Big History - Description

Description

Big history looks at the past on all time scales, from the Big Bang to modernity, seeking out common themes and patterns. It draws on the latest findings from many disciplines, such as biology, astronomy, geology, climatology, prehistory, archeology, anthropology, economics, cosmology, natural history, and population and environmental studies. Big History arose from a desire to go beyond the specialized and self-contained fields that emerged in the 20th century and grasp history as a whole, looking for common themes across multiple time scales in history. Conventionally, the study of history concerns only the period of time since the invention of writing, and is limited to past events relating directly to the human race; yet this only encompasses the past 5,000 years or so and covers only a small fraction of the period of time that humans have existed on Earth, and an even smaller fraction of the age of the universe.

Big history evolved from interdisciplinary studies in the mid-20th century, during the Cold War and Space Race. Some of the first efforts were Cosmic Evolution at Harvard University (USA) and Universal History in the Soviet Union. The first actual courses in what is today called big history were experimental ones taught in the late 1980s by John Mears at Southern Methodist University (Dallas, Texas) and by David Christian at Macquarie University (Australia) and San Diego State University (USA). Since then, other universities have offered similar courses.

Major publications in big history include Fred Spier's 1996 book The Structure of Big History: From the Big Bang until Today, which offers an ambitious defense of the project and constructs a unified account of history across time scales. Another notable text in big history is David Christian's Maps of Time: An Introduction to Big History, which explores the trajectory of history from the first microseconds after the Big Bang, to the creation of the Solar System, the origins of life on Earth, the evolution of humans, the agricultural revolution, modernity, and the 20th century. In his book and big history course available through The Teaching Company, Christian examines large-scale patterns and themes, and provides perspective on time scales. Graeme Snooks in The Dynamic Society, published in 1996, provided the first general dynamic theory to explain Big History over the past 4 billion years, and to make scientific predictions about its future course. Fred Spier's new text, Big History and the Future of Humanity, was published by Wiley-Blackwell in 2010. Currently in process is a textbook on big history for McGraw Hill by David Christian, Cynthia Stokes Brown and Craig Benjamin. Brown initiated big history at Dominican University of California and wrote Big History: From the Big Bang to the Present. The Dominican University program in big history is part of the university's First Year Experience, and is directed by Mojgan Behmand. Barry Rodrigue, at the University of Southern Maine, established the first Big History course in a general education curriculum, and then began the first online Big History course, which has drawn students from around the world. At the University of Queensland in Australia there is an undergraduate course entitled Global History, which is compulsory for all degrees majoring in history, and surveys how powerful forces and factors at work on large time-scales have shaped human history. As of 2011, about 50 professors are offering courses in big history around the world. There is a movement underway to make big history the basic course for students in higher education throughout the world.