Theoretical Use of Historical Information

I have placed the terms captures and object in quotation marks in the preceding statement because they are problematic. Not all methodologies imply that the researcher should "capture" the "object" of study. Feminist methodologies oppose these terms, because they imply that a researcher is trying to dominate the phenomenon under consideration (see Keller, 1985). Other chapters in this volume review some of the implications of current methodologies. This essay necessarily adopts a methodology; to wit, adequate social science includes a theoretical use of historical information. Any social phenomenon must be understood in its historical context. To grasp historical information, one must have a point of view, including an interpretive framework that includes some notion of the "meaning" of history.


However, just as the nature of social science is widely debated, so too what history "means" is problematic. Indeed, that "meaning" is precisely what historians debate. Sometimes they debate the relevance of theories shared with the social sciences: Does a Marxist or a Weberian interpretation of a specific phenomenon best capture its "essence"? How, if at all, is geography central to grasping the development of specific regions, such as the development of the Mediterranean area (Braudel, 1972)? Which social group should historians study and why: elites, the poor, intellectuals? What are the consequences of studying which group? What picture of the past does the historian create by her or his choice? Sometimes historians debate per iodization, or how the division of history into periods influences generalizations (Kelly, 19'!'7). Sometimes they debate the nature of historical narratives: Is there a "grand narrative" that can tell the story of, say, European development? Can the history of other continents (or minority peoples) be incorporated in a grand narrative? Or even, Is the historian's task the development of a grand narrative (Coontz, 1992; 11immelfarb, 1987)?

There are no simple answers to questions about the "meaning of history," just as there are no ready answers to the "meaning" of social science or—to draw an admittedly foolish comparison—to the meaning of life. Given that I do not believe there are a series of correct answers, I will ask such questions as the following: How have empirically minded sociologists grappled with distinctions between the historical and sociological enterprises? How has historical information figured in social science classics? Within the past few decades, how have historians seemingly modified the nature of the historical enterprise? How are those modifications relevant to social scientific research?