Posted by young goodman brown on 02/06/09
Last updated 02/08/09

Today, popular historians on both the political Left and Right write partisan books which present their demented and delusional views of history.  The Left feels the need to write histories which are inclusive to historically marginalized groups and to present the American past as racist, sexist, and imperialistic to advocate the need for their so-called "progressive" social reforms.  The Right, on the other hand, continues to make apologies for what it views as American heroes, whose good qualities should be emphasized to teach children values and morals.

The most recent example of partisan history comes from Fox News conservative Larry Schweikart, who wrote A Patriot's History of the United States (2004) to combat Howard Zinn's A People's History of the United States.  Partisans like Schweikart write history only for the constituents of their respective ideological positions and not because it contributes in any way to historical scholarship.  Although they claim that their histories are the true and only version of the past their interpretations mainly consist of badgering the other side while praising their own. 

The sad fact of the matter is that most of the people who read these books are completely convinced about the assertions the authors make.  They care not for rigerous scholarship and archival research which at one time was a standard in the historical profession and they are not interested in critically analyzing the author's arguments; rather they accept the author's opinions verbatim because the books gives them an ideological and emotional high.  At one time popular histories and textbooks were forced to back up their interpretations with documentation and footnotes from the original manuscripts (most textbooks even came equipped with a book of primary source material).  One thinks of Charles and Mary Beard's The Rise of American Civilization (1927), which was a sweeping portrait of American history that incorporated new scholarship in economics and sociology.  The book is still very readable today, even for the general public (this was their hope), and even though some of its conclusions are slanted they are made based on data and research and not emotional appeals.

Public debate over history is virtually non-existent in contemporary America.  Arguments against a particular interpretation usually devolve into ideological "name calling" instead of engaging that author in an intellectual debate or providing counter-evidence.  As the late social critic Christopher Lasch observed in his last book, The Revolt of the Elites:

Both left- and right-wing ideologies, in any case, are now so rigid that new ideas make little impression on their adherents.  The faithful, having sealed themselves off from arguments and events that might call their own convictions into question, no longer attempt to engage their adversaries in debate.  Their readings consist for the most part of works written from a point of view identical to their own.  Instead of engaging unfamiliar arguments, they are content to classify them as either orthodox or heretical (80-81).

Historical scholarship used to be an intellectual discipline where ideas could be discussed and debated within the public sphere.  What Carl Becker meant when he delcared "Everyman His Own Historian" in 1931 was for the average citizen to reflect on historical issues and problems by viewing the past through their own personal lense.  Too often today citizens take their personal opinions for granted and adhere to the usual partisan banter.  They feel they must choose a side on each political issue and yet they never hear or understand the arguments presented by the two sides.  This has occured, not because of the lack of intelligence among American citizens, but because of the lack of intellectual and political discourse.  This serves the puppet masters on the Right and the Left, but it hurts the decision-making ability of the citizen.

The prospects for a renewed interest in public debate about historical and intellectual issues is dim.  Partisans have control over major media outlets which encourages their readers and viewers to buy their partisan history.  Dissenting opinions are often marginalized and, for the most party, ignored.

Posted 02/08/09 nobody Ephrata, PA

Good Post,I'm listening, though silent.

Posted 02/14/09 jdutilljr Lancaster, PA

I have said this many times before. This society is just a dumb, illogical society. Which is exactly why I express maximum, constant action (conversations, etc.) from this campaign. Most people I talk to (around Lancaster), will give shared or borrowed viewpoints with out any factual information to back themselves up... "Convinced that the people are the only safe depositories of their own liberty, and that they are not safe unless enlightened to a certain degree, I have looked on our present state of liberty as a short-lived possession unless the mass of the people could be informed to a certain degree." --Thomas Jefferson to Littleton Waller Tazewell, 1805. Sadly in this country... the phrase "ignorance is bliss" is popular.