<<

Bibliographic Research Plan

Strange Worlds: An introduction to the of Alternate

Reese Sako LIS 601 Professor Irvin May 5, 2016.

Reese Sako 1

Contents I: INTRODUCTION ...... 2 II: SEARCH STRATAGIES...... 3 Call Numbers ...... 3 Subject Headings ...... 3 Search Strategy Table ...... 3 III: Search Process ...... 4 OPAC ...... 4 ManoaOneSearch ...... 4 WORLDCAT ...... 4 Databases and Indexes ...... 5 JSTOR ...... 5 PROJECT MUSE ...... 5 PROQUEST ...... 5 ACADEMIC SEARCH COMPLETE ...... 6 ...... 6 HISTORY REFERENCE CENTER ...... 6 HISTORICAL ABSTRACTS ...... 6 GOOGLE SCHOLAR ...... 7 LEXISNEXIS ...... 7 WEB RESOURCES ...... 7 .NET ...... 7 ALTERNATEHISTORY.COM ...... 7 IV CONCLUSIONS ...... 8 V. BIBLIOGRAPHY ...... 10 VI: APPENDIX I: ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY ...... 12 General Resources...... 12 Topic I: Hard/Plausible ...... 13 Topic II: Soft/ Alternate History...... 14 VII: APPENDIX II: SEARCH TERM RELEVENCY CHART ...... 16

Reese Sako 2

I: INTRODUCTION is said that the saddest and most though provoking question is “?” What if I had done this? What if I had forgotten to do that? More importantly, the genre of Alternate History, sometimes referred to as , Imaginary History or Alternative History, ask us the question of “What if this historical event had ended otherwise?”. Within the genre, scholars, and writers begin to ask, speculate, and in many cases construct an alternate world where the Confederate States of American achieved independence, or went on to dominate the world. It is important to note that Alternate History does not include that speculated about events, such as World War III or the collapse of the USA in 1999, only for that time to pass and the event does not come true. In some cases, such as 1984 or War Day, a 1984 which proposed World War III breaking out in the 1988, have been retroactively declared “Honorary Alternate ”. As of late the genre has become more popular and well-known in popular culture and entertainment: Amazon.com has recently adapted the Phillip K. Dick novel, The Man in the High Castle, which portrays a world where Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan won World War II. Essentially, what I seek to do with this bibliographic guide, is introduce the genre and explain two different aspects to the genre: essentially the difference between “Hard” or plausible Histories, and “soft” histories that are more heavily influenced by the Fantasy and . There is a mix of both scholarly articles discussing the popularity and why the genre is important, along with an introduction to several novels of varying plausibility and realism, thus allowing the reader to get a better idea of what is in the genre. For the sake of simplicity, the subsections will be titled “Hard/Plausible Alternate History” and “Fantasy Alternate History”. While searching for information and resources, the most important part was finding the necessary keywords and phrases. Due to the nature of the genre, most works are split between several different Library of Congress headings. The most popular headings include D: WORLD HISTORY, E: HISTORY OF THE , PN: LITERATURE and PS: AMERICAN LITERATURE. Call number vary by exactly what the book is written on, but those in D: WORLD HISTORY, tend to fall under D1-24.5: GENERAL HISTORY or D731-835: WORLD WAR II. As these call numbers show, more scholarly works fall under the D or E categories, while fiction falls under the generic literature or American Literature headings, depending on the author and topic. In addition to book resources, I also went through several electronic resources, such as History- based databases, such as Jstor, LexisNexis, Academic Search Complete and others. Literature based resources, such as NoveList and Worldcat were also consulted in the search for novels and other print resources. Online resources are harder to come across, due to the nature of the genre, but I have found some that may be of use.

