Libbster
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Hey. my half yearly is tomorrow and the question is 'discuss the aims and purposes of history" I've written some of my essay and would like to get some other opinions. I'm arguing the purpose of history is to be objective.
Historical objectivity is a key factor when considering the purpose of history. The post modernist idea that the historian is writing fiction, and thus truth is relative, is debated by the divergent historians EH Carr and GR Elton. The relativist EH Carr’s historiographic work “What is History?” seems to take a postmodernist perspective on the affiliation between the historian, history and the facts. Carr’s argument is that it is the historian that creates the history, not the evidence. Many historical sources are texts, which are occupied with misrepresentations, and therefore, the historians own work will be distorted in the same manner.
Carr states “It used to be said that facts speak for themselves. This is of course, untrue. The facts only speak when the historian calls on them: it is he who decides to which facts to give the floor, and in what order or context.” This quote supports the postmodernist theory that the truth we maintain is the truth that is most relevant to our requirements. Therefore we can argue that there is no such thing as historical objectivity, which undermines one of the main purposes of history, that is, to be free of bias and be objective as possible. Since it is the historian that creates subjectiveness in the work, however unintentional, it follows that we must examine the historian’s context before we can study his ‘distortion’ of the facts.
Relativism denies that meaningful truth is able to be found, and Carr thus rejects the reality of historical knowledge, which is dangerous relativism.
However, there is one major difference between Carr’s perspective and his seeming acceptance of postmodernist ideas. Carr does not reject the possibility of the historian’s objectivity. It is seems that Carr did not want to realise the full implications of his ‘subjective historian’ as this means that many interpretations of history would have equal validity.
Historical objectivity is a key factor when considering the purpose of history. The post modernist idea that the historian is writing fiction, and thus truth is relative, is debated by the divergent historians EH Carr and GR Elton. The relativist EH Carr’s historiographic work “What is History?” seems to take a postmodernist perspective on the affiliation between the historian, history and the facts. Carr’s argument is that it is the historian that creates the history, not the evidence. Many historical sources are texts, which are occupied with misrepresentations, and therefore, the historians own work will be distorted in the same manner.
Carr states “It used to be said that facts speak for themselves. This is of course, untrue. The facts only speak when the historian calls on them: it is he who decides to which facts to give the floor, and in what order or context.” This quote supports the postmodernist theory that the truth we maintain is the truth that is most relevant to our requirements. Therefore we can argue that there is no such thing as historical objectivity, which undermines one of the main purposes of history, that is, to be free of bias and be objective as possible. Since it is the historian that creates subjectiveness in the work, however unintentional, it follows that we must examine the historian’s context before we can study his ‘distortion’ of the facts.
Relativism denies that meaningful truth is able to be found, and Carr thus rejects the reality of historical knowledge, which is dangerous relativism.
However, there is one major difference between Carr’s perspective and his seeming acceptance of postmodernist ideas. Carr does not reject the possibility of the historian’s objectivity. It is seems that Carr did not want to realise the full implications of his ‘subjective historian’ as this means that many interpretations of history would have equal validity.
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