Local history
Local history is the study of history in a geographically local context, often concentrating on a relatively small local community. It incorporates cultural and social aspects of history. Local history is not merely national history writ small but a study of past events in a given geographical area which is based on a wide variety of documentary evidence and placed in a comparative context that is both regional and national. Historic plaques are one form of documentation of significant occurrences in the past and oral histories are another.
Local history is often documented by local historical societies or groups that form to preserve a local historic building or other historic site. Many works of local history are compiled by amateur historians working independently or archivists employed by various organizations. An important aspect of local history is the publication and cataloguing of documents preserved in local or national records which relate to particular areas.
In a number of countries a broader concept of local lore is known, which is a comprehensive study of everything pertaining to a certain locality: history, ethnography, geography, natural history, etc.
References
References
[edit]See Also
External Links
External links
[edit]
- American Local History Network, United States.
- Local History from the National Archives, UK.
- Local History Trails from the BBC.
- Waverly Lowell. "Doing Your Neighborhood History". Preserving Your History. USA: Society of California Archivists.
- Library guides
- "U.S. local history: a research guide". Princeton LibGuides. USA: Princeton University Library. Archived from the original on 2013-06-01.
Further Reading
Further reading
[edit]- Beckett, John (2007). Writing local history. Manchester: Manchester University Press. ISBN 978-1-84779-513-7.
- Celoria, Francis (1958) Teach Yourself Local History. London: English Universities Press
- Hey, David (1996) The Oxford Companion to Local and Family History. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-104493-9 (as editor)
- Hey, David. (1997; published online 2003) The Oxford Dictionary of Local and Family History ISBN 9780198600800
- Morrill, John. "The Diversity of Local History." Historical Journal 24, no. 3 (1981): 717-29. online on England.
- Parker, Donald Dean (1944). Bertha E. Josephson (ed.). Local History: How to Gather it, Write it, and Publish it. New York, USA: Social Science Research Council – via HathiTrust. (fulltext)
- Richardson, John (1974) The Local Historian's Encyclopedia. New Barnet: Historical Publications
- Rogers, Alan (1972) This Was their World: approaches to local history. London: BBC (to accompany the BBC radio series broadcast Apr.–Jun. & Oct.–Dec. 1972)