Reese Sako 3

II: SEARCH STRATEGIES As stated before, call numbers were taken from the Library of Congress, and tend to vary, depending on the topics. The most common Call numbers are as follows: Call Numbers LOC D: WORLD HISTORY -Range D1- D24.5: GENERAL HISTORY -Range D732-835: WORLD WAR II LOC E: HISTORY OF THE AMERICAS -Range E456-655: LOC PN: LITERATURE LOC PS: AMERICAN LITERATURE -Range E 370-379: PROSE FICTION

For my subject headings, I had an idea of what to start with, and as I continued my search, I was able to find several more:

Subject Headings

IMAGINARY HISTORIES ALTERNATE HISTORY (FICTION) ALTERNATE HISTORY (HISTORY) ALTERNATIVE HISTORY (HISTORY)

There are also several other subject headings, but they are simply repeats or variants of the four listed above. After finding these, I began to develop my search terms, Boolean phrases and Natural language phrases to start digging into databases.

Search Strategy Table

Search Terms Boolean Phrase Natural Language Alternate Histor* “Alternate Histor*” Alternate Histor* Alternative histor* “Imaginary Histor*” Speculative histor* Speculative Histor* “Alternative Histor*” Alternative Histor* Imaginary Histor* “Counterfactual histor*” Counterfactual Histor* Counterfactual Histor* “Speculative Histor*” Imaginary Histor* What If “What If” What If? Fiction “Alternate Histor*” + Germany

As this chart shows, most of my search phrases are redundant and tend to overlap. While I initially searched using the phrases “Alternate Histor*” and “Imaginary Histor*”, I included the other phrases to see if there were any results that I was missing. To a certain degree, I disliked the phrase “Counterfactual history”, as it is sometimes used to discuss , I.E. holocaust denial and other pseudohistorical topics. Reese Sako 4

III: Search Process OPAC

ManoaOneSearch

With ManoaOne Search, I went in expecting to find more academic resources, either analyzing the popularity of the genre, critiques of the genre, and such. On the whole, the search was mixed: the phrase “Alternate History” came up with around 325 results when used as a general search term. When used as a subject search term, only 70 results came up. What I did notice after looking through several of the more interesting articles and books, was that they all had the subject keyword “Imaginary Histories”. After learning this, I opened up two more searches using the phrase “Imaginary Histories” as both a general search and subject search, resulting in 90 and 81 results. From these results, I was able to pick out several books, articles and novels, including the 2004 C.S.A.: Confederate States of America, Robert Cowley’s anthology The Collective What If?: Eminent Historians imagining what might have been, and Gavriel Rosenfeld’s The World Hitler Never Made: Alternate Histories and the Memory of Nazism. From here, I was able to find their LOC subject headings: D: WORLD HISTORY. More importantly, I ran into some problems while searching. Both “Alternate history” and “Imaginary History” would bring up unrelated articles in topics ranging from math to art. Second, the Onesearch system showed all available options, some of which the library does not have. Third, there is a relative lack of uniformity with subjects: One article I found under the phrase “Alternate History” did not show up under “Imaginary Histories” because it was filed as “Counterfactual histories”. With those articles and books in mind, however, I was able to go on into my other searches. WORLDCAT I elected to search worldcat because most book in the genre fall under fiction. The phrase “Imaginary Histor*” came up with around 1100 results, in a variety of genre, including math books, art, and business. Here, I was able to narrow it down to 242 results by adding the subject lines “History & Auxiliary subjects”. The majority of results in this search were more “scholarly” works. After this, I entered the search phrase “Alternate Histor*” which gained 1,404 hits. From there, I narrowed the search to “Language, Literacy & Literature”, and “American Literature” thus bringing the results down to 288 novels based around the concept. Here, I was able to find most of the examples of Hard AH and Soft AH. In this particular case, my other search phrases, such as “Counterfactual Histor*”, and “Alternative Histor*” only showed a fraction of the same resources that had appeared under “Alternate Histor*” and “Imaginary Reese Sako 5

Histor*”. Because I am a fan of the genre, I was looking to see if there were familiar novels and authors, and I was able to find books that I have read and books that I would like to find. Databases and Indexes

