Objectivity in History and its Critique

Objectivity can be considered the founding principle of historical writing. It denotes the representation of the past without bias and prejudices. Peter Novick, in his book That Noble Dream: The “Objectivity Question” and the American Historical Profession, pointed out that ‘The objective historian’s role is that of a neutral, or disinterested, judge; it must never degenerate into that of an advocate or, even worse, propagandist. The historian’s conclusions are expected to display the standard judicial qualities of balance’. The objectivist tradition believed in both the reality of the past as well as in the possibility of its mirror representation. Objectivity is a balanced assessment of the evidence. This is professional work in collecting, identifying, weighing the evidence, and analyzing evidence.

Auguste Comte and the Scientific Method

Auguste Comte was a French positivist philosopher, who introduced the idea of positivism. He introduced scientific observations into the study of history and thereby popularised the concept of objectivity. He also claimed scientific status for the humanities. Comte arranged the sciences in order of their importance as Mathematics, Astronomy, Physics, Chemistry, Biology, and Sociology. In the 19^th century, a group of historians called the Positivists emerged. They believed in the positivist philosophy of Auguste Comte and argued that the duty of a historian is (a) Ascertaining facts and (b) Framing laws.

Contributions of Ranke

It was Ranke who laid the foundation of a genuinely ‘objective’ historiography. He clearly distinguished history from literature and philosophy. By doing so, he attempted to avoid overdose application of imagination and metaphysical speculation. For him, the historians’ job was to investigate the past on its own terms and to show the readers how it essentially was. It did not mean, however, that Ranke had blind faith in the records. He argued for the strict analysis of the sources to determine its authenticity. He wanted the historians to critically examine and verify all the sources before reposing their trust in them. But, once it was proved that the records were genuine and belonged to the age which the historian was studying, the historian may put complete faith in them. He called these records ‘primary sources’. He considered that these sources would provide the foundations for a true representation of the contemporary period. Thus the historians should trust the archival records more than the printed ones which might be biased. He, however, believed that it was possible to reconstruct the past and that objectivity was attainable.

Critique of Objectivity

W. H. Walsh points out that “Every history is written from a certain point of view and makes sense only from that point of view”. Thus history represents the subjective account of the past. While interpreting the sources, a historian may be guided by the following subjective conditions, which may reflect in his interpretation:

• Historian has no direct contact with the past. It is, therefore, difficult for them to be objective in the representation of the past.
• ‘All the facts of the past are constructed facts’, hence the facts itself are a subjective representation of the past.
• The lack of evidence sometimes necessitates the use of imagination to fill the gap between the facts.
• The very selection of the topic may be determined by the social position of a historian hence the research starts from a biased position.
• Nationality is a crucial element that influences a historian while writing about his nation and others.
• The personal likes and dislikes of the historian will reflect in his interpretations. His perspectives, emotions, ideologies, and existing social positions, all will influence his thoughts.
• Historians generally use theories to interpret their sources, which naturally place his work as one partial way of thinking, because there are several conflicting theories.
• Historians approach the past with their own philosophical ideas, like ethical, religious, metaphysical, rational, etc., which decisively affect their way of interpretation.

Is Total Objectivity Possible?

Historians have generally accepted that the historical research procedure is objective. Therefore, it is necessary to strike a balance between objectivity and subjectivity. Historians should try to overcome extreme subjectivity biases, prejudice, mental climate, and political and ideological connections.

At the same time, it has been argued that written history can never be objective, even if the personal bias of the historian can be overcome (which is doubtful). It is still inevitable that what is written must be relative to the tastes, customs, and prejudices of the creative moment. No two historians can agree on what really happened in one particular historical moment.

Some argue that impartial history is ideal and is a downright impossibility. No historian can narrate everything that happened in the past even within the field he chooses to study. Max Nordau in his book, the Interpretation of History argues that ‘objective truth is inaccessible to writers of history’. Therefore objectivity - subjectivity is an unresolved issue. To conclude, as Eileen Power points out that “Objectivity is an illusion… but it is a necessary and beneficial illusion.”

