On the Teaching of Historiography in Higher Educational Institutions of the USSR

Abstract

The significance of the history of historical science (historiography) in the system of higher education in history, as a discipline of the greatest importance in terms of method and political ideas, has now long been recognized, as evidence of which we have the introduction of this subject in the standard curriculum not only of universities but of teachers colleges. As early as 1962-63 the subject and content of the university course in the historiography of USSR history was discussed in the pages of Problems of History [Voprosy istorii]. Problems of teaching courses in historiography have been discussed regularly at USSR-wide historiography conferences convened by the USSR Ministry of Higher and Secondary Specialized Education jointly with the Learned Council on the History of Historical Scholarship of the History Division, USSR Academy of Sciences, in 1961, 1963, 1965, and 1969. But these questions were discussed in fullest detail at the USSR Conference of Teachers of Historiography convened in Smolensk by the History Division, USSR Academy of Sciences, and the Ministries of Education and of Higher and Secondary Specialized Education of the USSR, at the end of January and early February 1973.