationship between history and contemporary theory. It analyses the concepts that concern both theorists and historians, such as power, identity, modernity and postcolonialism, and offers a critical evaluation of them from an historical standpoint. Written in an accessible manner, History and Cultural Theory gives historians and students an invaluable summary of the impact of cultural theory on historiography over the last twenty years, and indicates the likely directions of the subject in the future.