One would think that world history has been a field of study since the beginning of the written word and the study of history on earth.   Indeed it has been, but the notion of examining history from a global perspective was entirely dependent on how an individual perceived the earth writ large and their position within it. 

 

The legendary Jerry Bentley (1949-2012), one of the towering figures in the study of world history (and founding editor of the World History Association's Journal of World History), recognized in his introduction to The Oxford Handbook of World History (2011) that “the term world history has never been a clear signifier with a stable referent.”  Yet Bentley acknowledged that it has had a long history and has taken “different forms and meant different things at different times to different peoples.”  He cites the origin myths of Hindus and Hebrews, Mesopotamians and Maya, Persians and Polynesians as examples in which societies locate their own stories within a larger context of what we would recognize as world history.  

 

There is clear evidence that over the course of the writing of history, individual thinkers sought to make connections between groups of people and events.   Whether we are talking about 14th century Arab scholar Ibn Khaldun in his Muqaddimah (first published in 1370), tracing the interconnections between settled and nomadic peoples, or 20th century historian/philosopher Arnold J. Toynbee’s multi-volume A Study of History to chronicle world history by identifying journeys that apply to all civilizations, from genesis to growth, to times of troubles, an universal state, and finally, disintegration.  

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Several key qualities set world history apart from other types of history. World historians use a wide spatial lens, though they do not always take the entire world as their unit of analysis. They tend to de-emphasize individual nations or civilizations, and focus instead on regions defined differently, including zones of interaction, or on the ways in which people, goods, and ideas moved across regions through migration, conquest, and trade. Most world historians think that history should be studied on a range of chronological and spatial scales, including, but not limited to, very large ones. Some world history has a narrow temporal framework, examining developments around the world in a single decade or even a single year. Other historians use an expanded timeframe, beginning with the Big Bang to examine history on a cosmic scale. Histories of single commodities such as salt, sugar, or silver can be world history, as can those of single individuals, organizations, or ideas.

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World history as we recognize it today is a field marked by a very particular approach to the study of history.   It focuses on connecting and identifying networks and systems that disparate cultures share or mirror.   It does not simply offer an “it’s a small world” view of history nor does it seek to focus on individual communities or societies in isolation.   World history often takes a thematic approach to studying societies and events of the past.   It can examine how the events and processes of world history drew people and societies together as well as how world history offers an opportunity to unpack the diversity of human experience.   It recognizes that Eurocentric views of the past have been centered in much of the telling of history in the western world and instead seeks to decenter ethnocentric views of the world.  Often that means that world history focuses on the local but situates the local in broader transnational, transcultural, and global contexts.  

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In the 21st century, world historians are building on different national and regional roots and traditions to create a multivocal version of world history, working upwards and outwards from the available sources in multiple languages and from multiple sites. World history today is a research field, with academic journals, conferences, books, and research centers, as well as a teaching field, from primary school through postgraduate work. Scholars, teachers, and students have developed innovative approaches and materials and regularly engage in debates about theory, methodology, and content on websites, blogs, podcasts, and in print.

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The World History Association, founded in 1982 by several of the foremost historians in this field, has played a central role in nurturing, encouraging, and promoting the study of world history.   If we agree that we are all global citizens, a deep and thoughtful understanding of global history is key.  The WHA seeks to continue to advance this work and study as borders disappear, interactions on the globe increase exponentially, and global understanding becomes essential to human futures—and survival—on this planet.