Citations: Footnotes/End Notes and Popular Abbreviations

Citation simply means to cite or mention a source. It is a method of documenting a source and it is an integral part of research practice and ethics. A researcher should authenticate his arguments by supporting reliable sources. This is the chief difference between a work of history and a work of fiction. The method of using footnote gives the researcher an opportunity to display his sources and supporting documents. It also helps the researcher to avoid plagiarism and uphold research ethics. 

The important objectives of citations are:

• to substantiate a statement made in the work
• to record or acknowledge the indebtedness to a source used
• to provide less important discussion or information without affecting the textual body
• to give cross-references to the matter appearing elsewhere in the work itself

A historian should acknowledge not only the sources of his facts but also the sources of any new idea or opinion or conclusion borrowed from others. In the text, he should clearly distinguish between his own ideas or conclusions and those of others borrowed by him. Ideas and opinions are like the property of somebody, and whenever they were borrowed, the ethics of historical scholarship demands that such borrowings be acknowledged.

The narration in the textual body must not be interfered with by less important or irrelevant matters. These matters can be given in the footnotes. Sometimes the personal details of the historical person dealt with within the text are provided in the footnotes. But care must be taken to avoid very lengthy footnotes.

There are three popular methods for giving citations in the text - Footnote, End Note and in-text Citation. The difference between these types lies in the position in the text.

Footnotes

It is placed at the bottom of the page. If the footnotes are given at the bottom of each page, then it is easy to look for references. It provides the immediate cross-verification of an argument.

End Note

It is placed at the end of the chapters or at the end of the whole work chapter-wise.  If it is given at the end of the chapter or the end of the book, the reader needs to look for a reference at the end and come back to the test. Then reading will be interrupted.

In-text Citation

In this method, the sources were cited in the text itself. Here, the name of the author, year of the publication and page number were given within parenthesis at the end of the sentence. The reader has to look for the other details of the source in the bibliography.

Methods of Giving Footnote/End Note Numbers

The footnote/endnote numbers in the text should be given in superscripts or raised numerals. There are three methods of giving these reference numbers.

• give fresh numbers for each page and give the footnotes at the bottom of the page
• give consecutive numbers for each chapter and give the footnotes either at the bottom of each page or at the end of each chapter as an endnote in a continuous order
• give consecutive numbers for each chapter and give the footnotes at the end of the whole book in chapter wise

Content of a Footnote/End Note

Generally, the first reference to a source should contain all relevant details of that source. Thus the first footnote/endnote for a book may contain the following details:

1. The name of the author/editor as entered in the cover page of the book
2. Title of the work in italics
3. The name of the publisher
4. The place of publication
5. The page number is preceded by the letter “p.” (for one-page number) and “pp.” (for more than one page) in the lower case
6. Number of the page or pages

Popular Abbreviations

Only the first reference to a source is to be given in its complete form. The subsequent reference to the same source should be given in an abbreviated form. The commonly used abbreviations are given below:

Ibid – Abbreviation for the Latin ibidem meaning ‘in the same place’. It is used for a footnote if it comes immediately after the earlier footnote to the same source. If the page number is different, then it is also given.

op.cit. – Abbreviation for the Latin term opera citato meaning ‘the work cited’. It is used for a footnote cited previously (not just above) but with a different page number.

loc cit. – Abbreviation of the Latin term loco citato meaning ‘in the place cited’. It is used for a footnote cited previously (not just above) with the same page number.

Popular Style Manuals for giving citations

MLA - Modern Language Association

APA – American Psychological Association

Chicago Manual

Data Analysis

Research data can be seen as the fruit of researchers’ labor. If a study has been conducted in a scientifically rigorous manner, the data will hold the clues necessary to answer the researchers’ questions. To unlock these clues, researchers typically rely on a variety of statistical procedures. There are two types of data:

• Quantitative Data
• Qualitative Data

The data analysis is concerned mainly with the quantitative data. These statistical procedures allow researchers to describe groups of individuals and events, examine the relationships between them, measure differences between groups and conditions, and examine and generalize. Knowledge about data analysis can help a researcher interpret data for the purpose of providing meaningful insights into the problem being examined.

