History and Anthropology: dialogues

Abstract

Given the importance of the New History in contemporary historiography—including in Brazil—this article aims to analyze the transformations in historiographical production that emerged with the École des Annales, focusing particularly on the pursuit of dialogue with the social sciences, especially anthropology, and the resulting developments. The École des Annales was a historiographical movement that originated in Strasbourg, France, centered around the journal Annales d’histoire économique et sociale, founded in 1929 by Lucien Febvre and Marc Bloch. Its goal was to counter traditional historiography—which focused on political events and the actions of prominent figures—by grasping societies in their economic, social, cultural, and mental dimensions. One of its defining characteristics was the dialogue established with the social sciences, which broadened the scope of historians’ interests through the inclusion of new subjects, approaches, and issues—as evidenced by the titles in the collection directed by Jacques Le Goff and Pierre Nora. This dialogue also led to the emergence of new historiographical fields: economic history, demographic history, serial history, quantitative history, social history, and the history of mentalities. The latter—also known by other names depending on theoretical and methodological focus, such as cultural history, anthropological history, and the New History—is primarily characterized by its engagement with ethnology and anthropology. The article aims to analyze the contributions of these two disciplines to history through the reflections of historians associated with the historiographical field, highlighting the focus on the symbolic universe for understanding social life.