[Political Interest]

History is very widely open to interpretation. Historians base their work on primary and secondary sources, on papers, interviews and documents. Most delve into archives and look for evidence. They piece together evidence and then create their historical narratives. When they put down to paper these narratives are written as books and then sold. We buy the books and read them then absorb the narratives. I have come to the realisation that every piece of historical information I have read has been the product of a historian's narrative.

My question is though, how do historians really know? If they read a letter or piece of correspondence they may interpret it in a certain way. However that interpretation may not really explain the context or help to create an accurate narrative. You could have ten historians who may all have failed to truly capture what happened in history. All our histories of a certain time period, a certain state or political system, could all be completely distorted.

Is true historic objectivity ever possible? Will we ever know anything for certain or is it all subject to narratives that simply give interpretations of our history?

Perhaps historiography is nothing more than a collection of narratives based on guess work and interpretation.

[Zamuel]

Is true historic objectivity ever possible? Will we ever know anything for certain or is it all subject to narratives that simply give interpretations of our history? Perhaps historiography is nothing more than a collection of narratives based on guess work and interpretation.

The further you look into the past, the more obscure it becomes. It's important for a devoted student to develop a strong appreciation for "Possibility and Probability." Examining personal agenda's is also required as a GREAT DEAL of accepted history reflects nothing more than moral rationalization to support popular concepts. Most important of all is perspective, History is only of value as it relates to the present.

Beware of absolutism, it's a façade and looking behind it may get you into trouble.

Zam

[Heinie]

It is said that history is written by the winners. We do not study history with a tabula raza but with some questions, attitudes, and our own experience of human nature. I think you are largely right in your speculation that we get "a collection of narratives based on guess work and interpretation." But some historians are better than others and some are complete phonies.

[ThirdTerm]

I have a little bit of experience in history writing and historians usually have read all relevant books published on a particular subject, and thus they can cherry-pick on historical incidents and anecdotes to present their own narratives to their readers. It does not matter if a particular narrative is historically accurate or not as long as the author can convey his world view coherently. But he has to worry about how his books or papers are reviewed by critics or professors and popular historians would make it appealing to the masses.

[Cartertonian]

History is very widely open to interpretation. Historians base their work on primary and secondary sources, on papers, interviews and documents. Most delve into archives and look for evidence. They piece together evidence and then create their historical narratives. When they put down to paper these narratives are written as books and then sold. We buy the books and read them then absorb the narratives. I have come to the realisation that every piece of historical information I have read has been the product of a historian's narrative.

My question is though, how do historians really know? If they read a letter or piece of correspondence they may interpret it in a certain way. However that interpretation may not really explain the context or help to create an accurate narrative. You could have ten historians who may all have failed to truly capture what happened in history. All our histories of a certain time period, a certain state or political system, could all be completely distorted.

Is true historic objectivity ever possible? Will we ever know anything for certain or is it all subject to narratives that simply give interpretations of our history?

Perhaps historiography is nothing more than a collection of narratives based on guess work and interpretation.

TIG's opinion on this will be interesting, given that he's an academic historian IRL.

Generally though, speaking as an academic non-historian ( ), I suspect your analysis of the situation is pretty close to the truth. There are undoubtedly such things as historical facts, but what was thought and felt about those facts at the time, immediately thereafter and then through history up until the present is likely to have changed dramatically, in the manner of the parlour game Chinese Whispers. How and why we are told what we are told is as important as the raw content. My PhD is using a methodology called narrative enquiry to collect oral histories of a key period in the life of my subjects. I fully expect and anticipate that the stories they tell me will be coloured by what it is that they want to convey, rather than being the dispassionate and objective reporting of facts - indeed my post-interview analysis will depend on that. So it is with history, in my view. We are told what those doing the telling want us to hear.

[Geschichtlichkeit]

Read some philosophy of history, it's very interesting.

[Dagoth Ur]

There is no such thing as objectivity PI. The sooner you accept this the better.

I don't mean to get all Post-Modern and "the truth is the one you make" but the "truth" isn't important. Truth is simply an underlying theme onto which we sew our views..

[Potemkin]

I fully expect and anticipate that the stories they tell me will be coloured by what it is that they want to convey, rather than being the dispassionate and objective reporting of facts - indeed my post-interview analysis will depend on that. So it is with history, in my view. We are told what those doing the telling want us to hear.

In fact, if their stories were indeed the dispassionate and objective reporting of facts, then they would be boring and pointless. Who cares what happened in the past, unless it affects the way that people think and feel in the here and now? And in order to have such an effect on people, then those events must mean something to them, which implies that they must have interpreted those facts and events. Facts only have meaning once they have been interpreted. Otherwise, it's just shit that happened. Who would care about it? History is the same; the historical 'facts' of the past only have meaning - in fact, they only exist at all - as part of a framework of interpretation, in other words as part of a narrative. A list of the dates of a few famous battles isn't history. But a narrative of, say, the Wars of the Roses which includes those battles and interprets them as part of the process by which the Middle Ages evolved into the early modern period in England would be history. The problem, of course, is that every such narrative, every such framework of interpretation, is subjective to some degree or another. But why is that necessarily a bad thing?

