Gendering Historiography

All major sub-disciplines of history – one thinks of classical social history, political history or economic history – have not merely undergone methodological innovations, but as a consequence of this renewal have also come to define their object of study differently. The history of historiography, however, which likes to portray itself as a theoretically ambitious sub-discipline, is still hacking away at the same old canonical subject: the writings of established historians. At most, more attention may be paid to outsiders or – as in the transnational perspective – to interactive processes. Unfamiliar texts, forgotten individuals, alternative forms of historical representation, or mechanisms of exclusion and inclusion, however, go largely unnoticed.

We believe it is about time that we took a closer look at the traditional historiographical canon, the dividing line between scholarly and non-scholarly historical writing, and the biographies of historians, with a focus on the category of gender.

A comparison with other countries quickly reveals that this is possible only on an international – and in some cases certainly also transnational – level. Initial studies have shown that in the nineteenth century in Europe and the United States, women were excluded from the production of (scholarly) historical writing and new constructions of masculinity were negotiated. At the same time, women also disappeared as a topic of historical reflection. These mechanisms of exclusion and inclusion did not proceed in a parallel manner in all countries, however. The borders were defined differently and their permeability varied. The analysis of these boundaries takes us deep inside the discus-sion of the very foundations of our discipline: What is historical truth and who defines the rules governing its validity?

Based on these reflections, “Gendering Historiography” seems to us a necessary project for the field. The international conference will address the following thematic areas:

The conference will inquire into the constructions of the (nationally) differing canons as well as the establishment of accepted narratives from the perspective of gender history. We will examine the respective dividing lines between academic and non-academic history for their gender-segregating and gender-hierarchical mechanisms of inclusion and exclusion. Finally, participants will look at the gender-coded profession of the historian and contrast it with alternative professional careers.

The goal of the conference is to uncover the gender-specific conditions of historiography both within and outside the academy. Intensive readings of the sources are intended to make an expansion of the canon unavoidable, and, if not to break the power of tradition, at least to challenge it critically.