This volume provides a practical introduction to spatial history through the lens of the different primary sources that historians use. It is informed by a range of analytical perspectives and conveys a sense of the various facets of spatial history in a tangible, case-study based manner.
The chapter authors hail from a variety of fields, including early modern and modern history, architectural history, historical anthropology, economic and social history, as well as historical and human geography, highlighting the way in which spatial history provides a common forum that facilitates discussion across disciplines. The geographical scope of the volume takes readers on a journey through central, western, and east central Europe, to Russia, the Mediterranean, the Ottoman Empire, and East Asia, as well as North and South America, and New Zealand. Divided into three parts, the book covers particular types of sources, different kinds of space, and specific concepts, tools and approaches, offering the reader a thorough understanding of how sources can be used within spatial history specifically but also the different ways of looking at history more broadly.
Very much focusing on doing spatial history, this is an accessible guide for both undergraduate and postgraduate students within modern history and its related fields.
Table of Contents
Introduction – Spatial history: an expansive field
Riccardo Bavaj
Part 1: Working with sources
1. Maps
Bernhard Struck and Riccardo Bavaj
2. Travel guides
James Koranyi
3. Novels, autobiographies and memoirs
Sarah Deutsch
4. Newspaper archives
Sherry Olson and Peter Holland
5. Architectural drawings
Despina Stratigakos
Part 2: Exploring spaces
6. Ships
Matt Ylitalo and Sarah Easterby-Smith
7. Bars
Kate Ferris
8. Rivers
Mark Harris
9. Infrastructures
Frithjof Benjamin Schenk
10. Border zones
Lisa Hellman
Part 3: Reflecting on concepts, tools, and approaches
11. Lefebvrean landscapes
Dawn Hollis
12. Maritoriality
Michael Talbot
13. Regional imaginaries
Konrad Lawson
14. Economic geographies
Antonis Hadjikyriacou
15. Digital mapping
Tim Cole and Alberto Giordano
Selected Bibliography