Whitney Howarth
Textbook Review
Global Historiography
November 12, 1996

A History of World Societies by John McKay, Bennett Hill and John Buckler. Houghton Mifflin Company, Boston. 1992. 3rd Edition.

This superbly illustrated two-volume text serves as a grand compilation of the histories of many societies, successfully fulfilling the promise of its title without delivering the global approach its authors ambitiously strive to achieve. While the text does indeed include the histories of a multitude of non-European societies in an attempt to satisfy the authors determination to present "an effective global balance", it is unable to provide a global methodology which synthesizes these histories or shows their interactions on the planetary stage. The reader is left questioning the authors' world historical intentions in this case, and can only be fully satisfied if he or she accepts a semi-balanced global coverage of regions as the main criterion for a "good" world history text, rather than a criteria which demands we engage history with a global perspective.

The organization of this textbook weighs heavily in favor of the role of European societies despite the efforts of the authors to reduce the chapters focusing on Europe in earlier editions. Though concise and coherent, the chapters detailing the history of Europe are far richer than others. Christianity and Euro-technology seem to dominate as global dynamic systems, while other world religions or the contributions to science from China and Islam remain quietly unspot-lighted. A revealing "quantitative" review of coverage here (otherwise known as counting pages) shows us time and time again that this study is not a "balanced" one. For instance, in Volume I, while the Church of the Middle Ages and the Reformation receives 32 pages (with 8 pages focusing on Martin Luther, alone!), the religions of China (including Taoism, Legalism, the I Ching and the philosophy of Yin & Yang) receive only 3 pages total! Hence, the result seems to be a Western Civ. text which "generously" includes a few chapters about the rest of the world, so as to impress on the reader a global sympathy. Sympathy, however, is not what I believe world historians seek. An integrated study which explores parallel trends, connections and comparative analysis is a far greater reward.

A better look at how these volumes are organized and presented might illustrate these points farther. The first of the two Volumes includes 19 chapters and spans time from the Paleolithic age of the first humans to 1715, marked here by the signing of the European treaty which ends the War of Spanish Succession (an uncommonly European date to end the volume, the choice of which is never explained by the authors). Beginning with a chapter entitled, simply, "Origins", the volume takes the traditional text-book path tracing the "development" of mankind from Homo Habalis to hunter-gatherer and agrarian master, placing the first societies in Mesopotamia and in other river valley cultures. The title of this chapter compels the reader to accept a certain diffusion bias as the text urges us to assume that agriculture and other applied systems of "advanced thought" had origins in singular areas and "spread" beyond. Independent alphabetic systems are mentioned here also, but the idea of culture as a body of knowledge that is "spread" rather than formed by interaction is emphasized repeatedly.

Geography plays a major role in these early chapters as ancient societies in China and India are presented as adaptive entities struggling to survive in the elements. India's chapter begins with a section called "The Land and Its first Tamers", and China's begins with "The Land and Its Challenge", while Ancient Greece is more promisingly entitled "Hellas: The Land". Perhaps the Greeks are better able to master their environment and thus move onto more important matters like developing science and politics, or so the authors suggest with shades of good old-fashioned geographic determinism. Unlike the Indian and Chinese people (undoubtedly trapped in their struggle against monsoons and river floods), the Greeks were able to "move beyond myth making and religion" (p116). The authors boast that the Greeks are hence considered the intellectual ancestors of Europeans, the founders of rational and logical thought applied to understanding the universe and their place in it. According to the authors "the Greeks were the first to explore most of the questions that continue to concern thinkers to this day." A proud tone seems to emanate from these pages and as a reward, the Greeks receive an extra chapter of consideration, so that the reader can more fully delve into the greatness that was Europe's heritage.

