Research Agenda
European historians of the U.S. and its antecedents, since 1945
The network will survey European historiography on the United States since 1945, considering the work of European historians up until the end of the 1980s against the backdrop of the Cold War, and since the 1990s, in the context of American academic hegemony and the internationalization of the U.S. history project, and finally the contrasting political uses of this work on both sides of the Atlantic.
National institutional structures
The network will also reflect on the role of national institutional structures, taking into account differing teaching and working cultures, language and writing styles across European higher education institutions.
Some specific European entries into the history of the United States and its antecendents
Finally, the network will consider some specific European entries into U.S. history, analysing comparative, Transatlantic and Atlantic approaches to history writing.
Following a prepatory workshop in Paris in 2009, the network is divided into subgroups of scholars which will address, collaboratively, the topics outlined above. Thanks to a substantial grant from the Leverhulme Trust, each of these subgroups will be able to meet together over the coming months to produce essays for a roundtable to be submitted to a major journal in Spring 2011 and pre-circulated papers for a conference in Oxford in June 2011. The network’s conclusions will be presented in a book and at a public seminar to be held in the United States in Fall 2011.
