Popular history, also called pop history, is a broad

genre Genre () is any style or form of communication in any mode (written, spoken, digital, artistic, etc.) with socially agreed-upon conventions developed over time. In popular usage, it normally describes a category of literature, music, or other fo ...

historiography Historiography is the study of the methods used by historians in developing history as an academic discipline. By extension, the term ":wikt:historiography, historiography" is any body of historical work on a particular subject. The historiog ...

that takes a popular approach, aims at a wide readership, and usually emphasizes

narrative A narrative, story, or tale is any account of a series of related events or experiences, whether non-fictional (memoir, biography, news report, documentary, travel literature, travelogue, etc.) or fictional (fairy tale, fable, legend, thriller ...

personality Personality is any person's collection of interrelated behavioral, cognitive, and emotional patterns that comprise a person’s unique adjustment to life. These interrelated patterns are relatively stable, but can change over long time per ...

and vivid detail over scholarly analysis. The term is used in contradistinction to professional academic or scholarly history writing which is usually more specialized and technical and thus less accessible to the general reader.

Conceptualizations

It is proposed that popular history is a "moral science" in the sense that recreates the past not only for its own sake but also to underscore how history could facilitate an ethically responsible present. Some view it as history produced by authors who are better interlocutors capable of translating the language of scientificity to ordinary everyday language. Some scholars partly attributed the development of popular history to the increase of writers-turned-historians such as Benson Lossing, David Pae, and Mary Botham Howitt, who wrote historical events "in good style" and, thus, more appealing to the public.

Popular historians

Some popular historians are without academic affiliation while others are academics, or former academics, who have (according to one writer) "become somehow abstracted from the academic arena, becoming cultural commentators." Many worked as journalists, perhaps after taking an initial degree in history. Popular historians may become nationally renowned or best-selling authors and may or may not serve the interests of particular political viewpoints in their roles as historians that write for a wide-ranging readership. Many authors of supposed official histories and authorized biographies would qualify as popular historians serving the interests of particular institutions or public figures. Popular historians aim to appear on the "general lists" of general publishers, rather than the

university press A university press is an academic publishing house specializing in monographs and scholarly journals. They are often an integral component of a large research university. They publish work that has been reviewed by scholars in the field. They pro ...

es that have dominated

academic publishing Academic publishing is the subfield of publishing which distributes Research, academic research and scholarship. Most academic work is published in academic journal articles, books or Thesis, theses. The part of academic written output that is n ...

in recent years. Increasingly, popular historians have taken to television where they are able, often accompanying a series of documentaries with a tie-in book.

Examples

Academics

Recent examples of American popular historians with academic affiliations include Daniel J. Boorstin, Stephen E. Ambrose,

Doris Kearns Goodwin Doris Helen Kearns Goodwin (born January 4, 1943) is an American biographer, historian, former sports journalism, sports journalist, and political commentator. She has written biographies of numerous U.S. presidents. Goodwin's book ''No Ordinary ...

and Pauline Maier. Recent examples of British popular historians who are also academics include

Niall Ferguson Sir Niall Campbell Ferguson, ( ; born 18 April 1964)Biography
Niall Ferguson

, Mary Beard,

Christopher Hibbert Arthur Raymond Hibbert (5 March 1924 – 21 December 2008), known as Christopher Hibbert, was an English people, English author, popular historian and biographer. He has been called "a pearl of biographers" (''New Statesman'') and "probably the ...

David Starkey Dr. David Robert Starkey (born 3 January 1945) is a British historian, radio and television presenter, with views that he describes as conservative. The only child of Quaker parents, he attended Kirkbie Kendal School, Kendal Grammar School b ...

, Dan Jones, Simon Sebag Montefiore and

Simon Schama Sir Simon Michael Schama ( ; born 13 February 1945) is an English historian and television presenter. He specialises in art history, Dutch history, Jewish history, and French history. He is a professor of history and art history at Columbia Uni ...

, and – from a previous generation –

Eric Hobsbawm Eric John Ernest Hobsbawm (; 9 June 1917 – 1 October 2012) was a British historian of the rise of industrial capitalism, socialism and nationalism. His best-known works include his tetralogy about what he called the "long 19th century" (''Th ...

