Humanist Discussion Group, Vol. 40, No. 79.
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        Date: 2026-06-29 09:25:28+00:00
        From: Willard McCarty <willard.mccarty@mccarty.org.uk>
        Subject: methodology

Here is something especially relevant to the people of the machine who
work in the humanities (i.e. ourselves) and are so especially tempted to
speculate if not to formulate their method. It comes from Carlo
Ginzburg. At the end of Threads and Traces: True False Fictive
(Berkeley, 2012), before tracing a 'tortuous' path his research has
taken, quotes French sinologist Marcel Granet to warn that,

> in any scholarly situation a discussion on method has some value
> only when it is an a posteriori reflection on concrete research, not
> when it shows up (by far the most frequent case) as a series of a
> priori prescriptions.

To my mind, an excellent piece of advice to be written out and stuck on
the wall above your desk.

Comments?

Best,
WM
--
Willard McCarty,
Professor em., King's College London;
www.mccarty.org.uk


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