This lecture course was offered by the Asymmetries-project at the University of Helsinki in Spring 2015

HISTORY BEYOND METHODOLOGICAL NATIONALISM
Target Group: MA and post-graduate studies, 5 study units
Spring semester 2015, period III, Jan 20 – Feb 19, 2015, at 14–16 PM
University Main Building (Fabianinkatu 33), Room 10
Language: English
Responsible course teacher:
University Lecturer (on research leave) Marja Jalava

COURSE OUTLINE
This course examines the transnational and cultural transfer approaches that have recently grown increasingly popular in historical research. In the era marked by intensified global interconnectedness, the nation-states with their contemporary borders are not anymore taken as natural, given units of analyses, and there is a growing interest in flows, linkages, and identities that cross or supersede other spatial units or the phenomena and dynamics within them.

The course provides an overview on the up-to-date debates on transnational analysis and cultural transfers. It also presents concrete cases of research where these methods have been used. Of special interest are a small-state perspective and asymmetrical relations which have often been neglected in a discussion concerning entanglements and transfers between dominant cultural regions of Europe.

The course consists of lectures by five lecturers with different disciplinary background. It will be asked, among other things, of how do cultural transfers and transnational approaches contribute to the rethinking of the national bias? How can they be applied in the embedding of various national histories with wider Nordic, European, and global contexts and what new perspectives do they open? Where do the limits of these approaches lie? Continue reading →