“PECS” Notes
History is the study of human socio-cultural change over time. This covers nearly the entire human experience, so we must divide the information further into more manageable categories. The two main divisions of history are society and culture, but as these are still enormous categories, we will divide and simplify them further into the Political Economic Cultural and Social aspects of history (PECS).
In order to take notes on these most important aspects of the reading, it is necessary that you have at least a working understanding of what these concepts mean in the context of this note-taking strategy. (For greater elaboration see “Major categories of historical research” in the Skills section of the website.)
Political: generally refers to the workings of government and people’s thinking about the government.
Some issues covered in this category are: elections, structure of government (division between state and national governments, branches of government, how many representatives are in Congress, etc.), who participates in making decisions about how the government functions, how people participate in the political process (how do they vote, do they form political parties, who gets elected), how much power does the government have other people and society, what do people think is the proper role of government in their lives, how do political leaders respond to other aspects of society.
Economic: generally refers to how people make money and get the goods and services they need and want.
Some issues covered in this category are: is the economy industrial or agricultural, is it in the process of changing from one to the other, how is wealth distributed within the society (who are the winners and losers), how much and what kind of stuff is the economy producing and how is this changing, how do different regions differ in what and how much they produce.
Cultural: generally refers to how people think about themselves and their society, how it is and how it should be.
Some issues covered in this category are: what do people think about the nature of race, gender, and class; what is the society’s political and moral philosophy; how does the society express itself in art and fashion; how does the society express itself religiously, and how does the society differ over religion.
Social: generally refers to demographics: where people live, how they live, how many of them are there, what is their status.
Some issues covered in this category are: do people live in cities or rural areas, how old is the population on average, what are the percentages of males/females/whites/blacks/Hispanics/Asians/natives/immigrants and how is that makeup changing, how is status in the society determined (race, wealth, birth, political connection).