Usable Past
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€32.50
17th century
A01=William J. Bouwsma
academic
Author_William J. Bouwsma
Category=NHA
civilization
cultural history
cultural studies
eq_bestseller
eq_history
eq_isMigrated=1
eq_isMigrated=2
eq_nobargain
eq_non-fiction
essay anthology
essay collection
european culture
european history
historian
historical
historical research
historiography
law
lawyers
legal issues
metaphysical
middle ages
nietzsche
politics
reformation
renaissance
research
scholarly
secular
secular world
social history
social studies
society
western culture
western world
Product details
- ISBN 9780520069909
- Weight: 635g
- Dimensions: 152 x 229mm
- Publication Date: 27 Jun 1990
- Publisher: University of California Press
- Publication City/Country: US
- Product Form: Paperback
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The essays assembled here represent forty years of reflection about the European cultural past by an eminent historian. The volume concentrates on the Renaissance and Reformation, while providing a lens through which to view problems of perennial interest. A Usable Past is a book of unusual scope, touching on such topics as political thought and historiography, metaphysical and practical conceptions of order, the relevance of Renaissance humanism to Protestant thought, the secularization of European culture, the contributions of particular professional groups to European civilization, and the teaching of history. The essays in A Usable Past are unified by a set of common concerns. William Bouwsma has always resisted the pretensions to science that have shaped much recent historical scholarship and made the work of historians increasingly specialized and inaccessible to lay readers. Following Friedrich Nietzsche, he argues that since history is a kind of public utility, historical research should contribute to the self-understanding of society.
William J. Bouwsma (1924-2004) was Sather Professor of History at the University of California, Berkeley. His books include Venice and the Defense of Republican Liberty: Renaissance Values in the Age of the Counter Reformation (California, 1968) and John Calvin: A Sixteenth-Century Portrait (1988).