JSTOR I elected to look through Jstor first, expecting to find at least some articles discussing why were are so interested in the genre and what it means for us, as well as possible reviews of Alternate History novels. To begin, I entered the phrase “Alternate Histor*”, only to get an error message. Thus, I began searching with the phrase “Alternate History”, “Alternate Histories”, “Imaginary History” and “Imaginary Histories”. In this particular case, the phrases “Imaginary Histor*” brought up mythology, and articles discussing the “imagined place” in national and ethnic identity, all interesting topics on their own, but not relevant to this particular one. The phrase “Alternate History” brought up about 133 relevant articles, most of them book reviews. While looking through them, I discovered one interesting article, and a repeating author. The first is Gavriel Rosenfeld’s “Why do we ask “What If?” Reflections on the Function of Alternate History”. Here, Rosenfeld argues that what attracts us to the genre is the changing view of how we see our current situation. Those who think our present could be better write Utopic stories, while those who feel that this present is the better option will write dystopic stories. The other is an author named Phong Nguyen, who published articles in the North American Review. Three of his articles are framed as “Textbooks from Alternate Histories”, in which Christopher Columbus arrives in (The American continents do not appear to exist), Siddhartha Gautama became a king instead of founding Buddhism, and was not burned at stake and went on to revolutionize the . All three are written from the POV of their respective Alternate universes, but provide a very interesting, thought provoking commentary. PROJECT MUSE Project Muse did not promise much: “Alternate History” only promised 138 articles and books, and most of them I had already seen in the other databases. Most of these articles were book reviews, so I was not able to find much usual information. PROQUEST At first, ProQuest looked like it would have some promise. A search of the phrase “Alternate History” provided 2,231 hits, and after narrowing it down with the limiters “American Literature” brought that down to 948. The problem is that a fair amount of the articles is discussing Historical revisionism and the “fantasy” within those. There’s no strong discussion about Alternate History as a genre, save one article by M.D. Perschon. Perschon’s article discusses the popularity and use of the genre’s aesthetic in fiction. As a result of the genre’s fantasy origins, it is not uncommon to see the more fantastical Alternate Histories crossing over with Steampunk, (based on the technology from the early 1900s, prior to the Atomic age), and other fantasy elements.

Reese Sako 6

ACADEMIC SEARCH COMPLETE Academic Search Complete provided several articles critiquing the genre and aspects of it. This source actually provided some of the best articles on the topic out of the various other sources I had used. The search phrase “Alternate Histor*” had 372 hits, 101 of which were journal articles. In contrast, “Imaginary Histor*” had 183 hits, while “Counterfactual Histor*” had 206. Most of the articles I was able to find discuss popular aspects of the genre, fallacies that are commonly found in some stories, and how the portrayal of nations and powers has shifted through time. Geoffrey Winthrop-Young’s article “The Third Reich in Alternate History: Aspects of a Genre-Specific Depiction of Nazi Culture” discusses the development and shifts in how a victorious Nazi Germany is portrayed. From The Man in the High Castle’s competent and technologically advanced Germany, to In the Presence of Mine Enemy’s Nazi Germany as an expy of the declining to ’s dystopic Nazi Germany where death camps have become national monuments, Nazi Germany’s portrayal in fiction has varied greatly as new information about the Reich has become known. NOVELIST Much like WorldCat, the purpose of NoveList was to find popular Alternate History novels. The search phrase “Imaginary Histor*” did not come up with much of anything, thus I went back to my search phrase “Alternate Histor*”. “Alternate Histor*” resulted in 525 results. Even better, while I was looking to narrow down my search, under the genre option was “Alternate History”. By selecting that genre, I was able to cut my results down to 205. As I had mentioned before, I was using NoveList to find novels and books that I had previously read, or authors that I am familiar with. Again, I was able to find them. HISTORY REFERENCE CENTER At this point, I was beginning to look for more history-based sources to use. I selected the History Reference Center to see what sort of information that it may have, and to see what I might be able to benefit from. Unfortunately, there was not very much to work with. “Alternate Histor*” only came up with 39 hits, and “Imaginary Histor*” only came up with 20. The other search terms, “Counterfactual Histor*” and “Alternative Histor*” came up with almost no results, thus I ignored them. Out of the results that I did get, the majority of them were discussions and critiques about the plausibility of some works, and how authors may or may not use the so-called . HISTORICAL ABSTRACTS Out of all the sources I used, this was, no doubt, the most disappointing. Both search terms, “Alternate Histor*” and “Imaginary Histor*” resulted in 89 articles, and I had already seen these articles in previous EBSCO-based searches. Thus, I did not gain anything new from this particular resource. Reese Sako 7

