Questions about the relationship between historical research and contemporary social and practical problems have posed a challenge to generations of historians, as well as to philosophers and theorists of history. In recent years, views regarding the isolation of academic history from real-world issues and affairs have come under increasing criticism.

The contributions to this volume all focus on history's role in the world today and on the possibilities for, and limits to, engagement resulting from disciplinary practices and conventions. The authors undertake their assessment of...

Faced with the challenge of new ideological emphases and subjects of study, academic history has undergone significant changes in its contents in the past half-century. Simultaneously, pressures to change have been directed at its form, particularly in the shape of calls for more socially engaged and up-to-date modes of presentation. The demand for 'history' in this more existential sense is equally evidenced by the rise of practical and popular uses of the past outside academic history writing. Reflecting on these shifts in the broader history culture, this collection explores the...