New interpretations of the French Revolution and their geographical significance

Abstract

The historiography of the French Revolution has for a long time been dominated by French historians, with four main orientations: anti-Revolutionary radical (“Jacobins”) interpretations; long-term analyses stressing the continuity between “Ancien Régime” and Revolution. Becausse the 1789 Revolution played such a role in the definition of French identity, historians remained prisoners of these views until recently. New views have appeared during the last twenty-five years. For Furter and a part of the “Annales School”, the French Revolution is given a more complex structure: the role of ideologies is stressed, together with the symbolic dimension of events, and the permanent work of interpretation with gives its significance to Revolution. For British and American historians, the French Revolution is conceived as a part of a more global revolution: its role was to give a new consciousness to new historical actors. Traditional interpretatons focused mainly on revolutionary events in Paris. The ew interpretations open new geographical perspectives: the geography of the pre-Revolutionary penetration of enlightenment for Furet, the geography of the Revolutionary commemorations for Ozouf, and the diffusion of new attitudes for many British and American historians or geographers. The paper describes the main features of these new geographic perspectives.