Lumpers and splitters
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Lumping and splitting refers to a well known problem in any discipline which has to place individual examples into rigorously defined categories. The lumper/splitter problem occurs when there is the need to create classifications and assign examples to them, for example schools of literature, biological paleo-species and so on. A "lumper" is an individual who takes a gestalt view of a definition, and assigns examples broadly, assuming that differences are not as important as signature similarities. A "splitter" is an individual who takes precise definitions, and creates new categories to classify samples that differ in key ways.
Origin of the terms
The terms emerged from a debate in 1975 between J. H. Hexter and Christopher Hill in the Times Literary Supplement. it followed from Hexter's detailed review of Hill's book Change and Continuity in Seventeenth Century England, in which Hill developed Max Weber's argument that the rise of capitalism was facilitated by Calvinist Puritanism. Hexter objected to Hill's 'mining' of sources to find evidence that supported his theories. Hexter argued that Hill plucked quotations from sources in a way that distorted their meaning. Hexter explained this as a mental habit that he called 'lumping'. According to him, 'Lumpers' rejected differences and chose to emphasize similarities. Any evidence that did not fit their arguments was ignored as aberrant. 'Splitters', in contrast, emphasised differences, and resisted simple schemes. 'Lumpers' consistently tried to create coherent patterns. 'Splitters' preferred incoherent complexity. In a similar vein, historian of ideas Isaiah Berlin categorized thinkers as 'Hedgehogs' (lumpers) and 'Foxes' (splitters) in his essay on Leo Tolstoy, 'The Hedgehox and the Fox'.
Lumping and splitting in history
In history lumpers are those who tend to create broad definitions that cover large periods of time and many disciplines, whereas splitters want to assign names to tight groups of inter-relationships.
Each approach has its well known problems. Lumping tends to create a more and more unwieldy definition, with members having less and less mutually in common. This can lead to definitions which are little more than conventionalities, or groups which join fundamentally different examples. Splitting often leads to "distinctions without difference", ornate and fussy categories, and failure to see underlying similarities.
For example, in the arts, "Romantic" can refer specifically to a period of German poetry roughly from 1780-1810, but would exclude the later work of Goethe, among other writers. In music it can mean every composer from Hummel through Rachmaninoff, plus many that came after.
See also
