• Editor's preface; Introduction: Marshall G. S. Hodgson and world history Edmund Burke, III; Part I. Europe in a global context: 1. The interrelations of societies in history; 2. In the center of the map: nations see themselves as the hub of history; 3. World history and world outlook; 4. The great Western Transmutation; 5. Historical method in civilizational studies; 6. On doing world history; Part II. Islam in a global context: 7. The role of Islam in world history; 8. Cultural patterning in Islamdom and the Occident; 9. The unity of later Islamic history; 10. Modernity and the Islamic heritage; Part III. The discipline of world history: 11. The objectivity of large-scale historical inquiry: its peculiar limits and requirements; 12. Conditions of historical comparison among ages and regions: the limitations of their validity; 13. Interregional studies as integrating the historical disciplines: the practical implications of an interregional orientation for scholars and for the public; Conclusion: Islamic history as world history: Marshall G. S. Hodgson and The Venture of Islam, Edmund Burke, III.

"The pieces collected here show perceptive and rigorously developed insights into the problems of writing world history." Edwin J. Van Kley, Journal of Asian Studies