GOOGLE SCHOLAR Google Scholar was tricky to use. My initial query of “Alternate History” resulted in 3,930 hits, while “Alternate Histories” resulted in 1,473. The phrase “Imaginary History” Resulted in 1,690 hits. After weeding out citations, I was able to find that most of the articles within it, were articles that I had already found while looking through the other database. Ultimately, there was little new material to go through, so at this point I felt like was beginning to run out of resources to use and look through. LEXISNEXIS My final search was into the LexisNexis database. My initial query of “Imaginary Histor*” resulted in only 203 hits, most of them discussing the before mentioned imaginary place within ethnic literature and Historical revisionism. “Alternate Histor*” Resulted in 998 hits, and was reduced to 357 after reducing it to only show results from the “”. As mentioned before, most of the results from the search were articles and book reviews. While looking through the results, I noticed that there was a reoccurring reviewer: a web review called “Kirkus Reviews” with 48 reviews in LexisNexis. WEB RESOURCES

Before I discuss what web resources I used, I would like to make note of something: Due to the nature of the genre, there are very few professional websites devoted to Alternate History. The majority of websites based around the genre are run by fans and could be considered less ideal. However, many of these are online forums that can help expose people who are interested to other fans and help them learn more. UCHRONIA.NET Run by Robert B. Schmunk, Uchronia.net is basically a database for Alternate History works and novels. With over 2900 items in the database, users can look for exactly what they want. The site is organized to include a list of upcoming works, a list of anthologies, novel series, authors, and a list of books organized by what their Point of Departure is. Even more impressive, the author has organized a list of “honorary” Alternate histories that had been written before the genre had become mainstream and recognized as a separate genre, as well as a list of reference articles for those who wish to read something more scholarly. The site also hosts the Sidewise Award for Alternate History, a literature award given out to the best novel and of any given year. As a whole, the site can serve as a jumping off point for people looking for novels that may suit their interest. ALTERNATEHISTORY.COM In terms of resources, Alternethistory.com is an unusual choice. It is not a review website or scholarly website, but rather a discussion forum devoted to the genre, where fans can discuss recent novels, older novels, pass out suggestions for what people should read, as well as propose their own Alternate History questions and discuss what might happen, or even write their own stories. There are also sections to discuss implausible/fantasy Alternate Histories, games, as Reese Sako 8 well as an off topic area discussion, but they cannot be accessed by nonmembers, and are irrelevant to this particular discussion. The Forum is a good resource for people who want to get more involved in the genre and might want to try and write their own stories, but that is about it. The site boast to be the largest English Language Alternate History forum online, which may be true as most of the other, smaller discussion forums have closed down. On the whole, the site comes with all the usual problems of an online forum. Because it is an open forum, many of the users are well-meaning and do put effort into research, but are not always professional historians, researchers or academics. To a degree, one does have to be wary about claims and discussion, but it still can be a useful starting point for those new to the genre. While this may be unprofessional to say, the website did help foster my interest in the genre and help me find several good (and not so good) novels, as well as provided several very useful sources of information.

