I'm a political thought postgraduate, and one of the thing my department specialises in is conceptual histories and histories of ideas. My university also has a good history department. However, the two very rarely, if at all, interact and collaborate.
Simply put, I was wondering if there's any literature on the difference between these two 'disciplines' or however you may so call them, or what the main differences people would think distinguish these two fields.
In particular, I've got some time recently to write on my dissertation about Political Theory on Europe, and was wondering if there's any obvious differences between a 'history of Europe' and a 'history of ideas of Europe' that spring to mind.
To add to that question, is there any difference between history of ideas and conceptual history and history of philosophy?
These aren't exactly clear-cut divisions, but generally speaking both the history of ideas and conceptual history are mostly a part of history as an academic discipline. They often require interdisciplinary research due to their nature and focus. Those who research conceptual history will often venture into the realm of linguists, sociologists or even anthropologists. Meanwhile, the history of ideas regularly comes into contact with philosophy, sociology, anthropology or philosophy.
It's foreign to me that your university has a separate department for these totally disconnected from the history department. These specific types of history are very much a part of the curriculum of most historians. While for example someone like Foucault his ideas don't always agree with the concensus within historiography, his theories are fairly well-known and were a part of my education - as is the same for most of my peers.
Simply put, I was wondering if there's any literature on the difference between these two 'disciplines' or however you may so call them, or what the main differences people would think distinguish these two fields.
They are very different. What made you think that they are similar? The history of ideas is mostly preoccupied with how human thought and ideas changed throughout history, while conceptual history is a lot more focused on semantics and terminology. Think of it like this, the history of ideas is focused on the changes in human ideas whereas conceptual history is focused on the meaning behind the terminology used to express those ideas. So to put it crudely, conceptual history is more heavily focused on language.
In particular, I've got some time recently to write on my dissertation about Political Theory on Europe, and was wondering if there's any obvious differences between a 'history of Europe' and a 'history of ideas of Europe' that spring to mind.
The history of Europe entails the history of ideas of/in Europe. You can write about the history of early modern thought in Europe and your work can be classified as European history.