The idea of the question is that man, in all his circumstances, must live in a state of detachment when he talks with the historical event
Ahmed Shaker Alalaq ,
hi Ahmed. This might be the ideal, but in practice historians can be highly emotional and biased. One has only to watch BBC history programmes to understand this, let alone read academic treatises. It is virtually impossible for humans to be completely neutral and therefore detached from one's own social and cultural background. We bring our own values to every situation. Some people are more subjective than others and some are more right wing and authoritarian than others. For example, I find it difficult to watch any programme presented by David Sharkey, as he in my opinion, is to the right of Atilla the Hun.
Very accurate words, but I wonder why we don't try to analyze a historical passage or any historical event and be neutral and see what is the result of our analysis of this event... Just an experiment
Ahmed Shaker Alalaq Well, Ahmed, this is an interesting suggestion. It could form a doctoral project for an interested student. A textual analysis of some historical event, and compare results with other historians' views.
However, often text books do offer differing interpretations of the same event or information. For example, recently i was reading about Eleanor of Aquitaine, and the book did present other versions and interpretations of the same events in her life, and in what she was like as a person. It was up to the reader to choose what to believe. obviously, the further we go back in time, the less information is available, and so historians often conjecture to fill the gaps. Such conjecture is often based on examination of other information available about customs or practices or beliefs of the era.
Valerie Saunders I wish we would conduct an experiment on two models of studies for the same historical event, the first away from intellectual or ideological fanaticism, and the second within the ethnic or intellectual psyche... A very wonderful idea, my honorable teacher.
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