IV CONCLUSIONS

On the whole, I was not too surprised at the relative lack of academic sources and information. Relatively speaking, the genre is about speculation, and to a degree, treated like another part of , , and fantasy. While searching, it didn’t surprise me that there were a variety of terms used to describe the genre, I was already aware of Alternate history being called “Speculative History”. What did surprise me was the name “Imaginary History”, as it sounds significantly less scholarly: to me, Imaginary History sounds like it is a genre, where the or are fought with and magic. On a different note, I was surprised to see that some of the articles on alternate history use the phrase “Counterfactual History” to describe the genre, as I have associated that phrase with Historical Revisionism, and other wildly bizarre theories. The lack of a strong uniform phrase makes it difficult to search, as it seems that even scholars cannot agree on a single phrase to describe the genre with. Another reoccurring problem was that several off-topic books kept appearing, despite my best efforts to narrow down my searches and get rid of as many outliers as possible. While searching through the databases I selected, I was disappointed at several of the History databases and their lack of discussion. As I had previous read The Collective What If?, and several other smaller Anthologies that did involve historians speculating and proposing scenarios. While I did find several articles discussing the importance of using Alternate History as a thought exercise and why it is popular, as well as critiques on the genre’s handling of certain aspects, I only was able to find Phong Nguyen’s articles as actual Alternate Histories being written out. Most of the other articles that I was able to find were book reviews. While I did read several of them and it appreciated the commentary in them, book reviews can only do so much and are not really what I am looking for in this project. Sources like WorldCat and NoveList are Reese Sako 9 relatively limited in their scope, but Uchornia.net more than made up for their shortcomings. As for other online resources, the lack of any “professional” Alternate History websites is not a surprise. After going through all these databases and looking at what resources I have available, I realize that my selection may be much smaller than it seems. Many of the same articles and reviews appeared in various databases. As a history major, I was already aware of the struggle to find relevant, useful sources, so in many ways, this was nothing new. However, when discussing actual history, if one is having difficulty finding information on the internet, one can always turn to physical books and look for the information there. In this particular case, that was not a feasible option. Back then I did rely on the reference and department librarian for assistance in finding information on such topics as , American and German Samoa, Finland in World War II, Italian , the Democratic Revolution in Hawaii, and the life and accomplishments of Vycheslav Molotov. While I did also look up the information on my own, this is the first time I had to do it without the possibility of asking for someone else’s expertise. With this project, I know have a better idea of what I am getting into as a librarian, and how I can help other people find the information they need.

Reese Sako 10

V. BIBLIOGRAPHY

Academic Search Complete via UH Manoa Library. Website Alternatehistory.com Accessed May 3, 2016. http://www.alternatehistory.com/ Collins, Randal. 2007. “Turning Points, Bottlenecks, and the Fallacies of Counterfactual History.” Sociological Forum 22., no 3. 247-269. Academic Search Complete, EBSCOhost. (accessed May 3, 2016)

Google Scholar via UH Manoa Library. Website. https://scholar.google.com/

Harley, Trevor A. 2014. “History Lessons: What can we learn about History?” Rethinking History 18, no 3: 345-364. History Reference Center, EBSCOhost (accessed may 4, 2016).

Historical Abstracts. Via UH Manoa Library. Web

History Reference Center. Via UH Manoa Library. Web.

Jstor Arts and Science. Via UH Manoa Library. Web.

LexisNexis. Via UH Manoa Library. Web.

Nolan, Daniel. 2012. “Why (And everyone else) should care about counterfactuals.” Philosophical studies. 163 No 2. 317-335. Academic Search Complete, EBSCO host (Accessed May 3, 2016)

NoveList. Via UH Manoa Library. Web.

Nguyen, Phong. 2007. “Pages from the Textbook of Alternate History: Columbus Discovers Asia”. The Iowa Review 37 (1). University of Iowa: 26–30. http://www.jstor.org/stable/20536770.

Nguyen, Phong. 2008. “Pages from the Textbook of Alternate History: Joan of Arc, Patron Saint of Mothers and Soldiers”. The North American Review 293 (5). University of Northern Iowa: 13–17. http://www.jstor.org/stable/41220331.

Nguyen, Phong. 2009. “Pages from the Textbook of Alternate History: Siddhartha Remains in His Father's Palace”. Mississippi Review 37 (1/2). University of Southern Mississippi: 82–92. http://www.jstor.org/stable/25594463.

Reese Sako 11

Perschon, M. D. (2012). The steampunk aesthetic: Technofantasies in a neo-Victorian retrofuture (Order No. NR89296). Available from ProQuest Dissertations & Theses Global. (1151509327). Retrieved from http://eres.library.manoa.hawaii.edu/login?url=http://search.proquest.com/docview/11515 09327?accountid=27140

Project MUSE. Via UH Manoa Library. Web.

Proquest. Via UH Manoa Library. Web.

