Dalla public history alla applied history. Ruolo pubblico e funzione politica della storia nel recente dibattito storiografico angloamericano

Abstract

Nowadays the relationship between Humanities and post-industrial, high-tech societies, is complicated. Downgraded to the level of simple intellectual entertainment many of these subjects, History among them, struggle to place themselves in the society and in the market. In an attempt to react to this crisis some historians have devised innovative forms of research, able to give ambitious answers to the question of the role of History in the modern world. Two projects developed by the Anglo-American historiography are particularly interesting in these respect: public history and applied history. The paper aims to analyze the content of public history and applied history – giving special attention to the activities of the “History & Policy” network and to the Belfer Center’s “Applied History Project”.

Keywords

• applied history
• politica
• public history
• storiografia
• uso pubblico della storia