08-31-2016, 01:24 PM
This thread is about techniques to use in generational research. The thesis is as follows. The Strauss and Howe generational cycle as a theory of history is just about dead. Strauss is dead and Howe is mostly working as a financial columnist (he's 65 and has decided to focus on those aspects of his ideas that have had acceptance) there will be no further work from him, and when he dies the idea will die with him.
However S&H made an important contribution. The basic process (generations create history and history creates generations) that we attribute to them was not invented by them. It's all in Karl Mannheim's 1928 essay, but you have to have to really go deep to see it (unless having read S&H you know what to look for). Others have derived the same mechanism from Mannheim that S&H did. But as far as I know none have combined the political cycles observed by others with the religious cycles observed by McLoughlin and others.
A far as I know, Dave Krein is the only historian to have seriously considered the ideas of S&H and has extended their paradigm. Dave turns 74 this year. I was working on a paper on generational cycles and have lost it (corrupted file) and will be rewriting it over the next few years. I have another paper (intact) I plan to submit first so I am at least a year away from submitting the generational paper (it references the earlier paper which is why there is an order). Plenty of time to rewrite it. I will probably do it differently (might as well) hence this thread.
In the subsequent posts I plan to give an example of a technique and show how I apply it. Other T4Ters have proposed theories. How do you do it? And how would you seek to make a case in a peer-reviewed situation?
However S&H made an important contribution. The basic process (generations create history and history creates generations) that we attribute to them was not invented by them. It's all in Karl Mannheim's 1928 essay, but you have to have to really go deep to see it (unless having read S&H you know what to look for). Others have derived the same mechanism from Mannheim that S&H did. But as far as I know none have combined the political cycles observed by others with the religious cycles observed by McLoughlin and others.
A far as I know, Dave Krein is the only historian to have seriously considered the ideas of S&H and has extended their paradigm. Dave turns 74 this year. I was working on a paper on generational cycles and have lost it (corrupted file) and will be rewriting it over the next few years. I have another paper (intact) I plan to submit first so I am at least a year away from submitting the generational paper (it references the earlier paper which is why there is an order). Plenty of time to rewrite it. I will probably do it differently (might as well) hence this thread.
In the subsequent posts I plan to give an example of a technique and show how I apply it. Other T4Ters have proposed theories. How do you do it? And how would you seek to make a case in a peer-reviewed situation?
