| Memo - Reading
for Sept. 14 For one week, we are going to diverge from our focus on popular culture to consider some very general (but very important) questions: what is history, and how do you study it? The book you will read, E. H. Carr's What Is History?, comes from a series of lectures that Carr, an eminent British historian, gave at Cambridge University in 1961. In very plain language, Carr explores some basic philosophical questions about what history is, what it isn't, and on what basis can historians claim to analyze it. These are issues you will want to bear in mind as you undertake your own original research projects. The other reading is an online essay about how to evaluate a website critically. It is intended to help you be discriminating in the websites you use for your research and how you use them. A few questions to consider as you are reading: In what is "the common sense view of
history" (Carr, p. 6) and why is it a problem?
Why, in Carr's view, can't historians write "just the facts"? What is a historical fact? What isn't? What is causation? Why is difficult to analyze? Why does Carr refer to the "cult" of progress? What does he mean by this? Does he believe in progress? Why or why not? What similarities do you see between What Is History? and the essay on evaluating website? Do you think Carr would agree with it? Why? |
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