Critics of transnational history seem to attribute the term as a buzzword, a fad occurring within the historical discipline. Despite the opinions of its proponents and opponents, both would agree that transnational history is by no means new. Its rise to prominence can be attributed to three reasons, one of which I found personally meaningful. Students and historians themselves are becoming transnational subjects in their own right. Whether it is through traveling, studying higher education abroad, or learning multiple languages, our generation of historians has the opportunity to directly shape and influence the discipline. I know that my fellow classmates and I have experienced the multicultural and diverse connections made possible by an increasingly globalized world. This aspect of transnational history feels particularly important because I personally feel a part of this ongoing historical process. It also emphasizes the importance of what this course is achieving by attracting students shaped by transnational lifestyles, and the resulting desire to apply those experiences to our appreciation of history.
This week’s readings offered a variety of approaches and methodologies that have inspired my thoughts and development of the long-term project. It’s provided potential explanations as to why transnational history is important and how to cope with questions of space and scale, especially regarding the nation state. “Transnational history does not deny the impact of the nation and the nation state in modern history.” Transnational history’s ability to “play with scales” and narrow in on a particular person or region challenges perceptions of space and refutes the idea that history takes place within a limited, predefined space. The nation cannot be excluded from transnational history, but essentially it takes a back seat and is removed as the primary scale. These ideas contributed to transnational history are useful with regards to my project based on the ideas of Max Weber, and implemented by Andrade’s “A Chinese Farmer, Two African Boys, and Warlord: Toward a Global Microhistory”. The individual as study offers two models for the historian: one in which the individual is an agent in a chain of events, and the individual as representative of a larger group’s characteristics. These two models are some of the methodological approaches I hope to utilize in my long-term project. By engaging with microhistory, finding those links between the macro and micro, I could potentially study one figure from dOCUMENTA 55, such as the founder Arnold Bode, who is directly connected to the choosing of Kassel as the exhibition’s location, or a specific artist to demonstrate the individual’s role within the larger scope of resituating German identity. It is some food for thought, but the topic of microhistory is one I find interesting and beneficial to my engagement with transnational history.