Words in Time

Francesco Benigno is Professor of History at Teramo University, Italy, and the author of several books, including Mirrors of Revolution: Conflict and Political Identity in Early Modern Europe (Brepols, 2010).

"Francesco Benigno offers a panoramic overview of methodological issues in contemporary historical writing. Like many historiographers in our times, he provides a perspective on the proposition that we have crossed from a modern into a postmodern age.[...]His message seems to be that historiography, when viewed from the perspective of actual historians at work, is a dynamic process that mimics the speed of communication in our times."-Patrick Hutton, University of Vermont, Journal of Modern History

• AcknowledgementsIntroduction: writing history at a time of memory0.1 The distancing of modern0.2 The challenge of memory0.3 Traditional history vs memorial history?0.4 Conclusion: a plea for critical historyPart I Rethinking Early Modern EuropeChapter 1 ViolenceRites of violence?Different from usLosing one’s headConclusions: violence as judgementChapter 2 Popular culture2.1 The standard historiographical understanding of popular culture2.2 A thousand Menocchio2.3 The hermeneutical turn2.4 Folklore and reflexive anthropology2.5 Inventing the people2.6 Conclusions: rethinking the concept of popularChapter 3 Public opinion3.1 Critique as the matrix of the crisis3.2 An utopia of communication3.3 A deformed ancien régime3.4 Possible pluralisms3.5 Conclusions: counterposed rhetoricsChapter 4 Revolutions4.1 After the revisionisms4.2 The mother of all revolutions4.3 Revolutions before "the Revolution"4.4 Conclusions: revolutions and public memoryPart II Rethinking ModernityChapter 5 Identity5.1 There was once a thing called class5.2 Between radical individualism and representations5.3 The discovery of identity5.4 New types of subjectivity5.5 The modernity we have lost5.6 The liquified world5.7 Simul stabunt simul cadent: nation, class and identitary divisions5.8 Conclusions: coming in terms with lost innocenceChapter 6 Power6.1 The time of Grand Theories6.2 The anti-positivistic reaction6.3 Foucault6.4 Power in social organizations6.5 Power, institutions, identity6.6 Conclusions: the communicative dimension of powerChapter 7 Generations7.1 Wave on wave7.2 Grounding the concept of generation7.3 Historians and the concept of generation7.4 Generational memory and constructing of an event7.5 Conclusions: the generation callChapter 8 Terrorism8.1 Improbable definitions and unbelievable genealogies8.2 Revolutionary terrorism8.3 Insurgency and counter-insurgency8.4 The evil scourge8.5 Conclusions: terrorism on the stageIndex