Metabiography

Metabiographien deal with the relationship of biographical representations for temporal, geographical, institutional, intellectual or ideological position of the author. Metabiographik is a hermeneutics of biography. It considers the biographierte person as a collective construct different cultures of memory and thus contributes to the fundamental instability of historical biographies account. In the words of Steven Shapin emphasizes the Metabiographik "that lead changing biographical traditions mean that a person is more life stories has " one of which can raise no necessarily more claim to reality, because they are all "according to the sensitivities and needs of the changing cultural framework designed and redesigned ". In this regard Metabiographik expresses the conviction that historical knowledge is always viewer- dependent.

Metabiography vs. biography

Already have always used older biographical representations of the treated person of them to prepare their own work biographers. When dealing with their predecessors, these authors pursued as the goal is to demonstrate the factual inadequacy older research and refute traditional "myths" and " mistakes ", or they use it simply as a basis for a new, "final" representation. Metabiographik is however on the analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of the previous investigations addition to a particular life story. She is concerned less about the truth claims of biographical representations as to their inevitable relational character. It has been argued that in the history of science Metabiographik have a long fifty years standing tradition, the rich Henry Guerlacs study of Antoine Laurent de Lavoisier and his biographers to Rupert Hall's edition of Newton biographies of the 18th century and beyond. For these researchers, the employment had with older biographers a propaedeutic function in terms of the biographical works of their own era. They followed no relational approach and thus do not have the key feature metabiographischer investigations.

Metabiographien from the field of general history

In the field of artists and Schriftstellerbiographik the metabiographische approach is eg in a study by David Dennis about Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827) and Lucasta Miller ( 2001), which applied it successfully using the example of Emily Brontë ( 1818-48 ). No metabiography however, is Gordon S. Woods work on the Americanization of Benjamin Franklin, although the Franklin literature would be an ideal material basis for such a study.

Metabiographien in the field of historiography of science

Examples of Metabiographien about scientists are " The nine lives of Gregor Mendel " by Jan Sapp, Newton: the Making of Genius by Patricia Fara and Alexander von Humboldt: a Metabiography by Nicolaas Rupke. James Moore and Ralph Colp have applied the approach to metabiographischen Charles Darwin. A metabiographische tendency is also in the Reader's Guide to the History of Science ( 2000) identified.

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• Biography
• Historiography
• Historiography
• History