After the atrocities of WWII, many historians felt that a new history writing was required. Enlightened modernist values (e.g reasons/rationality, progress, scientific objectivity and also the tenets of 19^th-century historical materialism) which had inspired history writing until then (including that of the early Annales scholars) would no longer do: these 'values' appeared much less transparent and triumphant than they had to earlier generations of historians. A new age of intellectual questioning opened up. Modernist values came to be seriously questioned during the turbulent times of decolonisation, civil rights and women’s movements, anti-war and anti-nuclear protest. Any authority based on modernist norms and values was critiqued in public and academic life. The rise of the ‘new’ social’ history in the 1960s and 70s emerged in the midst of these critiques. By moving human experiences and the culture of individuals and social classes to the fore, this history ‘from below’ was to quickly conquer history departments all over the world.

In the lecture we shall concentrate on two prominent strands of the ‘new’ social history in the English-speaking world in the 1960s and 70s: the ‘socialist humanism’ of the E.P. Thompson and the writings of Sheila Rowbotham. E.P. Thompson was perhaps the most prominent Marxist historian in the English-speaking world to break with Stalinism in the wake of the revelations in Khruschev's speech to the 20th Party Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, and the Soviet invasion of Hungary. His rejection of Stalinist politics fed into a life-long search for a 'socialist humanism' which rejected orthodox-Marxist beliefs in historical inevitability and the ineffably 'scientific' status of Marxism. The revitalized Marxist historiography which Thompson pioneered came to be known as 'history from below'. This new form of socialist historiography soon entered into a tense, conflicted but productive relationship with second-wave feminism. While Thompson himself was much-criticized for his relative neglect of questions of gender and women's experiences, 'history from below' also inspired a new wave of feminist historiography, mainly practised by socialist-feminists. One of the most prominent British socialist-feminists was Sheila Rowbotham, whose writings on women's experiences, feminism, and radical politics was extremely influential. This week we shall examine some of the writings of Thompson and Rowbotham, and reflect on the nature of 'socialist humanism', 'history from below', and 'socialist-feminist history'.

 

READINGS CAN ALSO BE FOUND HERELink opens in a new window.

Texts/Documents/Arguments/Sources

Thompson, Edward Palmer, The Making of the English Working Class (London, 1963), pp. 8-27, 207-232, 887-915. (extracts)

Rowbotham, Sheila, Hidden from History. 300 Years of Women’s Suppression and the Fight Against It (London: Pluto Press, 1973), Preface; pp. and chapter 13 and 14, pp. 65-76.

 

powerpoint: socialist humanism

Background Seminar Reading

Soper, K., ‘Socialist Humanism’, in Kaye & McClelland, op.cit., pp. 204-232.

Downs, L. L., ‘From Women’s History to Gender History’, in S. Berger, H. Feldner and K. Passmore (eds), Writing History: Theory and Practice (London, 2003), pp. 261-82.

Also recommended reading:

 

Significant Quotations

‘Class is defined by men as they live their own history, and, in the end, this is its only definition.’ (E. P. Thompson, The Making of the English Working Class, 1963)

‘I have tried to explore both what has been specific to women as a sex and the many ways in which class has cut across oppression.’ (Sheila Rowbotham, Hidden from History, 1973).

‘This book comes directly from a political movement. The decision to work over some of the territory I had gone through and find out more came out of discussions in women’s liberation and on the left about the situation of women in contemporary capitalism’. (Sheila Rowbotham, Hidden from History, 1973).

 

 

Seminar Questions

Why were there virtually no women in history departments before the 1960s/70s?

How ‘original’ was E.P. Thompson?

Did Thompson’s political work make him a ‘better’ historian?

What did Thompson understand by ‘experience’?

Why did feminists of the 1960s/70s have a problem with E.P. Thompson work?

Why were women ‘hidden’ from history for such a long time?

 

 

Further Reading

Ankersmit, F. R., ‘Can We Experience the Past’, in Rolf Torstendahl and Irmeline Veit-Brause (eds), History-Making: The Intellectual and Social Formation of a Discipline (1996).

