The term ‘world history' describes one of the oldest, most persistent and most pliable forms of history writing.1
No simple definition is possible, for world histories vary widely in narrative style, structure and spatio-temporal scope. Furthermore, a wide assortment of labels have been used to describe them, including ‘universal history', ‘ecumenical history', ‘regional history', ‘comparative history', ‘world systems history', ‘macrohistory', ‘transnational history', ‘big history' and the ‘new world' and ‘new global' histories.
Despite terminological differences, however, world histories share the purpose of offering a construction of and thus a guide to a meaningful ‘world' or ‘realm or domain taken for an entire meaningful system of existence or activity' by historians or people in the past.[4] [5] Thus all histories are world histories. Where histories differ is in the degree to which the purpose of world construction is explicit.
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