Past, Present, and Future of HNR: Reflections on the Practices and Methods in Historical Network Research Based on a Quantitative Survey

The past, present, and future of Historical Network Research (HNR) is widely discussed. While various contributions thoughtfully reflect on the potentials and pitfalls of new (computational) methods and their implications for wider epistemological assumptions, the current discussion seems to lack a review of the actual practices and methods in use when doing network-related historical research. By conducting a quantitative online survey within the HNR community, we add to this perspective and enrich the current debate by discussing recent developments in the field as well as challenges and wishes stated by the survey respondents. We found that while methods from Social Network Analysis (SNA) are still prevalent within the field of HNR, there are also a variety of methodological approaches and thematic directions that extend beyond this. In the context of a broadening landscape of methods, the results underline the importance of developing common practices that facilitate data interoperability, resources fostering methodological literacy, as well as approaches for the fitting and validation of promising network analysis methods for various application scenarios in the historical sciences. Working towards a more practically grounded understanding of doing HNR may further advance the methodological and epistemological discussions within the community.