Currents of History 3/2018

Olga MANOJLOVIĆ PINTAR
Institute for Recent History of Serbia
olgamp0208@gmail.com

On Public/Applied History^[1]∗

Summary

The text shows the development of the concept of Applied History. In recent years, many universities have been offering their students courses on Public and Applied History, describing them as a practical use of the past in society and on the market and as a strategic potential in politics, diplomacy, economics, education, management, media and cultural activities, showing "historical thinking (...) as versatile, intellectual software." The article gives several examples of universities that offer basic and advanced Masters courses in the field of Public and Applied History. Special attention is focused on the work of the National Council on Public History (NCPH) in the United States, which offers detailed information on academic programs and business opportunities in the field of Public History. On the other hand, it shows the Applied History Program of the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs of the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University. Its creators, Graham Allison and Niall Ferguson, view the difference between traditional historiography and applied history in their approach to the past. Whereas traditional historians focus on events from the past in an attempt to give answers to questions about what happened and how, Applied historians begin with a current choice or predicament and attempt to analyze the historical record to provide perspective, stimulate imagination, find clues about what is likely to happen, suggest possible policy interventions, and assess probable consequences. The article pays special attention to a document initially called Our Manifesto: Establish a White House Council of Historical Advisers Now, later to be renamed Applied History Manifesto. This document is compared with the book, History Manifesto, written by Jo Guldi and David Armitage in 2014. This book deals with the place of history in modernity and the problems of historical methodology, which the authors believe places too much emphasis on researching short historical episodes and is devoid of possibilities for properly contextualizing historical phenomena.