This book studies everyday writing practices among ordinary people in a poor rural society in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Using the abundance of handwritten material produced, disseminated and consumed some centuries after the advent of print as its research material, the book's focus is on its day-to-day usage and on "minor knowledge," i.e., text matter originating and rooted primarily in the everyday life of the peasantry. The focus is on the history of education and communication in a global perspective. Rather than engaging in comparing different countries or regions, the authors seek to view and study early modern and modern manuscript culture as a transnational (or transregional) practice, giving agency to its ordinary participants and attention to hitherto overlooked source material. Through a microhistorical lens, the authors examine the strength of this aspect of popular culture and try to show it in a wider perspective, as well as asking questions about the importance of this development for the continuity of the literary tradition. The book is an attempt to explain “the nature of the literary culture” in general – how new ideas were transported from one person to another, from community to community, and between regions; essentially, the role of minor knowledge in the development of modern men.

This book studies everyday writing practices among ordinary people in a poor rural society in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Using the abundance of handwritten material produced, disseminated and consumed some centuries after the advent of print as its research material, the book's focus is on its day-to-day usage and on "minor knowledge," i.e., text matter originating and rooted primarily in the everyday life of the peasantry. The focus is on the history of education and communication in a global perspective. Rather than engaging in comparing different countries or regions, the authors seek to view and study early modern and modern manuscript culture as a transnational (or transregional) practice, giving agency to its ordinary participants and attention to hitherto overlooked source material. Through a microhistorical lens, the authors examine the strength of this aspect of popular culture and try to show it in a wider perspective, as well as asking questions about the importance of this development for the continuity of the literary tradition. The book is an attempt to explain “the nature of the literary culture” in general – how new ideas were transported from one person to another, from community to community, and between regions; essentially, the role of minor knowledge in the development of modern men.

Emotional Experience and Microhistory explores the life and death of Magnús Hj. Magnússon through his diary, poetry and other writing, showing how best to use the methods of microhistory to address complicated historical situations. The book deals with the many faces of microhistory and applies it’s methodology to the life of the Icelandic destitute pauper poet Magnús Hj. Magnússon (1873–1916). Having left his foster home at the age of 19 in 1892, he lived a peripatetic existence in an unstinting struggle with poor health, together with a ceaseless quest for a space to pursue writing and scholarship in accord with his dreams. He produced and accumulated a huge quantity of sources (autobiography, diary, poems, reflections) which are termed by the author as ‘egodocuments’. The book demonstrates how these egodocuments can be applied systematically, revealing unexpected perspectives on his life and demonstrating how integration of diverse sources can open up new perspectives on complex and difficult subjects. In so doing, the author offers an understanding both of how Magnússon’s story has been told, and how it can give insight into such matters as gender relations and sexual life, and the history of emotions. Highlighting how the historiographical development of modern scholarship has shaped scholars’ ideas about egodocuments and microhistory around the world, the book is of great use and interest to scholars of microhistory, social and cultural modern history, literary theory, anthropology and ethnology.

This book aims to demonstrate how scholars in recent times have been utilizing egodocuments from various angles and providing an opening for the multivocality of the sources to be fully appreciated. The first part of the book is concerned with the significance of egodocuments, both for the individual him/herself who creates such documents, and also for the other, who receives them. The author approaches the subject on the basis of his own personal experience, and goes on to discuss the importance of such documents for the academic world, emphasizing more general questions and issues within the fields of historiography, philosophy of history, microhistory, and memory studies. The second part of the book is based upon a photographic collection – an archive – that belonged to the author’s grandfather, who over decades accumulated photographs of vagabonds and outsiders. This part seeks to explore what kind of knowledge can be applied when a single source – an archive, document, letter, illustration, etc. – is examined, and whether the knowledge derived may not be quite as good in its own context as in the broader perspective.

The history of knowledge is a dynamic field of research with bright prospects. In recent years it has been established as an exciting, forward-looking field internationally with a strong presence in the Nordic countries. Forms of Knowledge is the first publication by the Lund Centre for the History of Knowledge (LUCK). The volume brings together some twenty historians from different scholarly traditions to develop the history of knowledge. The knowledge under scrutiny here is the sort which people have regarded and valued as knowledge in various historical settings. The authors apply different perspectives to this knowledge, maintaining the historicity and situatedness of the production and circulation of knowledge. The book presents the history of knowledge in all its rich diversity. The role of knowledge in public life is the focus of some chapters, while others concentrate on the importance of knowledge for individuals or local communities; some chart the realities of academic or systematic knowledge, while others consider its existential or mundane dimensions. Taken together, they make a significant contribution to the theoretical, conceptual, and methodological advances in the field.

In historiography, many interesting theoretical perspectives on biography have emerged in recent years, from forensics to structure and microhistory. Biographers themselves, though, often fear the study of the genre - needlessly, as these eighteen engaging new essays demonstrate.

This substantially revised second edition of The Routledge Handbook of Research Methods in the Study of Religion remains the only comprehensive survey in English of methods and methodology in the discipline. Designed for non-specialists and upper undergraduate-/graduate-level students, it discusses the range of methods currently available to stimulate interest in unfamiliar methods and enable students and scholars to evaluate methodological issues in research. The Handbook comprises 39 chapters – 21 of which are new, and the rest revised for this edition. A total of 56 contributors from 10 countries cover a broad range of topics divided into three clear parts: • Methodology • Methods • Techniques The first section addresses general methodological issues: including comparison, research design, research ethics, intersectionality, and theorizing/analysis. The second addresses specific methods: including advanced computational methods, autoethnography, computational text analysis, digital ethnography, discourse analysis, experiments, field research, grounded theory, interviewing, reading images, surveys, and videography. The final section addresses specific techniques: including coding, focus groups, photo elicitation, and survey experiments. Each chapter covers practical issues and challenges, theoretical bases, and their use in the study of religion/s, illustrated by case studies. The Routledge Handbook of Research Methods in the Study of Religion is essential reading for students and researchers in the study of religion/s, as well as for those in related disciplines.