Aims Data Analysis

The analysis of data can have several aims.

• Describe: The first aim may be to describe a phenomenon in some or greater detail.
• Compare: This is aimed at comparing the different data types.
• Explanation: This means looking for explanations such as dif­ferences in data.
• Interpret: It means the interpretation of data in relation to the context.
• Generalisation: It means to arrive at generalizable statements by comparing various materials or various texts or several cases.

Content Analysis

Content analysis is a research technique for making replicable and valid conclusions from text to the contexts of their use. Content analysis has been used to analyse content, bias, meanings, and perspectives in text. Content Analysis is described as the scientific study of the content of the communication. It is the study of the content with reference to the meanings, contexts and intentions contained in messages. However, the method achieved greater popularity among social science scholars as well as a method of communication research.

The content analysis begins with a specific statement of the objectives or research questions to be studied. The researcher asks the question ‘what do I want to find out from this communication content’ and frames the objectives for the study.

Before approaching a text for content analysis, the researcher has to consider the following features of a text:

• There is nothing inherent in a text. The meanings of a text are always brought to it by someone.
• Texts do not have single meanings. A text can be read from multiple perspectives and thus meaning will also change.
• Texts have meanings relative to particular contexts or purposes. Thus contextual meaning has to be found.

Method of Content Analysis

Step I: Set objectives or research questions (What to find out from the text)

Step II: Understand the literal meaning of the text

Step III: Analyse and find out the context and perspective of the text

Step IV: Establish the real or hidden meaning of the text

Step V: Infer valid conclusions or generalisations from the meaning for interpretation

Source Analysis

History is the result of the presentation and interpretation of various sources. Thus source analysis is the first and foremost task of historians in the practice of history. Source analysis is the first step toward understanding a source. While approaching a source, a number of questions have to be asked to validate the credibility of the source. Generally, the following aspects must be considered to analyse a source.

Origin of the source

This is the first thing to be analysed. The origin of the source can be traced by validating its author, and the period of its creation. This is particularly important if the researcher is dealing with an original source (whether is original or a copy). This also helps to determine the type of source - primary and secondary. 

Motive or purpose behind the source

Every historical source is, in one way or another created with a motive or purpose. Thus the researcher has to analyse the real purpose behind the creation of the source. This will help to find out the element of bias in the source.

Content presented in the source

It is very important to analyse what content is presented in the source. It naturally leads to the types of materials used to present the theme. In the caste of a secondary source, the credibility of the content can be assessed through the citations and use of primary sources.

The context in which the source is produced

Firstly, place the document in its historical context. This enquires the background of the creation of the source. Where, why, and under what circumstances did the author write the document? How might the circumstances have influenced the content, style, or tone of the document?

Audience focused

Finding out the source's intended audience is an integral part of source analysis. Here, the researcher has to find out whether the source is meant for any target group. If it is a historian it is likely that the audience is the general public or an academic circle. If the source is a diary entry it is highly likely that the intended audience was either solely to the author or their family. Considering the audience is very important, as it will also reveal elements of bias that may be present in the source.

The perspective presented in the source

This considers whether a source is objective or subjective. Perspective is extremely important as it helps establish reliability. It is also helpful to understand different views on a particular historical event.

Reliability of the source

For a source to be considered reliable it must contain accurate historical information. This means that a source can be written in a completely subjective manner and still be considered reliable, as all facts are accurate.

The usefulness of the source

In order to concisely answer whether a source is ‘useful’, consider the three R’s:

• Is the source relevant to what is being asked?
• Has the source revealed an insight into the question?
• Is the source reliable in providing the information required to answer the question?