, Paul Johnson, E. P. Thompson, A. J. P. Taylor (a pioneer of history on television) and Christopher Hill. Podcaster and pop history author Tom Holland, while not holding any formal qualifications in the field, does retain an academic affiliation. Much of

Hugh Trevor-Roper Hugh Redwald Trevor-Roper, Baron Dacre of Glanton, (15 January 1914 – 26 January 2003) was an English historian. He was Regius Professor of Modern History (Oxford), Regius Professor of Modern History at the University of Oxford. Trevor-Rope ...

's output was also directed at a popular audience. There is also

Stella Tillyard Stella Tillyard FRSL (born 1957) is a British author and historian, educated at Oxford and Harvard Universities and the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. In 1999 her bestselling book ''Aristocrats'' was made into a six-part series for ...

and her work ''Aristocrats'', which combined scholarly research with the popular method of presentation. Canadian academics whose work has crossed over to public consciousness are few. Examples might include

Michael Bliss John William Michael Bliss (January 18, 1941 – May 18, 2017) was a Canadian historian and author. Though his early works focused on business and political history, he also wrote biographies of physicians Frederick Banting, William Osler and Har ...

Donald Creighton Donald Grant Creighton (15 July 1902 – 19 December 1979) was a Canadian historian whose major works include ''The Commercial Empire of the St-Lawrence, 1760–1850'' (first published in 1937), a detailed study on the growth of the English merch ...

, Desmond Morton, J. L. Granatstein, or

Margaret MacMillan Margaret Olwen MacMillan (born 23 December 1943) is a Canadian historian and professor at the University of Oxford. She is former provost of Trinity College, Toronto, and professor of history at the University of Toronto and previously at Ryers ...

. In French Canada the influence of Father Lionel Groulx in the historical thought of the twentieth century was preponderant.

Non academics

American non-academics include Walter Lord,

Bruce Catton Charles Bruce Catton (October 9, 1899 – August 28, 1978) was an American historian and journalist, known best for his books concerning the American Civil War. Known as a narrative historian, Catton specialized in popular history, featuring in ...

, Shelby Foote,

David McCullough David Gaub McCullough (; July 7, 1933 – August 7, 2022) was an American popular historian. He was a two-time winner of both the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award. In 2006, he was given the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the United S ...

, Max Cutler, Ron Cutler, and Barbara W. Tuchman. Podcasting has become a new medium for the dissemination of popular history, in which the contributions of Americans Dan Carlin and Robert Evans are notable. John Julius Norwich, Charles Allen, and

Tariq Ali Tariq Ali (;; born 21 October 1943) is a Pakistani-British political activist, writer, journalist, historian, filmmaker, and public intellectual. He is a member of the editorial committee of the ''New Left Review'' and ''Sin Permiso'', and co ...

are popular British historians who have never been academics. English-Canadian writers of popular histories include journalists

Pierre Berton Pierre Francis de Marigny Berton, CC, O.Ont. (July 12, 1920 – November 30, 2004) was a Canadian historian, writer, journalist and broadcaster. Berton wrote 50 best-selling books, mainly about Canadiana, Canadian history and popular cultur ...

and Peter C. Newman, humourist Will Ferguson, folklorist and pulp fiction writer Thomas P. Kelley, and television presenter Patrick Watson. François-Xavier Garneau was the leading historian in nineteenth century French Canada from outside the academy. Polemicists in the national unity debate have also written influentially about Canadian history, notably militant Pierre Vallières and journalist

Normand Lester Normand Lester (born July 10, 1945) is an investigative journalist from Quebec. Though he built his reputation through investigations of the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS), the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) and the Canadia ...

critiquing the Canadian state and novelist

Mordecai Richler Mordecai Richler (January 27, 1931 – July 3, 2001) was a Canadian writer. His best known works are ''The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz (novel), The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz'' (1959) and ''Barney's Version (novel), Barney's Versi ...

critiquing Quebec nationalist historians as anti-Semitic. Notably, Canada has produced several writers who have written popular histories of specific ethnic communities, including Ken McGoogan (Scots and Irish), Myrna Kostash (Ukrainians), etc.

Conceptualizations

Popular historians

Examples

Academics

Non academics

See also

References

Further reading