Comparative Uses of Transnational History

Patricia Clavin’s article on Global, Transnational, and International history is an adequate introduction of these approaches’ potentials and limitations in reshaping European history. She divides her article into three parts, time, manner, and place, to describe how specifically a transnational historical approach can ‘blur chronological boundaries, […] study processes and relationships, […] and explore the sites of historical enquiry in European history.’ (Clavin, 627) Throughout her article, Clavin alludes to how looking at European history through a transnational approach helps break down our established ideas of periodization and inclinations to study Europe’s history of “progress’ and ‘conquest’.’ (Clavin, 626) In looking at connections and networks of unconventional relationships and geographical locales, lesser and marginalized histories of Central and Eastern European countries arise and a ‘rich variety of new histories [emerge].’ (Clavin, 629)

While Clavin’s article offers a helpful explanation of the potential to see the whole of European history from an alternative vantage point through a transnational historical approach, it lacks a discussion on the contemporary discourse surrounding the sometimes-vague benefit of Transnational History in comparison to Global, World or International History. The ‘American Historical Review Conservation: On Transnational History’ is an exciting text pulling from the opinions and commentary of six historians. The conversation is vibrant and fluid in its coverage of Transnational History. While the six authors each provide their unique definitions of Transnational History, they discuss the specific innovations of studying understated connections and networks in International History from a transnational approach. Each contributor illuminates the benefits of a transnational approach to specific spheres beyond European Studies. The text exemplified how Transnational History moves away from binary narratives such as dominant and resistant, North and South, and Elite vs. Subaltern, to uncover new connections within the histories of endless topics.

In reading both articles, I was giving a comprehensive introduction to Transnational History, its benefits and its limitations. Clavin’s article is a successful foundational text in understanding the need for a new approach to European History, but the conversation illuminated the possibilities of Transnational History to reexamine studies beyond a European context and through unconventional methods. The comparative views of the seven historians’ thoughts on the advantages of Transnational History elucidate the necessity in using a transnational approach to reshape the history of the modern world.