Secondary Sources

Secondary sources are interpretations of the past written by historians often based on primary sources.  A secondary source is one in which the eyewitness or the participant i.e. the person describing the event was not actually present but who obtained his/her descriptions or narrations from another person or source. This ‘another person’ may or may not be a primary source. They reflect filtered information that has been passed through one source to another. These are the sources that indirectly relate to a historical event. Historians take the raw data found in primary sources and transform it into written histories that attempt to explain how and why things happened as they did. Secondary sources, thus, do not have a direct physical relationship with the event being studied. A good historian uses them for general information, substantiation, description, alternative interpretations, and understanding of the topic. Secondary sources yield ideas and new questions in historical inquiries.

Secondary sources consist of:

• Books/Monographs
• Historical dictionaries and encyclopedias
• Reviews
• Scholarly articles,
• Essays, and
• Lectures

Secondary sources provide three basic understanding to the historians:

It provides background information about a topic. Reading secondary sources can convey a strong understanding of the present knowledge about a particular topic. Thus it provides a preview, which helps the historian to initiate his research.

It provides a sense of historical context. It gives an idea about the time period and the individual, theme, or event discussed.

It provides a historiographical context. Secondary sources reflect the theoretical and methodological approaches employed by different historians on a particular topic. It provides an idea about the questions posed by these historians, their interpretations of the sources, how they supported their arguments, etc.

Limitations of Secondary Sources

Relying predominantly upon secondary sources denotes faulty, weak historical research. It is possible that secondary sources contain errors due to the passing of information from one source to another. These errors could get multiplied when the information passes through many sources thereby resulting in the misinterpretation of history. Thus, wherever possible, the researcher should try to use primary sources of data. However, that does not reduce the value of secondary sources.

Since secondary data have already been obtained, it is highly desirable that proper scrutiny of such data is made before they are used by the investigator. In fact, the user has to be extra cautious while using secondary data. In this context, Prof. Bowley rightly points out that “secondary data should not be accepted at their face value.” Therefore, before using the secondary data the investigators should consider the reliability of the data.

Theory of Practice - Structure and Habitus

Pierre Bourdieu, one of the foremost social philosophers of the 20^th century, in his book Outline of a Theory of Practice examined the social conditions that make objective knowledge. Bourdieu delineates a three-tiered framework of theoretical knowledge. The first element of this framework is ‘primary experience’ or what Bourdieu also calls the ‘phenomenological’ level. This level is known to all researchers in the field because it is the source of their basic descriptive data about the familiar either of their own society or another. The second level, almost as familiar, is the ‘model’ or ‘objectivist’ knowledge. Here, knowledge ‘constructs the objective relations (eg. economic or linguistic) which structure practice and representations of practice.’ In the third level, Bourdieu outlines the theory of practice. Bourdieu proposes that a theory of objectivist knowledge will be a more rigorous and illuminating theory of practice. He claims that a truly rigorous theory of practice is accomplished by taking up the position of the realism of practice. Practice can be understood solely in terms of individual decision-making. Structure and habitus are part of Bourdieu’s theory of practice as the articulation of disposition in social space.

The key concept of Bourdieu’s formulation of a theory of practice is ‘habitus’. He defines habitus as a deep structure generative of all thought and behavior, one that orients practice without producing it. In the Outline of the Theory of Practice, he defines habitus as composed of systems of durable, transposable dispositions, “an acquired system of generative schemes objectively adjusted to the particular conditions in which it is constituted; the habitus engenders all the thoughts, all the perceptions, and all the actions consistent with those conditions, and no others.” Bourdieu emphasizes the unconscious nature of such schemes, which are subjective but not individual. Rather, the cultural schemes installed by the habitus are laid down in the earliest stages of life as basic dispositions, or orientations, and operate equally as bodily dispositions and mental operations that function, according to his metaphor, as “maps” of the individual’s social worlds, generating thoughts, perceptions, expressions, and actions limited by the historically and socially existing conditions under which they are produced

