Norske, engelske og franske historikere
er enige om at det mastergradsstudenter i historie skal lære i løpet
av studiet, er hvordan bedrive historisk forskning.
Men hva er historisk forskning? Når historikere
fra seks universiteter i disse tre landene i intervjuer beskriver
den faglige kjernen de ønsker å formidle til studentene, vektlegger
de ulike aspekter: Mens de norske insisterer på ensom og langsom
modning gjennom arkivarbeid og skriving av lange oppgaver, er de
engelske opptatt av å utvikle studentenes retoriske ferdigheter
gjennom kursundervisning og skriving av korte essays. De franske
historikerne er derimot opptatt av at studentene skal utvikle et
sanselig forhold til gamle dokumenter og «få smaken for støv». Hvordan
skal vi forstå disse variasjonene, og hva kan de fortelle oss om
sammenheng mellom undervisningspraksiser, disiplinidealer og den
historiske og samfunnsmessige konteksten disse inngår i?
The nature of history and national
educational cultures
A sociological study of Norwegian, French and English historians’
disciplinary
self-perceptions
Norwegian, English and French historians agree that the key thing
that has to be conveyed to their master’s students is how to conduct
historical research. But what is historical research? This article
is based on interviews with professors of history at six universities
in Norway, England and France about how they define their discipline
and how they think it ought to be taught. The interviews unveil
variations between the historians’ disciplinary definitions and
also between their forms of transmission. These turn out to be structured
along national dimensions: whereas Norwegian historians primarily
value slow and individual work on primary sources and the writing
of a single long thesis, the English value training in rhetorical
skills through seminars and the writing of several shorter essays.
French historians focus on developing the student’s sensitivity
for the material aspects of historical research. Furthermore, there
are variations between the ways in which historians situate their
discipline on a wider disciplinary map: whereas Norwegian historians
set up a map pitting disciplines within the humanities against disciplines
within the social sciences, and consider history as part of the
former, English historians consider that this division takes place within
history, opposing humanities-oriented historians to social science-oriented
ones. The French depart even further from the others by not opposing
the humanities and the social sciences at all, but by considering
all these to be part of a common group sharing epistemological ideals
and research practices. The article further investigates the historical-sociological
context for the development of the discipline of history in each
of the three countries in order to make these variations more understandable.
The structure of the educational system, the regulation of the relationship
between the educational system and the labour market and historical
disciplinary debates all shed light on the nationally varying conceptions
of history.