Historians like talking about history. Posting on Reddit is much more like doing that than formal writing. I might crank out a 500 word response on Reddit in a few minutes, but a 500 word book review for publication might take two weeks of work to produce and polish. An article takes months, books take years. But a quick reply to a question here is like talking to a student after class for me, something I do casually and generally enjoy.

Plus, unlike basically all other forms of "publication," Reddit allows for interaction, followup, and exchange in a relatively rapid format. After a couple of decades of conference participation I've come to hate those formal venues-- people posturing or trying to cram in six questions in a five minute window before the next paper is presented. Here there's time for thoughtful responses, and better still, others may chime in with source or knowledge the OP or first respondent didn't know existed.

Again, it's much more akin to sitting around bullshitting with a group of smart grad students than it is writing for publication; low stakes and low barriers to entry make it more enjoyable than many other things I might be doing.

/u/SnowblindAlbino makes a good point. It's enjoyable to take part in the discussions.

I'll just add to that a point about outreach. In recent years this has become a bigger thing for a lot of people in the Humanities. That is, what are you doing to present your particular expertise or research to the non-academic world?

It's a form of contributing to society through public education, and it's from this that there are more department based blogs or twitter accounts popping up. There's outreach being done not only by individuals (e.g. many of the flaired users here) but also happening officially at the level of department or university.

Related to that, Reddit also provides a good opportunity for people to improve their abilities to write clearly for non-specialist. It's easy to get in the habit of only ever using the particular jargon of your subspecialty, and then being an absolute bore at parties when no one knows what the hell you're talking about.

Still, I think for most people, "we like it" is the main reason they're here.

To state the obvious, I like African history. If you read through the flaired users list you can see that there are many many more people who are willing to declare expertise in North American or European history than of Africa (or pre-columbian americas, or Oceania, etc).

Part of the reason for that disparity is that African history is not taught in North American schools, perhaps because it is not considered "relevant" to the experiences of the students. Many people are taught, or at least come to believe, that Africa "doesn't matter".

So, when someone comes to AskHistorians having heard something about the Swahili states, or about Ethiopia resisting colonialism, and wanting to know more, I appreciate that opportunity. If people are interested and want to learn about the things I like to learn about, I am happy to share what I know in the hopes of nourishing that interest.

Historians like talking about history.

This.

My second reason is that I finished my undergraduate degree 7 months ago and haven't been in study since, but I start postgrad in a month. So this seemed like good practice for research in the meantime. That's why a large percentage of my answers have nothing to do with my specialty - I like to go outside that and research other areas.

In a lot of the cases where I've posted (here and elsewhere), what looks like a substantial, well-researched essay is really just close familiarity with a complicated topic. Though I will admit to being less prolifically wordy than other posters (my favorite mentor drilled us on conciseness as a virtue).

For people that have spent a long time specializing in and working with a specific genre (or genres), being asked to summarize something on-topic and recommend a few readings isn't all that hard. And when it's something you care about, it's fun to share it with others (especially when it's something you're not asked about all that often).

Sometimes people carefully answer questions in their field of study simply to refresh their memory and to exercise their brain in case they might need to provide a similar answer unexpectedly in a more formal setting in the near future.

I'm an undergraduate studying History with a concentration in American History. I have a degree in Criminal Justice, and am getting an additional degree in History. I find that posting and reading (more reading) here allows me to find a type of people that I can identify with.

When I do make posts here of a historical nature (I have tried exactly twice) I know they have to be up to rigorous standards, so it improves my historical writing dramatically outside the class room, and gives me extra practice and allows me to post about historical topics that interest me when I do have the answers.

many of these questions are either too broad (why did the Roman Empire fall?) or too specific (what were the late Roman laws regarding shipping loans? Was Babatha related to Salome Komaise or not ?) to be tackled in anything less than a book or a scientific article.

From the perspective of someone looking for answers, these are excellent reasons to turn to reddit. To start with, lots of people (like me) don't have access to academic journals or an academic library, so it's hard for them to access much of the specialist literature.

Not sure if you want to read through a whole book, let alone the large and contentious historiography, about why Europe was the first region to industrialise? Someone on reddit may take the time to summarise, and quite possibly other people will come along and explain different views and you can learn from a discussion.

Want to know how tall horses were in antiquity compared to the middle ages? Even if you have access to journals or an academic library you might struggle to find specific information like this. Ask here, and you never know who's read a book on the subject or who has expertise in this area. (This particular question is one of my favourites, because someone posted a good answer, and then it turns out we have a topic expert in "equine history" who turned up and gave even more information!)

Great answers everyone.

Possible scenario: Someone asks a question you think you can answer (hell, 1/5 of your master's thesis tackled the question). Before you know it, somebody else answers it, with some correct parts, but also with lots of inaccuracies, parts that are flat out wrong, opinions considered dated since the 1960's, highly controversial personal opinions with a small dose of propaganda. Add 15 more of those answers. Do you still answer the original question ? Do you engage with the other persons, pointing out his/her mistakes and offering your own opinion ? Do you go nuclear war on them (possibly spending the better part of a Sunday morning on it) ?

P.S. Since legal historians in my branch are mostly (practicing) lawyers, we typically deeply enjoy going nuclear on somebody, provided it's actually worth it.