History is Interpretation - "Objectivity" in History
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- Опубликовано: 12 сен 2024
- The ever-changing nature of history is an often misunderstood concept. This, and the question of "objectivity" in history are fundamental theoretical concepts any historian must have an understanding of.
I'll give a brief introduction to these concepts, and quote from respected historians, whom you can read more from in order to understand these concepts at a higher level.
Some of the books I reference are frequently used in graduate and undergraduate studies of history.
If you do, my recommendation is John Lewis Gaddis' Landscape of History.
Sources:
Adam Tooze, Wages of Destruction.
Roderick Stackelberg, Hitler's Germany.
John Lewis Gaddis, Landscape of History.
Edward Callett Carr, What is History?
Peter Novick, The Noble Dream: The "Objectivity Question"
Cronon, A Place For Stories: Nature, History and Narrative., in the Journal of American History, March 1992.
#history
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If you enjoy the video, please leave a like, I'm told it helps. If you have questions or suggestions please leave a comment, I do my best to read them all!
really good deconstruction of why we have meetings in among us after a murder
It is quite easy if a player is red he's the impostor. If red is dead then it was suicide, if there isn't anyone who's red blame the colour most similar.
as someone that studies sociology and has learned about social constructivism I was mostly going "yeah, duh" during this video 🤣, most sociologist would probably go even further in saying that the idea of a "narrative structured past" is not just unobservable to us but also in the attempt of trying to retrospectively construct this idea of "history" we are already socially constructing something that really has never really happened in the exact way we thing about it
You'd think this should be obvious, but judging by the comments I usually get, it really isn't lol
You’re an example of how useless a degree is in the head of an ego driven desperate to prove their knowledge type person. Sociology is a pathetic and useless degre, often catering to people who aren’t intelligent or patient enough to read through history book by book.
@@FreddaYTIt’s not obvious. It’s absurd. So you will get called out on it and for this ridiculous perspective on historical study. Real Historians would never listen to what a useless sociologist has to say regarding history either.
And as somebody who currently studies history in university would tell you and every colleague of yours that you are wrong. There is objectivity in history, which we can see from the sources we use, to the evidence we have to using simple critical thinking and logic.
Like one of the source that are undisputable for proving a theory are the material ones.
Let me give you an example, lets say we think that a certain battle took place in a certain place however we cant be sure about that. As we only have writing and a description of the events that happend. Then we decide to dirty our hands at the supposed place the battle took place and boom what do you know it, we find weapons,armours, remains and so on.
There are many events in history for which we are not certain, many question marks unanswered but that does not mean that we should not make assumption that are based in reality with the current amount of evidence we have aka being objective.
I like how you completely missed the point of the video and of my comment but go off dude@@Silver_Prussian
It's so great that your channel has gravitated towards high level analysis and interpretation right as I am starting grad school for history. Keep it up!
* And that I found the channel now!
If this is the channel you go to as a student of history, you’re a misguided fool.
"just another opportunistic imperialist."
I think what people miss is that leaders are not beings of pure logic. It's never "pure opportunist" or "pure abstract ideology."
Ideology always has to develop from a subjective perspective of the world, either an individual perspective of a single brilliant or insane mind operating in a social vacuum, or much more commonly, a socially constructed perspective as a memeplex passes through many minds and specializes for a niche via process of directed mutation and unnatural selection, accumulating changes which optimize it for a particular niche.
One important aspect of human minds is that their existence and function is dependent on an external world with external constraints. Because which ideas are spread and survive in a given subpopulation is at partially dependent on which ideas fulfill a need, such as efficiently obtaining physical needs, emotional security about one's role in the world, belief in group belonging, belief that one's actions have meaningful effects, etc, memetic spread is greatly influenced by social and material conditions of the people it is spreading through, yet simultaneously can alter those conditions. Niche creation is just as much viable in memetic evolution as biological evolution.
