What If? Counterfactual & Alternate Histories

Orthodox historians have tended to dislike attempts to think counterfactually about the past, on the grounds that ‘virtual history’ offers little more than entertainment and degenerates too easily into banal trivialities. Yet popular and professional interest in counterfactual history continues to grow, spawning a growing number of books on the ‘what if?’

This course explores the counterfactual approach to history – the history of “what might have happened” – in its multifaceted embodiments (literature, film, philosophy, social sciences, and historiographical practice).