[redcarpet]

There are confirmed facts and opinions expressed by the figures involved in the events at the time. You clearly mark each as separate. And only accept an opinion or claim made by someone if it is compounded by others agreeing and/or physical proof. If something is just asserted it's just an opinion, whether accurate or inaccurate.

Obviously in historical assessment you have to be honest about what are confirmed facts and what are just opinions that are unproven and 'still a matter of speculation to this day'.

[Zamuel]

historical 'facts' of the past only have meaning - in fact, they only exist at all - as part of a framework of interpretation, in other words as part of a narrative. - every such framework of interpretation, is subjective to some degree or another. But why is that necessarily a bad thing?

Pote seems to think history is a sandbox for him to play in ... it's not. Interpretation is NOT necessary to find relevance ... it is necessary to CREATE it. As I mentioned previously, history should be viewed with an eye to the possible and the probabal. Speculation is a useful tool, but does NOT lead to reliable conclusions. Opinions and interpretations represented as FACTS are deliberate distortions and should be discarded as unlikely supposition. The facts may be boring, but "enhancing them" with personal fictions makes them also useless.

ie: Obama was a Muslim - Here's a false "interpretation" of the facts that skews the TRUTH into a twisted web of political lies that will mislead history students for centuries to come.

ie: America "LOST" the Vietnamese War - a popular "misinterpretation" that deceptively BEGINS with the mistaken premise that there ever WAS a Vietnamese "WAR" ... and makes the development of Presidential Executive Powers into an incompressible muddle that implicates the US congress in actions it never even considered.

ie: Richard Nixon was a crook - A common "emotional interpretation" that conceals the complex issues of presidential priveledge that have influenced every presidency since. AND obscures the important and relevant accomplishments of the Nixon administration that changed WORLD history.

Interpretation is at best a distraction and at worst a malicious manipulation.

Zam

[Heinie]

...
ie: America "LOST" the Vietnamese War - a popular "misinterpretation" that deceptively BEGINS with the mistaken premise that there ever WAS a Vietnamese "WAR" ...

I can assure you there was a Viet Nam War and the Americans lost it.

[Zamuel]

I can assure you there was a Viet Nam War and the Americans lost it.

Vietnam was never a war ... We shed some blood, but America lost nothing ... We gained a couple of generations advantage in weapons and tactical development and diverted communist attention from South America.

Zam

[Heinie]

Vietnam was never a war ... We shed some blood, but America lost nothing ...

58,220 U.S. military fatal casualties amount to "nothing"? You embarrass yourself, Zamuel.

[Zamuel]

Vietnam was never a war ... We shed some blood, but America lost nothing ...

58,220 U.S. military fatal casualties amount to "nothing"? You embarrass yourself, Zamuel.

You do not comprehend ... Casualties are the accepted cost of doing "military business" ... People are expendable assets. These are the guys who postulate a "Winnable Nuclear Exchange." Lose territory and you are a disgrace, Lose lives and you are a National Hero.

As far as HISTORY is concerned ? Vietnam was a "containment" and a successful one. It produced a significant advantage for the US in weapons and tactics for the price of some cheaply trained and equipped troops ... It produced some minor prestige for the communist block but delayed their expansion ... it probably saved Taiwan from invasion (now I'm interpreting / speculating) and our timely withdrawal opened the door to china by proving that we were NOT crazy nuclear whacko imperialists. (Mao was impressed.)

SEE what history reveals when you get past the emotional narratives ?

Zam

[noemon]

Vietnam was a "containment" and a successful one. It produced a significant advantage for the US in weapons and tactics for the price of some cheaply trained and equipped troops ... It produced some minor prestige for the communist block but delayed their expansion ... it probably saved Taiwan from invasion (now I'm interpreting / speculating) and our timely withdrawal opened the door to china by proving that we were NOT crazy nuclear whacko imperialists. (Mao was impressed.)

This PI is an example of narrativistic denial. Brought to you live for your instruction in spotting it while reading history.

[R_G]

Well yes, you can have an objective account of history, especially the last hundred years or so due to two factors:

1. Numbers
2. Video & Audio

In short, numbers of a variety such as recorded dates, money, etc and visual/audio material for confirmation of stated facts.

This can limit what we know but in the general sense it's fairly grounded.

With current technologies however, entire archives can be rewritten and video evidence doctored. That's when shit becomes really interesting indeed.

