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Scholars pursue sweeping new interpretations of the human past.

Jonathan Slaw, Harvard Magazine

(…) The rise of a global perspective is one of several trends that are changing the way history is studied and understood. The increasing use of science to illuminate the past is another. Goelet professor of history Michael McCormick leads the University’s Initiative for the Science of the Human Past, which has engaged a range of collaborators: from geneticists and chemists elucidating patterns of migration using DNA and isotopes, to climate and computer scientists using ice cores and Christian texts to parse the rise and fall of civilizations. In the Joint Center for History and Economics, Knowles professor of history Emma Rothschild has, as director, revitalized this third realm of historical research (which dates to the 1890s in the United States and Britain). Scholars there embrace new quantitative methods such as network analysis to enhance historical inquiry (see “Examining Economic Webs,” page 56); by undertaking collaborative projects—such as studying the history of energy—they are contributing freshly relevant understanding to some of today’s most pressing problems.