The Social History of Ethnic Chinese in Theory and Methodology Perspective: The Comparative Studies
Faculty of Cultural Sciences, Universitas Gadjah Mada, Indonesia
ABSTRACT
The history of Chinese ethnicity is an interesting historical study to be studied by historians, sociologists and sinologists is trying to analyze and explain in various points of view from the arrival and the formation of the community. This is certainly requires by appropriate methods and methodologies to produce historical narratives. The social history of ethnic Chinese as a community is one of the approaches and methodology in narrating them. According to Rafhael Samuel et al (on his book “What is Social History”?), social history also focuses on public issues, the history of ordinary life, family history, "a grassroots" compared to the lives of the elites, the military, the politics, and the economy. This study is about comparative history, I use the method of history from book, journals and the others. The view of social history is more about the experience than an action of their life. Based on Raphael's explanation, the above raises the question of how historiography provides an explanation of ethnic Chinese in terms of method and methodology through comparative studies, whether the Chinese ethnicity is general in its locality based on existing of historiography. Some major findings are that the Chinese history has been written in Indonesia is still limited and need to write more to enrichment the historiography about Chinese society.
KEYWORDS
Social history, ethnic Chinese, theory and methodology, comparative studies