2. What is alternative history? (soc.history.what-if)
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This article is from the soc.history.what-if FAQ, by Anthony Mayer anthonyemayer@yahoo.co.uk with numerous contributions by others.
2. What is alternative history? (soc.history.what-if)
"Alternative history" essays/stories are the "what ifs" of history,
describing events that could have happened but did not. (The terms
"allohistory," "alternate history," "counterfactual" and "uchronia" all
have advocates and nuanced meanings, but "alternative history" is the
generally accepted name, in English, for what we do on SHWI.) A typical
example is the question, "What if had Napoleon won at Waterloo?" Most
alternatives concern human history, but there are some examples of
alternative natural history, making changes in geology or ecology.
You may find such questions asked in science fiction literature, wargaming
magazines, and history and economics journals. However, it can also be
occasionally found in such mainstream publications as Time magazine or
Entertainment Weekly, and an occasional alternative history novel will
crack the New York Times bestseller list and maybe even get made into a
movie (e.g., Robert Harris' FATHERLAND).
In science fiction, alternative histories are a subset of parallel worlds
and alternative universe stories, in which some emphasis has been put on
an historical element. If those terms are meaningless to you, note that a
parallel world may have no historical or physical similarity to our own. A
common example is for someone in our world to be mysteriously transported
to a "magical" world. Alternative history fiction, on the other hand,
requires that the world described be visibly the same as ours up to some
specific point in history, after which things begin to get different.
The boundaries are not firm: many alternative histories throw in magic --
or, to put it another way, many "historical fantasy" novels, especially
recently, use AH trappings. Similarly, alternative histories often have
slightly different physical laws than our universe -- most commonly to
allow time travel, since AH in science fiction began as an outgrowth of
time-travel stories.
The distinction between alternative histories that are explorations of
"what might have been", and those that utilise devices from science
fiction and fantasy is one that has caused tension on SHWI in the past.
Opinion is divided as to whether essays and fiction that involve magic and
time-travel are really alternative history, or simply fantasies with a
historical setting. A large proportion of SHWI users prefer to discuss
only the stricter, purely historical forms of AH, and this should be borne
in mind when posting an article with a more fantastic setting. See
Question 5 for more on this discussion.
The stricter form of AH, in which divergences are the result of entirely
plausible minor changes or individuals making different decisions,
reflects the use of AH in an academic sense. Academic historians have
tended to treat alternative histories, or "counter- factuals" with little
respect, although this has changed somewhat in recent years, (see Question
13).
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