Historyas an

Area of Knowledge

TaK - History

Write down the two most significant events that have happened at the College since you arrived in the summer of 2009.

Who do you think is best qualified to write a history of RCNUWC:

• a graduate?• a teacher?• a member of the board?• a local journalist?

Why?

TaK - History

“Historians are dangerous people. They are capable of upsetting everything” Khruschev

“He who controls the present, controls the past. He who controls the past, controls the future.” Orwell

“If you do not like the past, change it.” Burton

TaK - History

TaK - History

TaK - History

“Those who don’t study the past are condemned to repeat it” Santayana

“What experience and history teach is this - that people and governments have never learned

anything from history” Hegel

TaK - History

To what extent do you think that people keep making the same mistakes?

Why?

TaK - History

Why should you care about the past?

What dangers are there in being obsessed with the past?

What dangers are there in ignoring the past?

TaK - History

“History is bunk. It’s tradition. We don’t want tradition. We want to live in the present.”Henry Ford

TaK - History

What is history?• Is it enough to define it as “the study of the

past”?

Concerned with:

• Evidence (the present traces of the past)

• Significance (concerned with significant events)

• Explanation & Understanding (not only describing the past, but also explaining it)

TaK - History

Different histories

• Over-reliance on the written word? • In parts of West Africa, history is told through

song by a griot, a respected wandering musician

• Among many Australian Aborigines, the land itself is history. Geographical features reflect the creation stories of the ‘dreamtime’

TaK - History

What is history?

• Micro histories. Our own.

• “For the want of a nail…….”

TaK - History

How can the past be known?

Primary Sources(materials produced at the time of an event by people who were there)

• Fallible eye-witness

• Social bias

• Deliberate manipulation

Secondary sources (second-hand accounts)

TaK - History

Writing history

• History is the selection of a selection

• Advantages of hindsight

• Disadvantages of hindsight

TaK - History

Perspectives in history• Study the historian before you study his

facts

• Reading an 18th Century account of the 13th Century will possibly tell you as much about the 18th as it will about the 13th Century

• Propaganda and persuasion

TaK - History

Some Problems of Bias

• Topic choice bias

• Confirmation bias

• National bias

TaK - History

Theories of history

• The ‘Great Person’ theory

• Economic Determinism

• No meaning, only chance! “Had Cleopatra’s nose been shorter,

the whole history of the world would have been different”

Blaise Pascal

TaK - History

Why study history?

• History gives us a sense of identity

• History is a defence against propaganda

• History enriches our understanding of human nature

TaK - History

Some key points:

• History seeks to study and explain the significant events of the past on the basis of currently existing evidence

• The study of History can be justified on the grounds that it contributes to our sense of identity, is a defence against propaganda, and enriches our understanding of human nature

• History is based on primary sources, but since they are selective they cannot always be taken at face value

• In seeking to explain the past the historian has the benefit of hindsight which can sometimes result in hindsight bias

• We can perhaps get closer to the truth by exploring the past from a variety of perspectives

• Historical events rarely have a single cause but are usually the result of a combination of factors

1) “We see and understand things not as they are but as we are.” Discuss this claim in relation to at least two ways of knowing.

2) Are some ways of knowing more likely than others to lead to truth?

Essays

Knower(s)

Natural Sciences

Language

SensePerception

Emotion

Reason

Mathematics

Human Sciences

History

Arts

Ethics

Ways of Knowing

Areas of Knowledge

Theory of Knowledge Diagram

TaK - History

History

PerceptionHow reliable is

eye-witness testimony as a

primary source?

ReasonWhat fallacies

arise in studying history?

EthicsShould historians

make moral judgments about

the past?

ArtsHow is history

similar to fiction? How is it different?

LanguageCan historical

events be described in

neutral language?

Human Sciences

How does history differ from other social sciences?

MathsWhat role do

statistics play in history?

Natural Sciences

Can the scientific method be applied to

history?