As far as anything pre-21st century? Entirely based on allowance. Unpopular books survived because there was some financial backing for re-prints, etc. Ancient materials have survived but not much remains in terms of serious transcripts.

[Wellsy]

Coincidentally I was wondering the same thing and came upon this: http://www.theoryofknowledge.net/areas-of-knowledge/history/can-we-say-anything-for-sure-in-history/

Which at the very least name dropped some figures to further examine their views.
It would seem that sometimes we learn new things simply because people take on a different perspective.
Recently I've been looking into indigenous history of Australia and it's noted that it has been largely neglected for many years.
I think an important framing when examining primary sources is asking what cultural norms may have been prevalent and whose voice one is is reading.
For example, it had long been reproduced that women in colonial Australia were all but whores based on the descriptions of upper-class men. What was neglected was that many women and men were monogamous but for different reasons didn't marry though they cohabitated, to the sentiments of upper class at the time, this was immoral and worthy of denigration. So it can be quite easy for history to interpret things in a way that from another perspective and with greater analysis, we can see how we might be misguided, accepting that the new perspective is closer to the truth.
What I think of context is merely adding of more information relevant to one's conclusion, it would seem that there is many perspectives to play with to try and find kernels of truth. At the same time, a feminist lens also presented problems in distorting the representation of women in colonial Australia to which a new perspective arose in the 80's where indigenous women criticized white female historians for presenting a simplistic morally safe sense of women in Australia, where they weren't also part of an invading people that had power and status over indigenous.

So perhaps a bit like the messiness of social sciences like psychology, there is a truth but each perspective has it's failings in its emphasis on certain things and thus neglects important parts, so by taking on many different perspectives one may take on a greater chance of seeing things closer to what is. Not that you will see what is, but I would assume more information with enough rigor should at least ideally bring one closer to reality than not.
Suppose it depends on how skeptical you want to get to what qualifies as evidence in support of something.

At the same time, perhaps we do just make up stories and thus history is just an interesting reflection of our modern sense, which in itself may not be without utility: https://newrepublic.com/article/126679/many-faces-john-berger

Berger wants us to understand why 50,000-year-old paintings are relevant right now. On one hand, this approach makes Berger’s essays feel very urgent. On the other, it shows us that art history, like all history, has to be continually rewritten. Only when the historian understands the needs of the present can he elucidate how these needs are answered by the art of the past.

...

“All history is contemporary history,” begins a famous paragraph from G, his 1972 novel that won the Man Booker that year. “For even when the events which the historian studies are events that happened in the distant past, the condition of their being historically known is that they should vibrate in the historian’s mind.”

[Potemkin]

So perhaps a bit like the messiness of social sciences like psychology, there is a truth but each perspective has it's failings in its emphasis on certain things and thus neglects important parts, so by taking on many different perspectives one may take on a greater chance of seeing things closer to what is. Not that you will see what is, but I would assume more information with enough rigor should at least ideally bring one closer to reality than not.

This approach is known as 'Perspectivism', Wellsy. And reality, in and of itself, is unknowable. All we have are our individual, subjective perspectives. And we cannot even 'triangulate' on the truth by comparing and contrasting our different perspectives. The truth, just like reality, itself, will always elude us. This should not be a cause for despair, however - it means that every perspective, partial and subjective though it is, is in a sense equally valid. My perspective is true for me, just as your perspective is true for you. In other words, disciplines such as psychology etc are not really sciences at all, but are in fact part of the humanities. Lacan, for example, started out trying to make psychoanalysis into a rigorous science, but by the late 1950s he had accepted that psychoanalysis was not a science and that the attempt to make it one was misguided and was causing harm to the development of psychoanalysis as an intellectual discipline.

[Wellsy]

This approach is known as 'Perspectivism', Wellsy. And reality, in and of itself, is unknowable.

Thank you, I'll have a look into it.

[Robohistorian]

That was so until now... I have changed that... I brought use of meta-data to history...

History is very widely open to interpretation. Historians base their work on primary and secondary sources, on papers, interviews and documents. Most delve into archives and look for evidence. They piece together evidence and then create their historical narratives. When they put down to paper these narratives are written as books and then sold. We buy the books and read them then absorb the narratives. I have come to the realisation that every piece of historical information I have read has been the product of a historian's narrative.

My question is though, how do historians really know? If they read a letter or piece of correspondence they may interpret it in a certain way. However that interpretation may not really explain the context or help to create an accurate narrative. You could have ten historians who may all have failed to truly capture what happened in history. All our histories of a certain time period, a certain state or political system, could all be completely distorted.

Is true historic objectivity ever possible? Will we ever know anything for certain or is it all subject to narratives that simply give interpretations of our history?

Perhaps historiography is nothing more than a collection of narratives based on guess work and interpretation.