After completing the assigned readings on historiography, you will write a short historiographical essay on the time period of your assigned song. This will require locating and reading 4 books on your time period and identifying the thesis, major points, and historiographical value of each source. The books must be written by historians and from a reputable publisher such as a university press. Your paper should be approximately 3-4 typed pages and include a bibliography (as an extra page) with each secondary source for your essay. Please follow Chicago Manual of Style for the bibliography.

Important questions include: How have historians’ perceptions and their arguments about the period changed over the years? What important themes have historians identified? What debates exist between historians on the period? What assumptions about history and the time period seem to be prevalent in the historiography? What gaps in the historiography exist that deserve further exploration (by you or any other historian)? This paper will help you with the historiographical portion of your longer Paper 4 as you will have to weave all of the sources together in a concise analysis rather than in a list of 4 book summaries. I will provide additional information.

Attached are the example historiography as well as the rubric for the essay.