Anderson, P., Arguments within English Marxism (London, 1980)

Bess, H., ‘E. P. Thompson: The Historian as Activist’, American Historical Review, 98 (1993): 19-38

Calhoun, C., The Question of Class Struggle: Social Foundations of Popular Radicalism During the Industrial Revolution (Oxford, 1982)

Chakrabarty, D., Rethinking Working-Class History. Bengal, 1890-1940 (Princeton NJ, 2000)

Curry, P., ‘Towards a Post-Marxist Social History: Thompson, Clark and Beyond’, in A. Wilson (ed.), Rethinking Social History: English Society, 1570-1920 and Its Interpretation (Manchester, 1993), pp. 158-200

Donnelly, F. K., ‘Ideology and Early English Working-Class History: Edward Thompson and his Critics’, Social History 2 (1976), 219-38

Dworkin, D., Cultural Marxism in Postwar Britain: History, the New Left and the Origin of Cultural Studies (Durham NC, 1997)

Eastwood, D., ‘History, Politics and Reputation: E.P. Thompson Reconsidered’, History 85 [No.280] (2000), 634-54

Feldman, D., ‘Class’, in P. Burke (ed.), History and Historians in the Twentieth Century (Oxford, 2002), 181-206

Hamilton, S., The Crisis of Theory: EP Thompson, the New Left and Postwar British Politics (Manchester 2011)

Hensman, Rohini, review of Joan Allen, Alan Campbell and John McIlroy (eds.), Histories of Labour: National and International Perspectives (2010), in Economic and Political Weekly, Vol. 48, No.3, 19 Jan. 2013, pp. 31-33. For a recent brief review of British labour history.

Hitchcock, T., ‘A New History From Below’, History Workshop Journal, 57 (2004), 294-98

Hobsbawm, E. J., ‘Where are British Historians Going?’, Marxist Quarterly, 2 (1955), 14-26

Iggers, G. G., Historiography in the Twentieth Century: from Scientific Objectivity to the Postmodern Challenge (Middletown CT, 1997), ch.7.

Jay, M., Songs of Experience. Modern American And European Variations On A Universal Theme, (Berkeley CA and London, 2005).

Jones, G. S., Languages of Class: Studies in English Working-Class History, 1832-1982 (Cambridge, 1984).

Ireland, C., ‘The Appeal to Experience and its Consequences: Variations on a Persistent Thompsonian Theme’, Cultural Critique 52 (2002), 86-107

Johnson, R., ‘Edward Thompson, Eugene Genovese and Socialist-Humanist History’, History Workshop Journal, 6 (1978): 79-100.

Kaye, H. J., The British Marxist Historians: An Introductory Analysis (Cambridge, 1984).

Kaye, H. J., The Education of Desire. Marxists and the Writing of History (London, 1992)

Kaye, H. J., ‘Fanning the Spark of Hope in the Past: the British Marxist Historians’, Rethinking History, 4:3 (2000), 281-94

Kaye, H., & McClelland, K. (eds), E.P. Thompson: Critical Perspectives (Cambridge, 1991).

Kenny, Michael, The First New Left: British Intellectuals After Stalin (London: Lawrence & Wishart, 1995).

King, P., ‘Edward Thompson’s Contribution to Eighteenth-Century Studies: The Patrician-Plebeian Model Re-Examined’, Social History, 21 (1996): 215-28.

Randall, A., & Charlesworth, A. (eds), Moral Economy and Popular Protest: Crowds, Conflict and Authority (Basingstoke, 2000)

Renton, D., ‘Studying Their Own Nation Without Insularity? The British Marxist Historians Reconsidered’, Science and Society, 69:4 (2005), 559-79.

Rosaldo, R. ‘Celebrating Thompson’s Heroes: Social Analysis in History and Anthropology’, in H. J. Kaye & K. McClelland (eds), E. P. Thompson: Critical Perspectives (Cambridge, 1990), pp. 103-124.

Palmer, B. D., ‘Reasoning Rebellion. E.P. Thompson, British Marxist Historians, and the Making of Dissident Political Mobilization’, Labour / Le Travail, 50 (2002), 187-216

Schofield, Philipp, ‘History and Marxism’, in Lambert, P., Schofield, Phillipp (eds), Making History: An Introduction to the History and Practices of a Discipline (London/New York, 2004), pp. 180-191.

