-
Why Historians Disagree
1
Most students
are usually introduced to the study of history by
way of a fat
textbook and become
quickly immersed in a vast sea of names,
dates,events
and statistics. The
students' skills are then tested by examinations
that require
them to show how much of
the data they remember; the more they remember,
the higher their grades. From this
experience a number of conclusions seem
obvious: the study of history is the
study of
historian is simply
one who brings together a very large number of
Therefore students often become
confused upon discovering that historians
often disagree sharply even when they
are dealing withe the same event.
2
Their commonsense reaction
to this state of affairs is to conclude that one
historian is right while the other is
wrong. And presumably, historians who are
wrong will have their
Historians usually all argue reasonably
and persuasively. And, the
names,dates,
events, statistics--ussally turn out to be
correct. Moreover, they
often find that
contending historians more or less agree on the
facts; that is ,
they use much the same
data. They come to different conclusions because
they
view the past form a different
perspective. History, which seemed to be a
cut-and -dried matter of memorizing
one good interpretation form among
many. Historical truth becomes a matter of
personal preference.
大多数学生通常都是通过一本厚厚的教科书接触历史的，
然后他们很快便淹没在浩瀚如海的
名字、
日
期、事件和数据当中。
然后学生们的学习水平通过考试来检验，主要考察他们记住
了多少资料；记得越多，
成绩就越好。我们可以从中得出一些显而易见
的结论：历史学习就
是学习过去的
”
事
实
“
；你知道的历史
”
事实
“
越多，你的历史就学得越好。专业历史学家们就
是将大量
”
事实
“
搜集到一起的人。
因此，
当学生们
发现历史学家们甚至对同一个历史事件常
常有完全不同的意见时，他们常常感到困惑不解
。
面对这种情况，
学生们的通常反应
是，
断定其中一位历史学家是正确的，
而另一位是错误的。
而且，据此推测，错误的历史学家们所掌握的”史实“是错的。然而，实际情况很少是这样<
/p>
的。历史学家们的论证通常都有理有据，并具有说服力。而且，那些”事实“
---
名字、日
期、事件和数据
---
通常被证明是正确的。此外，学生们常常发现争论不休的历史学家或多
或少认同这些”史实“；也就是说，他们使用的资料几乎相同。他们得出不同的结论是因为
他们从不同的角度看待历史。原本历史似乎是一件记忆”
史实
“的事，现在却变成从许多解
释中挑选出一种合理的解释的事了。历史
真相变成了个人喜好问题。
3
This position is hardly
satisfying. They cannot help but feel that two
diametrically opposedpoints of view
about an event cannot both be right; yet
they lack the ability to decide between
them.
4
To
understand why historians disagree, students must
consider a problem
they have more or
less taken for granted. They must ask themselves
what
history really is .
5
In its broadest sense,
history denotes the whole of the human past. More
restricted is the notion that history
is the recorded past, that is , that part of
human life which has left some sort of
record such as folk tales, artifacts, or
written documents. Finally, history may
be defined as that which historians
write about the past. Of course the
three meanings are related. Historians must
base their accounts on the remains of
the past, left by people. Obviously they
cannot know everything for the simple
reason that not every event, every
happening, was fully and completely
recorded. Therefore the historian can only
approximate history at best. No one can
ever claim to have concluded the quest.
这种看法几乎难以令人满意。
学生们
不禁觉得，
关于同一个历史事件的两种截然相反的观点
不可能同
时正确；然而，他们缺乏判断孰是孰非的能力。
要理解历史学
家们为什么意见不统一，
学生们必须考虑一个他们或多或少已经认为理所当然
的问题。他们必须问问自己，历史到底是什么。
从最广义的角度看，
历史是指人类过去的全部。若加以限定，
历
史是有记录的过去，即人类
生活中留下某种记录的那部分，
如明
间故事、
手工制品或书面文件等。
最后，历史也可以被
定义为历史学家们对过去的描述。
当然，
这三种
定义是相互关联的。
历史学家们对历史的描
述必须以过去人们的
遗物为基础。显然，
他们不可能清楚过去的一切，
原因很简单，
并非过
去的每一大小事件都被全面完整地记录下来。
因此，
历史学家们至多只能是接近历史。
没有
哪位
历史学家敢断言自己已终止了对历史的探索。
6
But this does
not say enough. If historians cannot know
everything because
not everything was
recorded, neither do they use all the records that
are
available to them. Rather, they
select only those records they deem most
significant. Moreover, they also re-
create parts of the past. Like detectives, they
piece together evidence to fill in the
gaps in the available records.
7
Historians are able to
select and create evidence by using some theory of
human motivations and behavior
Sometimes this appears to be easy, requiring
very little sopistication and subtlety.
Thus, for example, historians investigating
America's evtry into World War I would
probably find that the sinking of
american merchant ships on the high
seas by German submarines was relevant
to their discussion. At the same time,
they would most likely not use evidence
that President Woodrow Wilson was
dissatisfied withe a new hat he bought
during the first months of 1917. The
choice as to which fact to use is based on
a theory--admittedly, in this case a
rather crude theory, but a theory
nonetheless. It would go something like
this: National leaders contemplating
war are more likely to be influenced by
belligerent acts against their countries
than by their unhappiness with their
haberdashers.
但这
种解释还是不够。如果说历史学家因为过去的一切并非都有记载而不能全面了解历史，
他
们也不会全部采用获得的所有历史记录。
相反，
他们只挑选那些
他们认为最重要的记录来
用。此外，
他们还对部分历史进行重新
创造。
就像侦探一样，
他们要拼凑已有证据来填补现
有记录中的空白。
根据某些有关人类动机和行为
的理论，
历史学家能够挑选和创造证据。
有时，
这看起来很容
易，
不需要复杂的经验和敏锐的观察力。
比如说，
那些研究美国参加第一次世界大战原因的
历史学家很有可能会认为，
德国潜水艇击沉在公海航行的美国商船这件事与他
们的讨论有关。
与此同时，他们绝不会使用伍德罗
.
威尔逊总统对他在
1917
年头几个月买的一顶新
帽子不
满意这样的证据。选择使用哪些事实是基于一种理论
--
-
不可否认，在这种情况下，这是一
个相当粗糙的理论，
但不管怎么说，
它是一种理论。这个理论大致是这样的：对于考虑战争
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
上一篇：高考英语 完形填空基础练习(3)
下一篇：高一英语词汇知识拓展精华篇1-6