Favourite historian? (1 Viewer)

[snakeoils]

Who has been your fave historian so far? Mine is probably Tuchman, and my least favourite would be Elton.

 

[malayz_angel]

Yeah, Tuchman was good, she had some interesting things to say. I studied von Ranke and he was pretty influential but I think he was too obsessive concerning objectivity, especially as he was biased in that he was pro Prussian. I also don't mind Herodotus-- yeah he may be old 'ancient' actually, but he was like the father of history and he had no one to base his ideas on, so that makes him pretty cool.

 

[snakeoils]

i didnt get the chance to do von Ranke... but i managed to quote him in my assessment task yesterday

how did you study your historians? we started off with some basic ones like Tuchman, Elton, Becker, Gibbon... etc, and then moved on to more specific ones like feminist, marxist, revisionist... ending with some controversial ones like Windshuttle and his whole "aboriginal massacres never happened" thing...

 

[ladypenelope85]

oh dear...

we're just going through the book of sources systematically, answering questions on each of the historians and then discussing it for 2 hrs a week - we do talk about the whole 'feminist, marxist, revisionist' thing as well, but sort of as it comes up in conversation?!? other schools sound so much more structured.

we do an essay once a month on the what is history theme, with example hsc questions, and one of them is getting marked by a teacher from another school - should be good to see what they think!

(my favourite is trevelyan...why isn't one of his essays in the source book?!? will have to find a longer, more complicated one on the net i guess...)

 

[snakeoils]

we don't actually choose which historians we do out of the source book... our teacher just photocopies then ones she wants us to do, gives them to us, and we read through them and make notes, and then talk about how they relate to various things... whether they confirm/contradict what other historians have said, and how their contexts affect their content...

we have only done one trial question so far... i imagine we will do more at the end of the study (at least, i HOPE so)

 

[miguel_fugdey]

oooh i'm a new person on this thread...how thrilling

tuchmann is handy one (she has heaps to say) but cant say i really enjoyed her much... and von ranke WAS influencial, and he said lots of handy stuff coz of the whole 'rankean theory' thing

but i liked elton - iu thought he had plenty of good stuff to say, its just taht he was kinda boring...it took me AGES to read his article

 

[snakeoils]

oooh another extension history buddy.... how thrilling

i'll admit that elton had some good stuff to say, and he is good to write about in essays and exams, its just his whole attitude annoyed me (and he WAS boring...) because he just seemed pretty hypocritical, talking about how you shouldnt distance the reader by using jargon and things, but then he basically ended up doing the same thing by making his article so longwinded.

 

[Generator]

Photocopying from the source book? Don't you have your own?

 

[snakeoils]

nope... our teacher has the only copy of the sourcebook

 

[ladypenelope85]

wow, that could get kinda annoying for the exam revision... how many people are in your class snakeoils?

 

[snakeoils]

only 2...

 

[malayz_angel]

Wow, only two? We have about seven in our class which was a surprise as we were only expecting three and thought that we wouldn't be able to have a class

We got assigned a historian each and then we went off and made notes on them, then we presented them to the rest of the class and the teacher photocopied our notes for everyone.

 

[snakeoils]

we were kinda the opposite with numbers... we had like 9 people intending to do extension... and then when final selections happened, it ended up just being this other guy and me...

its a pretty decent arrangement... we can both handle most of the stuff that the teacher throws at us, so we move through things pretty quickly...

also, we TRIED to do the whole "make your own note and present them" thing... it failed dismally. luckily, our teacher gave up on trying to do that pretty quickly!

when do you do your extension? we have to do ours during free periods...

 

[malayz_angel]

Originally posted by snakeoils
when do you do your extension? we have to do ours during free periods...

Really... that sux. We do ours Tuesday afternoons but its okay because we finish early that day anyway plus we get a 1/2 hour break between school and the start of Ext to go to the shops down the road and get food. Our teacher's pretty cool, he lets us eat in class which kinda makes up for the whole staying-after-skool thing. We go from about 3:00 to anywhere between 4:00-4:30

 

[snakeoils]

yeah, you gotta love extension-subject-privileges... we used to go into the english staffroom and use their fridge and their kettle and things

 

[malayz_angel]

Okay, we're not that privileged. Wish we were!

 

[ladypenelope85]

WOW... they ARE privileges... with ext eng and ext history we spend 4 mornings a week getting to school at 7:30 - and both subjects seem equally useless, english is just one big conversation and history is just one big list of questions - both of which aren't fun in the morning!!! (but a thermos of coffee usually proves a good distraction) will suggest that we raid the english staffroom just like... which school is it snakeoils?

 

[snakeoils]

well i go to Byron High (northern nsw)... its not exactly what you'd call prestigous

 

[ladypenelope85]

lol that's ok, i just need a high school name to insert into my we-need-food-or-at-least-caffeine argument for tomorrow morning!...

 

[snakeoils]

GOOD LUCK! :d

do you have a kettle or anything in your senior common room? it took us ages of fighting, but we finally got a kettle, a microwave, a fridge, cups and cutlery, tables and a sink