People with considerably different social or material conditions will to at least some extent be susceptible to a different socially constructed, Lamarckianly evolved memeplex tailored to succeed in that social environment. This is what ideology is. It is not conspiratorially created window dressing designed only for useful idiots to follow as their ultra-rational chess engine leadership pursue the national interest. The leadership may not agree with the ideology of all of their supporters, but they do have an ideology. They cannot really avoid it because their own subjectivity and exposure to information alters their perspective of what is rational or irrational, good and evil, and successful or unsuccessful.
I stumbled across your channel recently and I LOVE the videos you’ve been doing. keep it up!!
Thank you!
That can’t possibly be true
I think the only one that would be able to give an objective view on human history would be an outside observer that could somehow able to see the entire human history as a movie in real time as its is happening.
You should make a vid on fascist fashion, another RUclipsr by the name of yugopnik made one and I’d like to see a vid of uniforms of other fascist regimes ❤️
Everyone is wrong, but some people are more wrong than others ;p
Wonder if Orwell would have liked that joke
Nope there are only right and wrong verdicts about historical events.
It would be interesting to see a comparison of media studies and histography.
Personally, I think that objective reality and thus historical reality exist(ed) on a ontological level, however the issue is epistemological and how we can get there and what we value with regards to history. I am against a lot of the more narrative hyper subjective types of history that give strong moral value judgments (I have even argued against it in a old video of mine with the title Meta history: 7 reasons why we should NOT moralize history!) where I argue against moralization as it adds an element of obscurity to the epistemological process. In other words don't judge history, but learn from it.
Denying objective reality is non sense.
@@samueltv9428Did… did you read the comment? He believes objective reality exists.
"there are historians out there, who are more wrong than others"
ah, the foreshadowing
make a video about the "Vietnam war" but from indigenous peoples (Cham, Hmong, Montagnard, Khmer) perspectives (who fought the war not for anticommunism neither communism but for social justice and against Vietnamese racist colonialism
FULRO fell off
nah, he can't do it. Fredda has an weird political contradiction like debunk right-wing youtubers (whatifalthist, tikhistory, kraut) and then 'does academy has an leftist bias?' like wtf?
Why not do it yourself? You seem to have information!
You inspire me to study history in the future, and I thank you for that
it was one of the most fascinating adjustments for me when it came to history, cause originally learning the subject in primary school I was taught history happened THIS WAY, on THESE DATES, and so on and so forth, and despite my initial distaste for that kind of history, I learned more, and wound up getting a BA degree in it, and like one of the things that were taught DAY ONE, is that there is a reason why HISTORY is considered part of the Humanities, because while there is a much more rigorous and scientific approach in regards to the veracity of evidence and proof, ultimately it is about presenting your subjective (despite efforts to rid yourself of your subjectivity to the best effort) interpretation of the historical events, as supported with your evidence.
to quote myself (a thing my professor said not to do, before quoting his own book-) on my introduction to the Viking Age viewed through Queer Theory:
"In fact, it is contrary to this, that in spite of the almost complete lack of primary sources, that historians are thus utterly fascinated with the period, as it allows for interpretation, an element of the humanities which historians so rarely get to participate in, but is otherwise overly prepared for." (followed by several pages of rigorous historicity and analytical work of the scant few primary and secondary sources anyways)
Lol some people really upset about you making history videos, even though this is not even controversial information.
I probably would’ve subscribed to em if he didn’t do gamin, bein an oldy I don’t follow games but I loves me some history; especially the Marxist perspective lol.
Well tends to happen when you call all historians ans history sources as mere interpretation on events open to speculation.
Sorry but no history is objective there are things in history we do know happend for sure and things that we can only speculate on. History isnt what we want it to be or whatever we have constructed as ,, bias narratives" as he would put it, its past events that either happend or did not happen.
Good video Freda, as an average history enjoyer myself, I too am fed up with all those people that think "the source is objective" is somehow true..
It is true mainly because actual historians dont really on once source they really on multipule ones, historians can also recognise if a source is bias or not. And since we are able to use other scientific fields such as chemistry and genetic studies we can even more accurately determine what is true and what isnt. History is objective regardless of your views, biases, perspectives there is only one truth in history, events either occured or they didnt.