Rosenfeld, Gavriel. “Why do we ask “What If?” Reflections on the Function of Alternate History” History and Theory. 41 (4), Dec. 2002. 90-103. http://www.jstor.org/stable/3590670

Schneider-Mayerson, Matthew. “What Almost Was: The Politics of the Contemporary Alternate History Novel.” American Studies 50, (3). 2009. 63-83. Https://muse/jhu.edu/ (Accessed May 2, 2016)

Uchronia.com. Accessed May 5, 2016. http://www.uchronia.net/

Winthrop-Young, Geoffrey. 2006. “The Third Reich in Alternate History: Aspects of a Genre- Specific Depiction of Nazi Culture.” Journal of Popular Culture 39, no 5. 878-896. Academic Search Complete, EBSCOhost (accessed May 3, 2016)

WorldCat.org. OCLC Online Computer Library Center, Inc. accessed May 3, 2016. https://www.worldcat.org/

Reese Sako 12

VI: APPENDIX I: ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY General Resources

Collins, Randal. 2007. “Turning Points, Bottlenecks, and the Fallacies of Counterfactual History.” Sociological Forum 22., no 3. 247-269. Academic Search Complete, EBSCOhost. (accessed May 3, 2016) -Collins’ article is a discussion of PODs: Points of Departure, that basically serve as the “hinge” that the alternate history depends on, i.e. a battle that goes differently, the death of a prominent historical figure before they can gain power, etc. Collins discusses how historians and writers sometimes ignore the many other historical factors that affect decisions and developments. For example, if Hitler is killed before he can form the Nazi party, it does not mean that there will be no World War II. Weimer Germany was an unstable mess with a large number of far right and far left parties and a disgruntled populace. With no Hitler, it is entirely possible that another charismatic individual could take power and cause a war. Cowley, Robert and Caleb Carr. 2001. The Collected What If?: Eminent Historians Imagining what might have been. New York, G.P. Putnam’s Sons. Call number: D21.3 .C64 2001, available in UH Manoa Hamilton collection. -An anthology of the two previous What If?: Eminent Historians Imagining What might have been. Essentially this is a collection of scholarly works, discussing a variety of potential what ifs? Ranging from Roman times, to World War II.

Nolan, Daniel. 2012. “Why Historian (And everyone else) should care about counterfactuals.” Philosophical studies. 163 No 2. 317-335. Academic Search Complete, EBSCO host (Accessed May 3, 2016) - Analysis of what role Counterfactuals play as a thought exercise, way to look and interpret history, , and how what we learn changes how things are portrayed. Essentially, the argument is that how we portray nations in Alternate history depends on historical knowledge, as it develops.

Rosenfeld, Gabriel. “Why do we ask “What If?” Reflections on the Function of Alternate History” in History and Theory. 41 (4), Dec. 2002. 90-103. http://www.jstor.org/stable/3590670 -Rosenfeld’s article discusses the question of why do we read and write alternate history? Using the common scenarios of Nazi Germany winning World War II, the South winning the American Civil War and no American revolution taking place, Rosenfeld argues that Alternate history is used to portray how we feel about current . Rosenfeld argues that Utopic Alternate History shows that we are dissatisfied with current society and wish it could be better, while dystopic Alternate History preys on our fears, and lets us realize that we really don’t have it so bad.

Reese Sako 13

Rosenfeld, Gavriel D. 2005. The World Hitler Never Made: Alternate History and the Memory of Nazism. New York, Cambridge University Press. Call number: D757 .R69 2005, available in Hamilton Library -Rosenfeld’s book discusses the portrayals of Nazi Germany in various medias, and how it changes within the genre. Interestingly, Rosenfeld’s argues that by writing these stories and portraying these alternate worlds, it helps us remember what Nazi Germany was capable of.

Schneider-Mayerson, Matthew. “What Almost Was: The Politics of the Contemporary Alternate History Novel.” American Studies 50, (3). 2009. 63-83. Https://muse/jhu.edu/ (Accessed May 2, 2016) -Here, Schneider-Mayerson discusses why the genre experienced a sudden boon in popularity during the 1990s. Between the end of the , a rise in libertarian politics and changes in the Printing industry, Scheider-Mayerson argues that it is essentially a perfect storm of causes. He argues that Alternate History novels, at the time, have a very libertarian touch and are influenced by the political culture of the time. Whether that is true or not, it is an interesting claim, and I would personally like to see another study to determine if more present day alternate history novels follow this pattern.