‘Habitus’ is derived from 16^th century Latin, where it means ‘a way of being’. Bourdieu considered habitus as a structured notion related to the way individuals and classes inhabit the world. Habitus is a product of history, and produces the ‘collective practices and hence, in accordance with schemes engendered by that history’. Habitus is almost like a kind of ‘practice – generating grammar’ – a grammar that includes psychological disposition. Through habitus, one internalizes the legitimacy of one’s inclusion or exclusion from privileges. Acquiring habitus is perhaps like acquiring a first language; no one can choose in the matter. With a given habitus, there is a wide range of possibilities, just as grammar enables a wide range of possibilities in a natural language. Habitus, then, is a kind of grammar of actions that serves to differentiate one class (eg. dominant) from another (eg. the dominated) in the social field. The boundaries between one habitus and another are always contested because of its fluid nature. A habitus allows for a certain degree of spontaneity, initiative and improvisation. Hence, habitus makes social action and interactions possible without making them predictable.

Habitus is connected, then to Bourdieu’s view (or empirical discovery) that modern capitalist societies are societies of inequality. Class conflict means that certain people receive a disproportionate share of cultural, economic, and symbolic capital. Privileges thus exist, and privileges generate privileges. Here, privilege should be grasped as being manifest not only at the level of economic capital (level of wealth) but also at the level of the symbolic (eg. education, language, acquisition, aesthetic appreciation).

If habitus exists beyond the consciousness of the individual, access to it can be gained only by collecting a wide range of statistical and other data relating to the social life of the individual. A specific habitus becomes evident when a range of variables (occupation, education, income, taste in food, artistic performance etc.) are shown, statistically to correlate with each other. Studies of parents’ occupation and educational attainment demonstrate that privilege is passed on (children of doctors and highly professionals also tend to get into the medical field). Studies of taste tend to suggest that privilege and the dominant paradigms of taste are connected. Studies of academic institutions suggest that, in the humanities and social sciences, a particular faculty with language relates again to economic and social privilege. In effect, Bourdieu’s claim is that once the objective data have been gathered across the board, it is possible to construct a map of social privilege. A habitus is connected to a lifestyle to the extent that it enables this lifestyle to be reproduced (which means: enabling the same inequalities to be reproduced). Habitus, then, consists of the transposable dispositions (transferable to a range of contexts), perceptions and appreciation an individual acquires through being a member of a given class, as this is articulated in a given set of material circumstances.

Structures constitute a particular type of environment (eg. the material conditions of existence characteristic of a class condition produce habitus, system durable, transposable dispositions. Structured structures are predisposed to function as structuring structures. It is necessary to abandon all theories which explicitly or implicitly treat conditions and are entirely reducible to the mechanical functionary of pre-established assemblies, ‘model’ or ‘roles’. Bourdieu argues that ‘power’ is imbricated throughout society’s institutions and practices and reproduced by these very institutions and practices.

The importance of Bourdieu’s project lies in his attempt to construct a theoretical model of social practice. To him, all social life is essentially practical. Practice is located in space and more significantly in time. Practice, according to Bourdieu is not consciously or not wholly consciously organised and orchestrated. He metaphorically considered social life as a game. All games have rules, the same is true of social life. Games are learned through explicit teaching as well as experientially in practice, the same is social competence. Social life cannot be understood as simply the aggregate of individual behaviour.

Oral History - Theoretical and Methodological Issues

“All history was at first oral”, says Samuel Johnson. Memory is the core of oral history, from which meaning can be extracted and preserved. Oral history collects memories and personal commentaries of historical significance through recorded interviews. As distinct from oral traditions (stories that societies passed along spoken from generation to generation) oral history interviewing has been occurring since history was first recorded. Oral history relates both personal stories and memories that people tell other people about the past and the formal collection or account of such stories and memories by oral historians and researchers.

