The Role of National Magazines of the First Third of the 19th Century in the Formation of Traditions of Universal History Studying and Teaching in Russia

Periodicals of the first third of the 19th century are analyzed in terms of their involvement in the discussion of historical knowledge in this article. The study examined 25 periodicals in which 600 publications on the topic of history were found. The analysis shows that such magazines as Zhurnal ministerstva narodnogo prosveshcheniya, Moskovskiy vestnik, Moskovskiy telegraf, Ped-agogicheskiy zhurnal and Тeleskop argued that a revision of views on the study and teaching of universal history was overdue in order to bring the very concept of universal history in accordance with world standards. In the course of this research, the author managed to determine how new rules of historical science were developed and systematized taking into account Western historical philosophical thought in the magazines. The authors and publishers of these magazines, who were often involved in historical studies, such as M.T. Kachenovsky, M.P. Pogodin, N.A. Polevoy, S.N. Smaragdov, actively joined the discussion of the flaws of universal history textbooks. Among the most frequent complaints were: (1) they lacked knowledge about the cause-effect relationships in universal history; (2) they lacked the ability to build an argument; (3) the narrative was overloaded with a lot of irrelevant facts; (4) they were unable to focus on their target audience. Critical textbook reviews in periodicals revealed the failure of the outdated textbooks by authors such as I.K. Kaidanov and the incompetence of the new generation of writers (N. Kirov, A. Preobrazhensky, A. Vetoshnikov). The latter often did not know the works of contemporary Western authors, and, as a result, they produced anachronistic and superficial judgments. As this study shows, the contemporary issues of historical science became a subject of discussion among a broad audience due to the diverse magazines of the second half of the 1820s - the first half of the 1830s. The discussion became an impetus for these issues' further development. It is also important that the authors of the textbooks reviewed by the periodicals took the criticism into account and corrected the flaws in subsequent editions (Kaidanov and Shulgin). The author focuses on the fact that Yu.I. Venelin, M.A. Maksimovich, M.P. Pogodin, N.A. Polevoy and S.N. Smaragdov were not just reviewers and observers, but also practicing history teachers, researchers, authors of works on history. They used the periodicals as a platform for discussing important historical problems. Due to the fact that such persons published their opinions in different types of magazines, it can be stated that the periodicals contributed to the genesis and evolution of the studying and teaching of universal history in Russia.

Keywords

Authors

References