Topic I: Hard/Plausible Alternate History

Conroy, Robert. 2009. 1942: A Novel. New York, Ballantine Books. Call Number: PS3553.O51986 A616 2009. Available at UH Manoa, Hamilton Hawaiian collection. -Asking the question of “What if Imperial Japan invaded the Hawaiian Islands after the ?” Relatively speaking, Japan’s resources had already been stretched thin by the time Pearl Harbor occurred, and any invasion would be a waste of precious resources. However, it does fit the Japanese strategy of trying to force the USA to surrender and prevent a longer war. The novel still ends with an American counterattack retaking the islands, but it does slow the American War effort. The library also has Harry Turtledove’s Days of Infamy series, a two book series which also details a Japanese occupation of the Hawaiian Islands.

Harley, Trevor A. 2014. “History Lessons: What can we learn about History?” Rethinking History 18, no 3: 345-364. History Reference Center, EBSCOhost (accessed may 4, 2016). -Using the assassination of Austrian Archduke Franz Ferdinand and the outbreak of , Harley discusses the historical landscape and how it affects what we believe. In this particular case, this feels more like a discussion about badly written Alternate Histories that do not take the background behind historical events into consideration.

Reese Sako 14

Nolan, Daiel. 2012. “Why Historian (And everyone else) should care about counterfactuals.” Philosophical studies. 163 No 2. 317-335. Academic Search Complete, EBSCO host (Accessed May 3, 2016) -Nolan argues the importance of using Counterfactual histories both as thought exercises, and as a way to get a better understanding of history. This may sound strange, but by understanding how things could have otherwise have gone, we get an understanding of the circumstances, that lead up to what actually happened.

Tsouras, Peter. 1997. Gettysburg: An Alternate History. , Greenhill Books. Call Number: E475.53. T79 1997. Available via ILL (Located at UH West Oahu) -An anthology of possible outcomes of the battles of Gettysburg, and what may result from them. Some do end in Confederate victories and later independence, while others only prolong the Union victory. Because of the various authors, there is a variety of quality and plausibility.

Topic II: Soft/Fantasy Alternate History

Due to the fact that most of these are novels, not scholarly works, most of these books are available at Public libraries. Perschon, M. D. (2012). The steampunk aesthetic: Technofantasies in a neo-Victorian retrofuture (Order No. NR89296). Available from ProQuest Dissertations & Theses Global. (1151509327). Retrieved from http://eres.library.manoa.hawaii.edu/login?url=http://search.proquest.com/docview/11515 09327?accountid=27140 -Alternate History frequently crosses over with the Steampunk genre in most of the more fantastical stories. Here, Perschon discusses the aspects of the Steampunk Genre, what defines it as such and gives several examples of Alternate History novels using the genre. Priest, Cherie. 2009. . New York, Tor. Call Number: PAPERBACK. Available via ILL (in UH Hilo General Collection) -A Steampunk-Zombie novel, Boneshaker takes place in the walled off city of , where the undead roam and the entire city is engulfed in toxic gas that reanimates anyone that it kills. The Novel followers a young man who goes off into the city looking for his father, and the boy’s mother who returns looking for him. The first book in Priest’s Clockwork Century series, this one is relatively light on the Alternate History, as those are regulated to background references: and Sky pirates roam, Mexico is implied to be under the Second Mexican Empire, Texas is a heavily industrialized independent state, and the American Civil War has dragged on into 1880. Later books in the series, which are not available in the UH library system, delve more into the Alternate History aspects/

Roberts, Kim Stanley. 2002. The Years of Rice and Salt. New York, Bantam Books. Call Number PS3568.O2893 Y43 2002. Available via ILL (Locate at UH Hilo, General collection) -In Robert’s book, the Black Plague proved to be even more deadly, wiping out nearly 90% of the population of Europe. As a result, the world is split between the Islamic world, Imperial Reese Sako 15

China, and many indigenous states. There is a significant religious aspect to the stories, as the main characters of each part are heavily implied to the be the reincarnations of their previous counterparts, but the world building within is fantastic.