The authors of this volume state that they intend to make social history a core element in their work, and in so doing include greater portions of recent scholarship in cross-disciplinary fields. One of the areas to which they claim to devote more consideration is "women's history". To this end, they have set aside portions of chapters to discuss such topics as "Hellenistic Women" (pp. 161-162) and "Women in Renaissance Society" (pp. 521-523). Though the authors should be lauded for their attempt to bring gender related issues into historical scholarship, they should also be held responsible for the methodology they employ in doing so. Recent scholarship in this area encourages the study of gender as it relates to the political, economic and power structures of the period, and does not promote the methodology of McKay, Hill and Buckler who merely seek to "add" women to history's periphery. Furthermore, very few pages in this text address gender issues in the non-European world, and those that do are strongly biased by Western Feminist values. Chapter 10 for instance, takes a look at women in classical Islamic Society and explains how such practices as "veiling" led to women's decreased status. I find this type of values assessment a problematic component for a world history text. and one which might be approached with more cultural sensitivity. Offering students an interpretive narrative in global history without imposing a Euro-centric viewpoint is indeed a challenge. That the authors are capable of confronting this is challege is best exemplified when the they try to understand the gendered implications of ceratain power structures and laws (as in their discussion of marriage in chapter 14), rather than when they offer value jugments on women's roles. To subjugate these matters to specific chapters, to put them on the periphery, to address them as "womanly" issues or examine the "misogynist" roots of such gendered experiences, does not due them justice.

The second of these II Volumes presents the paradigm of Europe as the dominant force but does not fail to recognize the existence of such African Kingdoms as Songhay and Benin, the splendor of the Ottoman State and the Mughal dynasty of India. Surprisingly, however, after 1800, these regions are lumped into a generic category of "third world" and are seen merely as they oppose, support or co-exist with Western Hegemony in the 20th century. This volume begins with overlapping chapters (18 & 19) from Volume I and proceeds to tell the story of world history after Europe's mastery of the seaways. However, the reader's immediate attention is not returned to the year 1715 (where we left off in Volume 1) in typical chronological form, but takes a windy stroll through some pre-Industrial European social history and non-Western Imperial history, before "getting back on track" with the Revolutions in Europe (1775-1815). This brief departure from a chronological presentation seems a bit confusing and un-strategic, since it holds no thematic emphasis, but does at least relieve the reader from the Euro-monotony of the last few chapters of Volume I and the remaining chapters to follow in Volume II.

These chapters discuss such "hot" European topics as the Scientific Revolution, the Enlightenment and the everyday life of the people in Europe. Little or no discussion of comparable socio-cultural history of non-European societies is notable in Volume II, which continues its Euro-view of global dominance up until the late 1970's. The volume ends with a contemporary commentary on the state of our "small planet" which features topics of global interdependence, multi-nationals, the arms race, nuclear proliferation and the predominance of modern (primarily Western) ideologies, such a increased secularization and the search for "mysticism", in modern society.

Despite its failings as a globally minded world history text, this survey of history does present several innovative ideas for future authors who might work towards a more culturally-interactive model. Among its most admirable characteristics is its attention to "new" categories in history rarely given substantial consideration in more traditional Western Civ. texts, these include topics such as migrations and nationalisms. Unfortunately, the authors do not go far enough to show global connections between such phenomena, though great potential exists to do so. I believe the authors are genuine in their attempt to provide the reader with a more global look at history, yet in my opinion it is still not global enough, for it defines a world system with little or no exchange between non-Europes and few super-national comparisons. From its genesis, it poses dominance as the singular fuel for the engine of history.

The cartographic essay at the beginning of the volumes serves as an excellent starting point to discuss impressions of our world and to engage in questioning the role of perspectives in history. I applaud the authors for attempting to bring in fresh perspectives into survey history through their study of family, home life and gendered roles in labor; however, these perspectives need to be representative of the globe and culturally relativistic. Lastly, the authors are careful in constructing their narrative to present various scholarly opinions on topics (that often oppose one another) thereby urging the reader to ask themselves how historians interpret history and how they make their analyses. This style fosters an appreciation for the complexity of the process, and inspires students to challenge the authoritative voice of the secondary text. Problematizing history and introducing students to the techniques of global thinking can not happen unless the content matches the methodology. For a text to aspire to such a task it must provide rigorous contexts for comparison and a well-balanced sampling from our planetary history; it must not merely show us the globe, it must challenge us to find the global.