The Oral History Association of Australia provides a two-part definition regarding oral history: as a practice or method for recording, processing and conserving oral accounts of the past. It highlights the importance of the background knowledge or preparedness of the interviewer and an interviewer that has direct experience and knowledge of the interview topic. As well, it covers the functional aspect and states oral history is a ‘tape-recorded interview in question and answer format … on the subject of historical interest … which is made accessible to the other researchers.” An interview becomes an oral history only when it has been recorded, processed in some way, made available in an archive, library, or reproduced in written form for publication.

Oral history is a history built around the people. It thrusts life into history itself and it widens its scope. It allows heroes not just from the leaders, but from the unknown majority of the people. Oral history offers a challenge to the accepted myths of history, to the authoritarian judgment inherent in its tradition. It provides a means for a radical transformation of the social meaning. (Paul Thompson, The Voice of the Past: Oral History). The general acceptance that oral history is critical to our understanding and appreciation of landscapes and places is located to broader trends in history.

Worldwide political and social changes during the last decades of the 20^th century confronted historians with the inadequacy of archival documentation which often reflected a discredited government rather than the resistance against it. Newly emerging nations in Asia and Africa found that the written documents reflect the view of former colonial masters and used oral history to revive buried national identities. Hence, oral history became an alternative source.

There are a number of theoretical and methodological issues and misunderstandings regarding oral history projects. There are questions on objectivity, reliability, multi-disciplinarily, the role of the interviewer, the role of interviewed, further interpretation of oral history, and so on.

Elite Historicism Vs Non-elite Historicism

Oral historians project the merits of the elite vs non-elite interviewing as it widens the understanding of historical phenomena. It is argued that the written histories project the views of the elite class written by the elite historian and written about the elite category of people in which the lives of non-elite masses were neglected. It is generally accepted that oral history clears this vacuum in historical narration. At the same time, this may lead to clashes of views on particular historical events.

The Question of Multi-disciplinarily

Oral history is always been multi-disciplinary. While many professional historians conduct oral history, a degree in history has been a prerequisite for entering the field. This has been questioned by traditional historians. To them, this will lead to the distortion of history.

The Question of Reliability

Ranke and the turn of history from a literary form into an academic discipline depended on the rigorous use of evidence. Ranke’s followers deemed oral evidence too subjective; shoddy memories told from a biased point of view. Many critics of oral history are skeptical about the accuracy of human memory and question the reliability of oral history sources. It is generally considered that archival and other written documents provide objective evidence. It can be said that oral history is as reliable or unreliable as other research sources.

Questions about the Role of the Interviewer

There are questions about the role of the interviewer in taking oral history interviews. Allan Nevins, who pioneered the oral history project at Colombia University, argued that the interviewer was envisioned as a neutral, objective collector of other people’s reminiscences. This will lead to the elimination of questions in taking interviews. Another view is that the interviewer should act as an active agent in the process of interviewing. This may lead to over-intervention of the interviewer. The more methodologically oriented oral historians criticized the uncritical acceptance of oral testimony and called for more thorough research and higher standards in conducting interviews.

Skepticism about the Accuracy of Human Memory

The critics of oral history argue that human memory is dependent on individuals and his/her memory power. Hence, oral history may lap the whole historical development of the discussed event. Further, the lack of accurate memory will lead to questions of objectivity, reliability, and authenticity.

Further Interpretation of Oral History

As the historian interprets the available written document to reconstruct a historical event, the recorded oral histories are also to be interpreted. While interpreting oral history, one should be aware of the time, context, space, and attitude of the interviewees. It should also be noted that it is the view of an individual about his surroundings and his experience with the past. 

Rumours Vs Memory

In some cases, the oral history may be mixed with rumors and hearsay. It should be clearly identified and analysed before taking it as a valid source. Most the individual memory is filled with exciting fascinating stories mixed with rumors.