@@Silver_Prussian"historians can recognize if a source is biased or not" so they can recognize if the source is objective or not?
why are you replying under multiple comments saying the same sloppy arguments
@@gunpowderwithnosulfur9042 why have you not provided a solid counter argument if they are so sloppy ? Seems to me like you are just unhappy that I am saying the truth and you got nothing to say. Sorry that history isnt the subjective landfill full of insane viewpoints that you want it to be.
I've come about this exact topic in the Enco Traverso book L'histoire comme champ de bataille : Interpréter les violences du XXe siècle, La Découverte, Paris, 2011. In my language ofc.
I took it up because on the cover it seemed like a book about history, yet it was a book about historiography, especially in the 20th century,from a marxist perspective. I loved it, it opened my eyes to this fascinating topic.
These are fun to watch.
Apropos of nothing, I really want to get back to Norway, I haven't been back in 35 years (both parents born in Oslo, me MN) and from what I can see, it's just gotten better since the mid eighties.
Great content and great quotes -- thanks from a retired History teacher. But consider the presentation -- you speak very fast -- maybe even get an expert voice-over person to deliver yout script.
Good shit, dude. Go off king
tooze bros we're so up
HOW DARE YOU HECKIN CONFLICT ME I HAVE A HECKIN COOOOOLEGEEE DEGREE YOU HECKIN CHUD AND MY COOOOLEGE SAID SO.
How old are you?
wat
Great video, its always paramount to keep in mind the lens through which we, and others, view history. I don't believe we can truly have an objective view of History, but we should always strive towards the truth as best we can.
Dude, you basically copied some of the exact same arguments, made by Josh Sullivan History in his vid calling you out
For your nonsense, and not to long after he made his video too hmmm. I get it you want your own take at history vids but then how about you practice what you preach, and maybe stick with HoI4
It's not copying, it's proving a point : what he says in this vid explains what you guys completely misunderstood in the video about al-history. That's the reason for the timing.
And come one, if two separate persons describe a scientific method, using different words and exemples are they copying each other or just studying the same subject ? Don't be ridiculous.
(edit) To be more precise, one of the point JS History completely misunderstood is the whole "History is partial" bit at the begining of Fredda's video about the dangers of Alt-Hist, where JS (and most of his channel followers) saw Fredda as just basically saying "nothing is real there are no facts" when actually Fredda was just glossing over the concept of scientific consensus in history without spending a long time on it because it's such a basic "History 101" in higher studies that anybody might forget it's not often explained to the wider public.
JS History spends A LOT of time in his video calling Fredda out on a concept Freddda perfectly understands, a concept that his one of the cornerstones of his reasoning about Alt-Hist, and to right this wrong he there explains it in a more academic manner.
imagine making a response video full of strawmans and misunderstandings on the very most basic foundational practices and calling the person who has made a proper critique "copying"
All Fredda is doing here is saying a bunch of words when he has nothing to say
@@AW27007 saying nothing is when you provide a well-thought out and rigorous critique on historiography
I'm reiterating the points I made in my previous video, but in a video that's exclusively about this idea. This is essentially a 101 concept for history that's taught to all students at an undergrad and then re-taught at a graduate level because it's so important.
Josh completely misunderstood my point and used it as a launching off point to make assertions of the nature of history as a field that may have been acceptable in the 1800s, but since the 1950s or 1960s have been thoroughly rejected.
To say that he has a rudimentary undestanding of history would be generous.
Excellent video once again Fredda
Thank you!
Spo-Can, not Spo-Cane.
The idea any subject is objective is fairly naïve.
Even subjects like mathematics and chemistry are fairly subjective.
Since all the ideas in those subjects are created with the human lens.
And humans are well flawed. Look at what people thought about these subjects in the past.
And then think of what people might think of us in the future.
I objectively disagree.
Uh, no? A scientific theory is an understanding of concepts proven through experimental evidence. These aren't "created", they're hypothesized and then tested for their validity.
Well no, not maths. Maths is the study of logical relations and is objective. The use of maths in scientific disciplines is subjective, as it ascribes relations to subjectively percieved phenomena. The relations and their implications are objective, but determining reality having them is not.
What we know about history is subjective but history is and will always be objective.
