Full Description
This collection opens with an inquiry into the assumptions and methods of the historical study of culture, comparing the new cultural history with the old. Thirteen essays follow, each defining a problem within a particular culture. In the first section, Biography and Autobiography, three scholars explore historically changing types of self-conception, each reflecting larger cultural meanings; essays included examine Italian Renaissance biographers and the autobiographies of Benjamin Franklin and Mohandas Gandhi. A second group of contributors explore problems raised by the writing of history itself, especially as it relates to a notion of culture. Here examples are drawn from the writings of Thucydides, Jacob Burckhardt, and the art historians Alois Riegl and Josef Strzygowski. In the third section, Politics, Nationalism, and Culture, the essays explore relationships between cultural creativity and national identity, with case studies focusing on the Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I, the place of Castile within the national history of Spain, and the impact of World War I on work of Thomas Mann.The final section, Cultural Translation, raises the complex questions of cultural influence and the transmission of traditions over time through studies of Philo of Alexandria's interpretation of the Hebrew Bible, Erasmus' use of Socrates, Jean Bodin's conception of Roman law, and adaptations of the Hebrew Bible for American children.
Contents
Acknowledgements. INTRODUCTION. Benjamin C. SAXCultural History. BIOGRAPHY AND AUTOBIOGRAPHY. James Michael WEISS: Varieties of Biography during the Italian Renaissance: Individuality and Beyond. Amy APFEL KASS: Autobiography and American Identity: Another Look at Benjamin Franklin. Milton EDER: Person and Personae in Mohandas Karamchand Ghandi's The Story of My Experiments with Truth. HISTORIOGRAPHY. James REDFIELD: Thucydides' Argument with the Facts. Benjamin C. SAX: An Acute and Practiced Eye: Jacob Burckhardt, The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy, and the Problem of Cultural History. Margaret OLIN: Art History and Ideology: Alois Riegl and Josef Strzygowski. POLITICS, NATIONALISM, AND CULTURE. Larry SILVER: Caesar Ludens: Emperor Maximilian I and the Waning Middle Ages. E. INMAN FOX: Spain as Castile: The Making of a National Culture. Alcyone SCOTT: Thomas Mann and World War I: Germanness under Siege. CULTURAL TRANSLATION. Alan MENDELSON: The Dialectics of Reward and Punishment in Philo of Alexandria. Katy O'BRIEN WEINTRAUB: O Sancte Socrate, Ora pro Nobis: Erasmus on the Problem of Athens and Jerusalem. Zachary SAYRE SCHIFFMAN: Jean Bodin, Roman Law, and the Renaissance Conception of the Past. Penny SCHINE GOLD: Making the Bible Modern: Translating Biblical Culture for Jewish American Children in the Early Twentieth Century. Contributors.
