Archive for social history

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Archive for social history

description Trade journal
Area of ​​Expertise history
language German
publishing company Verlag JHW Dietz ( Germany )
First edition 1961
Frequency of publication once a year
editor Beatrix Bouvier , Kirsten Heinsohn , Thomas Kroll , Anja Kruke , Philipp Kufferath (executive), Friedrich Lenger , Ute Planert , Dietmar Süß , Meik Woyke
Web link www.fes.de/afs
ISSN 0066-6505

The Archive for Social History (AfS) is a historical journal that has been published since 1961. At first it focused on the German labor movement . Today the magazine is committed to the recent social history of Germany, Europe and North America.

Basics

The archive for social history is published as a historical scientific journal by the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung and published by JHW Dietz Nachf. Between 1974 and 2004 the Institute for Social History Braunschweig-Bonn was also involved in the publication .

Initially, the AfS concentrated on the history of the German labor movement. Today the journal is committed to the recent social history of Germany, Europe and North America and deals with socio-historical topics that often have a current socio-political reference. It also repeatedly picks up on trends and developments in historical science, for example microhistory or oral history .

The annual volumes of the Archives for Social History are accessible online in full text except for the last three volumes. The extensive review section of the magazine has also been completely retro-digitized.

Early years

At the end of the 1950s, Georg Eckert developed the idea of ​​a historical journal that was to deal with the German labor movement. The German research landscape was weakened by the restriction of science under the Nazi regime and during the Second World War and there was a lack of specialist journals. The journal Archive for the History of Socialism and the Labor Movement, founded in 1911, or its successor Zeitschrift für Sozialforschung , which appeared from 1932 and was published until 1941, served Eckert as a model. He wanted to contribute to democratization with the history of the labor movement and in particular to educate young scientists to become responsible citizens. Another core topic he planned to deal with was the various effects of the industrial revolution. But Eckert also wanted to address other areas largely unexplored in Germany, such as the labor movement outside of Europe, in his journal and thus provide new approaches for the study of history. In addition, he planned to publish not only scientific articles, but also official, organizational and biographical documents in order to gradually give the professional world access to sources that were otherwise difficult to access due to war damage.

When looking for a cooperation partner, Eckert turned to the Friedrich Ebert Foundation. The political foundation, which is in the tradition of the social democratic movement, seemed to him the right institution for a magazine on the labor movement. In addition, Eckert maintained close personal contacts with Günter Grunwald , the then managing director of FES. For him, too, the journal, designed as a yearbook, promised worthwhile effects: Grunwald wanted to prevent the government and the thematically relevant research institutes of the GDR from interpreting the history of the labor movement in Marxist contexts alone, so against the background of the Cold War it was also a matter of interpretative sovereignty .

In 1961 the first edition of the magazine appeared as a "year book" - so the subtitle -, published by the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung. After a few years, the archive for social history was already praised in the professional world for its diverse representations and scientific approaches. Until now, historiography has mostly done traditional political history. The new journal, on the other hand, provided an impetus to look at new research fields and topics, which was gratefully received.

construction

Every volume has had a general theme since 1974, to which the individual contributions are subordinate. The number and scope of the contributions vary depending on the research situation, but the topic is always examined from different perspectives. This is followed by research reports and collective reviews, which can deal with partial aspects of the general topic or completely different topics such as current developments and debates in historical studies. In addition to the printed research reports and collective reviews, numerous individual reviews have been published online on a regular basis since 2000. These are also distributed via the H-Soz-Kult and recensio.net portals .

In 2013 a further section was added under the heading "Documentation - Analysis - Criticism". This part appears independent of the general topic and is open to different contributions. The texts are selected using a double-blind review process.

In addition to the annual AfS volume, supplements on individual topics are published at irregular intervals. They mainly publish edited sources on social and contemporary history as well as on the labor force and labor movement in the narrower sense in order to make them accessible to research and a broader public. Thematically relevant monographic works also find their place here.

Framework topics

In the 1960s, the magazine dealt almost exclusively with the history of the German labor movement, which included looking at individual personalities. Most of the contributions followed approaches from the history of ideas and organization. When Dieter Dowe took over the editorship in the early 1970s, this direction gradually changed. With Kurt Klotzbach and Hans Pelger , other younger historians joined the editorial team who had experienced their intellectual socialization at a later time than Georg Eckert. They formulated general topics for the AfS volumes that went beyond the original focus and also included studies on the labor movement outside Germany. This was not least due to the fact that European historians were increasingly concerned with topics and issues relating to social and societal history, which gave the editorial team new content-related impulses. It also increasingly included mentality and everyday history in the magazine. The period from the 19th century to the Second World War dominated initially.

After the end of the division of Europe in 1989/90, the orientation of the Archive for Social History changed again. The competition with the GDR historians for interpretative sovereignty with a view to the history of the workers' movement, which had existed from the outset, was eliminated, which meant that the magazine was again open to new topics. Eastern European countries were also increasingly being examined. In addition, in the 1990s, the period after 1945 came to the fore, with its historical foundations being analytically traced back and international perspectives being worked out.

Methodologically, the AfS is open to various theoretical approaches. Nevertheless, long approaches to the political history of society dominated in the journal, such as those represented by the Bielefeld School . Later, historical trends such as everyday history , oral history or the linguistic turn were also reflected in the archive for social history, as well as - if appropriate to the general topic - other approaches inspired by cultural studies.

Members of the editorial board

In the first few years, Georg Eckert ran the archive for social history according to his ideas. The yearbook was officially headed by a scientific commission of the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung chaired by Eckert, but there is little doubt that it essentially served as formal legitimation. In the 1970s, as already mentioned, Dieter Dowe, Kurt Klotzbach and Hans Pelger were added, who continued the AfS after Eckert's death (1974), with Dowe taking over the editing. The team remained small until the 1990s and has hardly changed: Dieter Rebentisch has worked as editor-in-chief since 1989, followed by Hermann Beckstein . In 1995 Beckstein left the AfS and was replaced by Karl Christian Führer . In addition, extended Friedhelm Boll , Beatrix Bouvier, Patrik von zur Mühlen and Michael Schneider , the editorial team. In the following decades the editorial team changed between the members of the editorial team. Anja Kruke started her editorial work in 2004, followed by Rüdiger Zimmermann and Meik Woyke in 2008 . Two years later, Ute Planert and Dietmar Süß joined them, and in 2012 Friedrich Lenger and Benjamin Ziemann . In 2016 Philipp Kufferath took over the role of managing editor, in 2018 Kirsten Heinsohn and Thomas Kroll were added as additional editors.

Authors

Historians primarily write for the Archive for Social History. Depending on the general topic and question, articles that are informed by political science or sociology are also included in the volumes. In principle, the AfS is therefore open to approaches from related disciplines.

meaning

In both 2007 and 2011 the Archive for Social History was classified by the European Science Foundation in the "INT1" category. This means that the journal is regularly cited internationally, thus achieving broad effectiveness and being viewed by experts as of high quality in the long term. In the choice of topics and methods, the AfS volumes often reflect current developments in historical studies.

literature

Web links