The Next Step for a Journal of Method

2010 ◽  
Vol 37 ◽  
pp. 1-5 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michel R. Doortmont ◽  
John H. Hanson ◽  
Jan Jansen ◽  
Dmitri van den Bersselaar

For over thirty years, History in Africa: A Journal of Method has been at the forefront of publishing scholarship on textual analysis and criticism of African historical sources, historiographical essays on the literature concerning Africa's past, bibliographical essays on relevant historical topics, reflections on the role of theory in historical investigation, and archive reports. The new editorial team will maintain this profile with an emphasis on theory and method, while aiming to enhance the journal by focusing on issues that will expand its appeal beyond its current audience. We seek to broaden the framing of methodological and historiographical topics to discuss new information technologies and pedagogical issues. The new editors work with an inclusive definition of “History” and invite scholars, no matter what discipline, to join the discussion and analysis of the past. In the multi-polar world of the twenty-first century, the new editors embrace the “in” in the title and are committed to publishing an increased number of articles from scholars on the continent. We also operate with a pluriform definition of “Africa” that includes the worlds of the diaspora and recognizes regional variations in the continent. The new editors wish to bring new perspectives associated with Africa's twenty-first century renaissance into the journal. Finally, the new editors will remain faithful to the focus of David Henige, the founding and long-serving editor of History in Africa, on the critical analysis of both the epistemological bases of historical inquiry and the construction of arguments about the past.

2010 ◽  
Vol 53 (2) ◽  
pp. 495-516 ◽  
Author(s):  
EMILE CHABAL

ABSTRACTWith France currently in the midst of a fierce public debate over its identité nationale, now is a very appropriate time to revisit one of the most controversial questions in modern French history: the definition of the nation. Taking a wide range of French and foreign authors from a variety of disciplines, this article shows how debates around the national narrative in France have developed in the past twenty years, as the country's intellectual class has come to terms with, amongst other things, the ‘post-colonial turn’, and the disintegration of Marxism.


Author(s):  
Alex J. Bellamy

Until recently, East Asia was a boiling pot of massacre and blood-letting. Yet, almost unnoticed by the wider world, it has achieved relative peace over the past three decades.1 At the height of the Cold War, East Asia accounted for around 80 percent of the world’s mass atrocities. By the second decade of the twenty-first century, it accounted for less than 5 percent....


Author(s):  
Alexander Gillespie

The cumulative environmental challenge of sustainable development in the twenty-first century is larger than anything humanity has ever had to deal with in the past. The good news is that solid progress is being reached in the understanding of issues in scientific terms and understanding what needs to be done. The bad news is twofold. First, although many of the environmental problems of earlier centuries are now being confronted, a new generation of difficulties is eclipsing what were the older difficulties. Secondly, much of the progress is being achieved by the wealthier parts of the planet, rather than the developing world. From population growth to climate change to unprecedented habitat and species loss, whether environmental sustainability can be achieved in the twenty-first century is an open question.


2018 ◽  

What does it mean to be a good citizen today? What are practices of citizenship? And what can we learn from the past about these practices to better engage in city life in the twenty-first century? Ancient and Modern Practices of Citizenship in Asia and the West: Care of the Self is a collection of papers that examine these questions. The contributors come from a variety of different disciplines, including architecture, urbanism, philosophy, and history, and their essays make comparative examinations of the practices of citizenship from the ancient world to the present day in both the East and the West. The papers’ comparative approaches, between East and West, and ancient and modern, leads to a greater understanding of the challenges facing citizens in the urbanized twenty-first century, and by looking at past examples, suggests ways of addressing them. While the book’s point of departure is philosophical, its key aim is to examine how philosophy can be applied to everyday life for the betterment of citizens in cities not just in Asia and the West but everywhere.


2005 ◽  
Vol 33 (3) ◽  
pp. 325-340
Author(s):  
Dana L. Robert

One of the most important mission theories for the past two centuries has been the idea of the “Christian home.” Historical research, interviews with current missionaries, and studies of Christianity in the non-western world all show that the Christian home remains a central metaphor for how women conceptualize what it means to be a witness for Christ. In this paper, I will discuss why the Christian home remains important for mission practice, examine reasons for its omission from academic discussions of mission theory, look briefly at its history and changing definition, and conclude by urging that the Christian home be a renewed priority in discussions of missionary contextualization for the twenty-first century.


2020 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-18
Author(s):  
Evangel Sarwar

Advances in medical technology have not only raised our expectations that medicine can perform miracles and keep us alive; it has also raised conflicts in allowing death to take its natural course. Many dilemmas are faced by physicians as well as families in end-of-life care and relieving the suffering. Ethical dilemmas about how to ensure individuals with terminal illness/end-of-life experience a “peaceful death,” when the meaning and perception of death has changed due to technology? In the past, death was expected and accepted, with rituals. Today, death has been reduced to an unheard phenomenon - shameful and forbidden. The advances in technology brought with it a change in culture of medicine from caring to curing, where medicine is expected to heal any disease. This advance has also acted as a double-edged sword, where longer lives come at the price of greater suffering, illness, and higher costs. While most Americans want to die at home, surrounded by loved ones - the “medicalization” of death does not allow the natural course of death to take place. Although recent studies indicate that more Americans are dying at home, most people still die in hospital beds – alone. This paper looks at the transition that took place in the concept of death and dying, and the impacts of technology, and makes suggestions for facilitating a “peaceful death” in the twenty-first century.


2018 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 58-74
Author(s):  
Viera Pejchal

In 2015, the migrant crises in Europe showed that countries that have less experience with immigrants are also the less welcoming. Lack of proper application of hate speech laws and common use of political hate speech in the Czech and Slovak Republics have further promoted prejudice and intolerance towards minorities. In the absence of a universal definition of hate speech, I interpret incitement to hatred in three different but complementary ways: incitement to violence; incitement to discrimination; and incitement to denial of human dignity. This generational model is also applied to interpret the Czech and Slovak case law to explore the possibilities for outlawing hate speech that targets migrants and to decide on which ‘legal goods’ a society should protect in the twenty-first century.


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