The past is objective, history is what we "know" about the past and is subjective.
As Joe Sendell said, history is what we know about the past. Because of this, history has elements of objectivity and subjectivity. And because it has elements of subjectivity, it cannot be objective. It can strive towards truth, but that's always going to be an ideal.
But what about casses like the American civil war where there so much evidence that one version is correct that telling any other version would be nonsense.
@@samueltv9428 A lack of objectivity doesn't mean one account of the past can't be more wrong than another.
The "correct" version of history can most easily be evaluated by the layperson by which version is accepted by a majority of historians.
To delve deeper you have to look at how a historian treats their sources for example, and that's a pretty complicated task that requires a proper understanding of the field that for the most part only historians who work in the field will have.
I see nice talk.
Tsk tsk tsk
Premier was 1 minute later than promised. Unbelievable.
Stay in your field Fredda, playing hoi4 don't make you a historian
Btw, thoughts on Christianity?
Yes, I cant believe he used hoi4 as his source....
Have you considered that maybe he plays hoi4 because he has a passion for history, and not vice versa?
What he explained in this video is the very basic of historical methodology and historiography you learn in first or second year of History in university.
Studying history does'nt necessarily makes one a historian, but being a historian certainly needs understanding what the scientific consensus means in History.
He basically just copied some of the points made by Josh Sullivan History in his vid call out Fredda for his bs
well, playing hoi doesn't, but studying history at uni kinda does...
Would love to see that future video ya mentioned at the end.
History is not the search for truth, but the search for a good story. What really happened was irrational, chaotic, confusing, and alternated between boring and terrifying. None of which forms any sort of narrative that anyone could really follow. The events come first; the plot is made up later. Humans really don't have any reasons for the things they do.
,,History is not searhc for the truth"
Yeah thats how I distinguish people who do know what history is and what history isnt.
History is infact about striving the learn the truth about past events.
@@Silver_Prussian Yeah, and that's how I distinguish people who do not know the history of History.
@@kimwelch4652 the history of history sure bud, I mean I am studying history at university but what do I know.
@@Silver_Prussian History as a study discipline has changed over time. How historians view historical events has changed. How historians distinguish what is fact has changed -- not necessarily for the better, but not necessarily for the worse. It is just different. Even people on the ground during an event never agree on the "Truth" of what happened and why. How can someone decades, centuries or millennia removed from the event even hope to find Truth? What one finds is a different viewpoint. Maybe one which illuminates some ignored feature of human behavior over time. Calling that truth is just shutting one's eyes to other points of view.
@@kimwelch4652 it has changed in the way that it has become even more objective dew to innovation in science and constant finding of new evidence.
Again your perspective does not come into play, atleast for a real historian, we simply collect the evidence and sources and with them and additional evidence found through archeology come to a logical verdict of what happend and what didnt happen. Anybody is free to disagree if they want bur they would be disagreeing with truth itself and would be directly denying events that did indeed took place aka they would live in denial.
How can I find the truth ? Simple by collecting every piece of information available if not enough search for more, then with all that information come to the most logical plausible conclusion.
History is about retailing past events just as they were not as we like to interpret them.
And what makes you think those points of view have any merit at all. I have all the evidence with me, all the other historians agree with me, scientists agree with me, unless you are able to prove them and me wrong with plausible and genuine information combined with simple line of thinking to connect the dots to see the bigger picture, those points of view are absolutely useless, incorrect and pure fiction.
Like the delusional fascistic people who deny that the russian people are part of the slavic ethnos. They are proven wrong by genetic studies by multipule historical sources, so what ? We need to accept their opinion as the truth as well ? Being objective is not about that. Whenever we have a case where we are unsure due to lack of evidence then can be we say ,,both parties have a point"
Off-topic question. What period of history do you like most?
1800s-1970s ish, with a particular fondness for the late 1800s and early 1900s because I like labour history.
@@FreddaYT Hell yeah man, love that period, honestly the one I know most about, although I want to add that post 1990 history is really interesting as well.
