Journal of World History, vol. 18, no. 1 (2007)

ARTICLES

Lords of the Auspicious Conjunction: Turco-Mongol Imperial Identity on the Subcontinent
Lisa Balabanlilar
pp. 1-39

Abstract: Re-evaluating the scholarly and intellectual isolation with which India’s Mughal empire has been treated, this study identifies the Mughals as direct descendants of Chinggis Khan and Tamerlane (Timur). It also explores the systematic manipulation of their Central Asian legacy through which the Mughals defined and defended their imperial identity and political viability on the South Asian subcontinent. In identifying and examining Mughal loyalty to Turco-Mongol institutions and traditions, the study positions the Mughal dynasty in the center of the early modern Islamic world as the direct successor of a powerful political and religious tradition.

FORUM: SOCIAL HISTORY, WOMEN’S HISTORY, AND WORLD HISTORY

Social History and World History: Prospects for Collaboration
Peter N. Stearns
pp. 43-52

Abstract: This article discusses the several reasons for the complex relationship between social history and world history. It notes also the increasing interest among social historians for reconsidering their geographical range and base, which provides new opportunities for interaction between the fields. Using childhood as an example, the article argues for the mutual utility of running social history topics through world history periodization and related concerns with interregional contacts.

World History and the History of Women, Gender, and Sexuality
Merry Wiesner-Hanks
pp. 53-67

Abstract: Women’s history had its origins in the women’s movement and in the new social history, and like other areas of social history, it has seen relatively few interchanges with world history as both have developed over the past twenty years. This article suggests some of the reasons for this lack of intersection; assesses recent scholarship that brings world history and the history of women, gender, and sexuality together; and suggests future directions.

Social History and World History: From Daily Life to Patterns of Change
Kenneth Pomeranz
pp. 69-98

Abstract: This article asks how questions from social history can be more closely integrated into world history and vice versa. It highlights cases in which this has already happened and suggests avenues for further development. It divides social history into three different types: history of daily life, history of social organization, and history of social movements and deliberate attempts to induce social change, whether from the top down or from the bottom up. The last kind of social history is particularly difficult to frame as world history, partly because we lack terms for collective agents that are agreed to be useful across cultural lines. But developing such a vocabulary remains necessary. The last section of the article examines how social histories of empire offer some approaches that are promising for this purpose.

BOOK REVIEWS

Richard W. Bulliet. The Case for Islamo-Christian Civilization
Reviewed by Howard J. Dooley
pp. 99-103

Pablo E. Pérez-Mallaína. Spain’s Men of the Sea: Daily Life on the Indies Fleets in the Sixteenth Century
Reviewed by Céline Dauverd
pp. 103-106

Herman Lebovics. Imperialism and the Corruption of Democracies
Reviewed by Jeremy Black
pp. 106-107

Michael Adas. Dominance by Design: Technological Imperatives and America’s Civilizing Mission
Reviewed by Daniel R. Headrick
pp. 108-110

Maria Kousis and Charles Tilly. Economic and Political Contention in Comparative Perspective
Reviewed by Peter T. Manicas
pp. 110-112