Turtledove, Harry. 1992. The Guns of the South. New York: Ballantine Books. Item Barcode: 1907408569. Available at Kapolei Public Library. Also available at Kaimuki Public Library, Hawaii State Public Library, Wailuku Public Library and Waipahu. -In 1864, as the Confederacy is on its last legs, South African White Supremacist travel back in time to provide Robert E. Lee and the confederate army with AK-47s and other modern technology that allow them to win the Civil War and their independence. However, as life beings to settle into normalcy, the South Africans and Confederacy begin to clash, leading to another . Not best novel, some of the dialogue is clunky and the premise is bizarre, but it does let readers get an idea of some of the more outlandish parts of the genre.

Reese Sako 16

VII: APPENDIX II: SEARCH TERM RELEVANCY CHART

UH MANOA CATALOG/ ONESEARCH Search Type Search Term Results Relevancy nl “Alternate History” 325 HR nl “Imaginary History” 90 HR nl “Counterfactual History” 114 U Boolean “Alternate AND History” 0 NR SU “Alternate History” 70 U SU “Imaginary History” 81 U SU “Counterfactual History” 18 U

JSTOR Search Type Search term Results Relevancy nl Alternate History 62,082. NR Nl Imaginary history 51,804 NR SU “Alternate History” 133 U SU “Imaginary History” 182 U SU “Counterfactual 265 HR History”

WORLDCAT Search Type Search term Results Relevancy nl “Alternate History” 1,179 U nl “Alternate Histor*” 1404 U nl “Imaginary Histor*” 1142 U nl “Counterfactual 405 NR Histor*” SU “Alternate Histor*” 94 HR SU “Imaginary Histor*” 242 HR

PROJECT MUSE Search Type Search term Results Relevancy nl “Alternate History” 138 U nl “Imaginary History” 42 U

Reese Sako 17

PROQUEST Search Type Search term Results Relevancy nl “Alternate History” 2,231 U nl “Imaginary History” 450 U SU “Alternate History” 6 U SU “Imaginary History” 1 NR SU “Alternate History” 337 U AND Novels SU “Alternate History” 948 U AND “American Literature”

ACADEMIC SEARCH COMPLETE Search Type Search term Results Relevancy nl “Alternate Histor*” 372 U nl “Imaginary Histor*” 183 U nl “Counterfactual 206 U Histor*” SU “Alternate Histor*” 18 U SU “Imaginary Histor*” 68 U SU “Counterfactual 0 NR Histor*”

NOVELIST Search Type Search term Results Relevancy nl “Alternate History” 525 U nl “Imaginary History” 5 NR nl “Counterfactual 3 NR History” Boolean “Alternate History” 488 U Boolean “Imaginary History” 5 NR Boolean “Counterfactual 3 NR History” SU “Alternate History” 1 NR SU “Imaginary History” 0 NR SU “Counterfactual 0 NR History”

Reese Sako 18

HISTORY REFERENCE CENTER Search Type Search term Results Relevancy nl “Alternate Histor*” 39 U nl “Imaginary Histor*” 20 U nl “Counterfactual 24 U Histor*”

ACADEMIC SEARCH COMPLETE Search Type Search term Results Relevancy nl “Alternate Histor*” 89 U nl “Imaginary Histor*” 89 U nl “Counterfactual 91 U Histor*” SU “Alternate Histor*” 4 NR SU “Imaginary Histor*” 76 U SU “Counterfactual 0 NR Histor*”

GOOGLE SCHOLAR Search Type Search term Results Relevancy nl “Alternate History” 3930 U nl “Imaginary History” 1690 U nl “Counterfactual 2770 U History”

LEXISNEXIS Search Type Search term Results Relevancy SU “Alternate History” 987 U SU “Imaginary History” 530 U SU “Counterfactual 337 NR History”