World History

To me, history as a subject IS kings and battles and whatnot, because they are what matter; they are what shaped the world and caused events to unfold that changed society. It is the doings of emperors and generals that brought about our world as we see it, and what we must understand as we address real issues. Do we have conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq now because earlier imperial forces imposed artificial boundaries on enforced amalgamations of assorted tribes, or because of how Pashtuns traditionally cleaned their backsides or how Mosul smelled centuries ago?

Surely trivial events shape the world too, but as coincidental triggers to great events. WWI may not have happened had not a (not intended to be the killer) participant in the botched assassination plot stopped for lunch, and doubtless booze to assuage his frustration, on a street which Franz Ferdinand, equally unplanned, happened to take as a detour after the event where he was supposed to have been killed. But it was the battles and the treaties that spawned the resentful rise of Weimar and Third Reich Germany and brought the world the replay. Neither depended on aggregate social norms and slice of life trivia. Don't grt me wrong I enjoy trivia - but trivia about daily life long ago is history only as any past events are history; history purely as a definition of completed events. They are not history as in the events that motivated and measured important world changes.