History Index

October 6, 2004 8:45 am

I have finally brought together my old web sites that had something to do with history. This has been long overdue. I am appalled at how I have let this go. At the moment I am pleased with my "2-color" approach for making notes on specific books. Thus in principle any of the links in the following tables should provide me with a blend of content and personal commentary.

However what is lacking is a meta-journal that steps back from the detail and shares thoughts with how I am approaching the whole topic of History. What is my strategy? What do I want to do next? First, I want to add a few more books that I have on my shelves to the list of references in the table on this page. Then I need to decide which book or books I want to look at first. A related question is whether I want to work with one or two books, or do I want to use them as references and plot my own journey through the topics (e.g Canada, Maya, Europe, China, Japan, science, etc.)? Noting the use of country as a focus, do I want to focus on a country at a time, or should I begin with some sort of overview of World history, and then return to various countries for a closer look?

As I have noted before, the issue is not to say that I have read a particular book or books, but to say that I have a good grasp of world history, with areas of a particular focus such as Canada, the Middle East, Japan, etc. There is so much to learn. Clearly the best strategy is to resort to a form of chunking. What are the primary chunks for thinking about world history?

Date last revised: October 6, 2004

E-mail: dale.burnett@uleth.ca