@@FreddaYT banger
I think TIK's video on History theory is really good, unironically. I don't like his channel so much but that video was a gem of his, it's sad some people just completely discarted him because of his political views when many of his videos are some of the very best in history RUclips.
His video on the great purge, Germany's oil problem, the German economy, etc are great.
Anyway this video is really good, congrats.
TIK has a lot of great history content, but also a lot that's heavily coloured by ideology, like his "Hitler was socialist" videos, which have been much derided for good reason.
From the videos I've watched before his coming out. It seemed that he mostly just read the sources, with some nice graphics as presentation
It was really sad when he showed his true colors.
@@charkini7243 I mean yeah. That's still some of the very best on history RUclips lol. How many people here actually link their sources? Or have actually read more than two articles on the subject?
Yeah
@@FreddaYT The Hitler socialism one is a something I don't know much about. Why? There is no way I'm watching 5 hours of a guy trying to convince me National Socialism was Socialism.
He just seems to be an ideolog either way. I'll check on him every once in a while because I enjoy the way in wich he presents things.
Speaking of ideologs, could you make a history video on tankies? Those guys are so dishonest it's actually baffling. Did you know that in reddit they made an attempt at debunking the Holodomor to be a result of Soviet policy... Just to link two authors who thought it was.
I'm Vietnamese, i'd watch your video seeing you're debunked of many historian RUclipsrs like WIAH, TIK, Kraut as if they're "vibes" on false, outdated or pop history sources, which is biased and bigot.
But that make me confused, history is subjective by anyone who've wrote it. I'm not historian nor as a academy student, but I have a right to be proud on my country as a patriotic.
If I have cite sources than I'm bias, If I said from personal experience as many Vietnamese people who had seen the same problem as me then I'm doing propaganda.
Whatever, all source that you considered to be outdated or pop history were actually the most popular sources like Gun, Germs and Steel by Jared Diamond, Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari, it's really weird if Spengler is wrong then there isn't cycle of civilization nor anything like young and old civilization and China is the long-lasting civilization ever as if there are no decline of it, if you're believe that new source is always true either you have Appeal To Novelty Fallacy or you don't know anything about Vietnamese history.
I don't know about your political agenda like you debunked most of rightist RUclipsrs but then you said "Does academy have a leftist bias?" it feels contradicted, personality I can't except the Rightist view of white supremacist and Leftist view of black vikings.
I don't even want to care about what's left and right in politics, i'd prefer a country know their geopolitics and practically, not ideologically.
So sorry, you can't just convince me not to proud for my country just because you're from academy from Norway and I don't vibes as they're.
Question: Does bias is alway bad? And how to sourced or proof that I'm right?
:D
Algorithm comment
There is such a thing as objectivity. Would people ever stop putting it in scare quotes?
Dunno
Fredda is so smart!😗😗😗😗😗😗😗
No you are 😗😗😗😗😗
Smart at being dumb😂💀🥖
Well I sure do love a 10 minute justification to historical revisionism.
You do realize that the history you've been taught is mostly politics right? It's been revised so many times we practically have to have an archeology of historical narratives.
@richardbrooks5899
All I'm hearing is "My politics before factual reality!" And if that's your argument, then it's no wonder Academia is rotting. I have a lot of work to do as a teacher.
@@killfang9659if thats all you're hearing then you were just looking for a reason to complain-the video quite literally said that we should strive for objectivity when we can but still acknowledge that this may not always be possible; I would say that it's far more revisionist to ignore the possibility of new info coming out and needing to be addressed in the historical canon, or to ignore the many many perspectives present in historical sources
all that is to say that you should find a new career before you do irreversible damage to the educational foundations of your students
Denmark did not invent social democracy… if you want to go down that route, speak of Sweden. This is common historical knowledge by now.
This video is just a man coping why his historical revisionism and bias misrepresentation is okay.
"historical revisionism"
You're coping that the continually evolving sources for history disagree with your conception of history formed by engaging exclusively with Paradox Interactive games.
. “Waaah my college prefwessor swaid so”. LOOK. LOOK AT MY HECKIN DEGREE. IT SAYS IM HECKIN FRECKIN HONKIN RIGHT AND YOURE A DUMDUM”