historiography

Historiography is the study of how history is written, including the methods, theories, and standards historians apply to the past. It examines not only events themselves but how historians interpret, select, and organize sources, construct narratives, and assign meaning to the past. Historiography also refers to the body of writing on a particular historical topic and to the evolving opinions about how that topic should be studied.

Historically, historiography has moved through phases and schools: antiquarianism focusing on documentary evidence; empiricism and Rankean science; the Annales school emphasizing long-term social structures; Marxist approaches analyzing class, economy, and power; and contemporary trends such as postcolonial, feminist, cultural, and microhistorical methods that foreground lived experience, discourse, and material conditions.

Methods include source criticism, corroboration across documents, and awareness of biases and context; historiography also studies the writing of history, including narrative form, interpretation, and the influence of language and ideology. Revisionism seeks to reassess accepted interpretations in light of new evidence or questions about sources.

Significance: historiography shapes how societies understand the past and their identity; debates about objectivity, neutrality, and moral responsibility reflect ongoing tensions in the field. Notable contributions include practices of critical source analysis, narrative theory, and the use of interdisciplinary approaches.