Labor historians

shows that in the 19th century, historians of the west, for the most part, had a positivist view. What this means is that they viewed historical facts as information that was not aligned with any person’s opinion. Carr noted that this view is faulty because historians choose which facts of the past are deemed historical fact if they’re important enough. For example, Carr states that millions of people crossed the Rubicon, a river in Northeast Italy, but historians picked the moment Julius Caesar…

The United States stands to be one of the most successful countries in the modern world. With a GDP of nearly 53,000 USD (United States Census Bureau, 2013), the US outcompetes nearly every other nation. This profound success is backed by an extensive and rich history, spanning from the time of colonization to modern day. However, the history of the United States is not one that is filled with joyous and pleasant occasion. It is marked by streaks of mistreatment and exploitation, including…

also urges against the ‘us vs them’ mentality created by mythistory. McNeill explains “The result is mythistorical: the past as we want it to be, safely simplified into a contest between good guys and bad guys, ‘us’ and ‘them’” (McNeill 80). If a historian writes history in this manner, then one group at all times falls short and is made out to look like villains for years to come. An example of this was Columbus’ story, the Colonialist were depicted as noble Christian saviors, and the Natives…

“The Strange Death of Silas Deane” The object of historians is to tell the facts of the past without changing the details or changing the perspective of the past. Historians serves as couriers between the old times and the modern times. The transition between the past and to the present can create a misconception of what really happened. For example, the death of Silas Deane. Silas Deane wasn’t overwhelmingly popular but served the United States as diplomat. Silas Deane was very determined to…

of the book, Grafton takes the reader backward in time to explore the various changes in history that influenced the development of the footnote. Grafton chose this unique chronology in order to help him reveal to the reader “where, when, and why historians adopted [the footnote’s] distinctive form of narrative architecture.” In choosing a non-linear chronology, Grafton is not constrained by the need to show the evolution of the footnote from a single, “primitive” form to the modern form used…

Interpretation of the past is an immense task left mostly to historians, who themselves have differing views and methods among each other. In From Reliable Sources: An Introduction to Historical Methods, Martha Howell and Walter Prevenier provide a history of the methodical and theoretical changes that historians have embraced and rejected. Many of these transformations were inspired by other disciplines as well as a reflection of social and political climates. Howell and Prevenier explain the…

posed in the title of his book, “Why Study History?” He answers this question in eight chapters that talk about the different aspects of history. In chapter one, Fea talks about the role of historians as “revisionists.” Though history can be revealed through simple facts, it is meaningless without a story. Historians try to identify the story behind the facts by following the five C’s: change, context, causality, contingency, and complexity. In chapter two, Fea proposes reasons for why we are…

1. In A People’s History of the United States chapters 1-8 by Howard Zinn. He writes about historic key points in which some history recollections doesn’t truly paint the truth of what happened, why it happened, and how we look at it now with newer, more open minded hindsight. Some of the most important points that Zinn brings to light in his book is that history is never truly written until after the fact and that fact is, history is written by those who deem it fit. With a vision that can at…

While Foucault identifies history with the past and the documents containing such information, Taylor (n.d) identifies history as a field correlated to the trauma that forms part of human existence. According to Taylor (n.d) history is part of human existence and it should be referenced according to the events that took part in the past years. This means that it should never be separated in terms of durations of discontinuities, but it should rather form part of the existence. Unlike Foucault…

Re-Thinking History by Keith Jenkins is a book that takes a critical look at writing history and how historians have individual approaches to history and the past. Jenkins creates a debate about theories, the definition of history, the question of truth, bias, and history as a science or as an art. He asks similar questions as John Tosh and John H. Arnold. All three challenge previous historians and theories. Jenkins even asks readers what method and ideology would they choose to follow, that of…