Joan Scott, 'The Evidence of Experience', Critical Inquiry 17: 4 (1991). This essay critiques the Thompsonian idea of 'experience'.

Carolyn Steedman, 'Threatening Letters: E. E. Dodd, E. P. Thompson, and the Making of 'The Crime of Anonymity', History Workshop Journal (online version, August 6, 2016).

Steinberg, M. W., ‘A Way of Struggle: Reformations and Affirmations of E.P. Thompson’s Class Analysis in the Light of Post-modern Theories of Language’, British Journal of Sociology, 48 (1997), 471-92.

Steinberg, M. W., ‘Culturally Speaking: Finding a Commons Between Post-Structuralism and the Thompsonian Perspective’, Social History 21 (1996): 193-214.

E.P. Thompson, ‘Anthropology and the Discipline of Historical Context’, Midland History, 1:3, Spring 1972.

ibid., ‘Folklore, Anthropology and Social History’, Indian Historical Review, 3:2 (1978), 247-266, & reprinted as a Studies in Labour History Pamphlet (1979), copy available in library.

Ibid., ‘Eighteenth-Century English Society: Class Struggle without Class?’, Social History, 3: 2, May 1978.

Ibid., Warwick University Ltd. Industry, Management and the Universities (1970), 2nd ed. (London, 2014).

ibid., The Poverty of Theory and Other Essays (London, 1978).

ibid., Writing by Candlelight (London, 1980)

ibid., Customs in Common (London 1991). A collection put together by Thompson of some of his best-known essays, along with replies to his critics.

Thompson, E. P., Witness Against the Beast: William Blake and the Moral Law (London, 1993).

ibid., ‘The Moral Economy of the English Crowd in the Eighteenth Century’, Past & Present 50 (1971): 76-136 (online) & reprinted in Thompson, Customs in Common (London, 1991), ch. 4, along with a rejoinder to his critics.

Wrightson, K., English Society, 1580-1680 (London, 2003), 9-16 (Introduction)

Yeo, E., ‘E. P. Thompson: Witness Against the Beast’, in W. Lamont (ed.), Historical Controversies and Historians (London, 1998), 215-224

 

Women’s and Gender History

Bock, ‘Women’s History and the History of Gender: Aspects of an International Debate’, Gender and History, 1 (1989).

Downs, L. L., ‘From Women’s History to Gender History’, in S. Berger, H. Feldner and K. Passmore (eds), Writing History: Theory and Practice (London, 2003), pp. 261-82. (send)

Editorial Collective, ‘Why Gender and History?’, Gender and History, 1:1 (1989), 1-12.

Davis, N.Z. ‘Women in History’ in Transition: The European Case’, Feminist Studies 3 (1976).

Downs, L.L., ‘If “Woman” is Just an Empty Category Then Why Am I Afraid to Walk Alone At Night? Identity Politics Meets the Postmodern Subject’, Comparative Studies in Society and History, 35:2 (April, 1993), 414-437. In the same issue, see also the response and counter-response: J. Scott, ‘The Tip of the Volcano’, 438-443; and L. L. Downs, ‘Reply to Joan Scott’, 444-51.

Kelly, J. Women, History, and Theory (Chicago, 1984).

Rose, S.O., ‘Gender at Work. Sex, Class, and Industrial Capitalism’, History Workshop 21:1 (1986), 113-132.

Rowbotham, Sheila, Promise of a Dream: Remembering the Sixties (London, 2000).

Ibid., Women Resistance and Revolution (Allen Lane, 1972)

Ibid, Dreams and Dilemmas: Collective Writings (London, 1983).

Scott, Joan, ‘A useful category of Historical Analysis’, American Historical Review 91 (1986): 1053-75.

Scott, Joan., Gender and the Politics of History (Columbia, 1988)

Scott, J. W., ‘The Evidence of Experience’, Critical Inquiry, 17 (1991), 773-97, & revised as ‘Experience’, in J. Butler & J.W. Scott (eds), Feminists Theorize the Political (New York, 1992), pp. 22-40.

Smith, B. G., The Gender of History: Men, Women, and Historical Practice (Cambridge MA, 1998).

Wiesner-Hanks, M. E., ‘Gender’, in G. Walker (ed.), Writing Early Modern History (London, 2005), pp. 95-113.