Conclusion

Oral history emerged as a paradigm shift in the course of historical writings. It brings the histories of marginalized people to the centre of historical events and tries to give a counter-hegemonic historical understanding. It brought the clashes of objective evidence (archival or other documents) with Individual Testimony (Oral History) and thereby brought new ways of historical analysis. In the handling of oral histories and its interpretation, historians should be aware of its methodological and theoretical issues.

Every Man His Own Historian

The idea ‘Every Man His Own Historian’ was first proposed by Carl L. Becker, the President of the American Historical Association, 1931, who is often listed among the proponents of the “New History”. The idea was first presented at a lecture delivered in an annual address of the President of the American Historical Association, in Minneapolis on December 29, 1931. Later it was published in the American Historical Review (Vol.37, No. 2, p. 221–36). Becker’s presidential address is frequently cited by his successors to encourage a better connection to history and the public.

“History is the memory of things said and done”

Through the idea of ‘Every Man His Own Historian’, Becker tried to reduce history to its lowest terms. For this purpose, he gave a very simple definition of history – “History is the memory of things said and done.” This is a definition that reduces history to its lowest terms, and yet includes everything that is essential to understanding what it really is. He considered ‘memory’ memory to be fundamental: without memory, there is no knowledge. The memory of things said and done is essential to the performance of the simplest acts of daily life. Historical knowledge basically comes from the memory of the people.

Everyman’s Memory as History

If the essence of history is the memory of things said and done, then it is obvious that every normal person, Becker calls “Mr. Everyman”, knows some history. Since we are concerned with history in its lowest terms, we will suppose that Mr. Everyman is not a professor of history, but just an ordinary citizen without excess knowledge. History in this sense cannot be reduced to a verifiable set of statistics or formulated in terms of universally valid mathematical formulas or in terms of theories. It is rather an imaginative creation and a personal possession. Mr. Everyman, fashions out of his individual experience, adapts to his practical or emotional needs, and with his aesthetic tastes creates his own history.

Historical Activity at Mr. Everyman’s Mind

Daily and hourly, Mr. Everyman’s mind is lodged in a mass of unrelated and related information and misinformation, of impressions and images. From a thousand un-noted sources in his mind, he somehow manages, un-deliberately for the most part, to fashion history, a patterned picture of remembered things said and done in past times and distant places. It is not possible, it is not essential, that this picture should be complete or completely true. It is essential that it should be useful to Mr. Everyman. It may be useful to him that he will hold it in memory. Only those things, which can be related with some reasonable degree of relevance and harmony to his idea of himself and of what he is doing in the world and what he hopes to do. 

Professional Historian and Mr. Everyman

Although each of the professional historians is Mr. Everyman, each is something more than his own historian. Mr. Everyman, being but an informal historian is under no bond to remember what is irrelevant to his personal affairs. But the historians by profession, less intimately bound up with the practical activities, is to be directly concerned with the ideal series of events that is only of casual or occasional import to others. Professional historians consider that it is our business in life to be ever preoccupied with that far-flung pattern of artificial memories that encloses and completes the central pattern of individual experience. Professional historians are Mr. Everybody’s historian as well as our own since their histories serve the double purpose of keeping alive the recollection of memorable men and events. The history written by historians, like the history informally fashioned by Mr. Everyman, is thus a convenient blend of truth and fancy, of what we commonly distinguish as “fact” and “interpretation.”

The Concept(s) of Culture

The term culture in its early use in English was associated with cultivation and also with religious worship, hence the word ‘cult’. From the 16^th to the 19^th century, the term was widely applied to the improvement of the individual human mind and personal manners through learning. The term was then also used to denote the development of society as a whole. Edward Burnet Tylor in his Primitive Culture defined “Culture … is that complex whole which includes knowledge, belief, art, morals, law, custom and other capabilities and habits acquired by ma as a member of society.” This implies the complexity of the term. It was further attested by Raymond Williams when he wrote “Culture as one of the two or three most complicated words in the English language.” He held that culture projects the whole way of life. In the last quarter of the 19^th century as a discipline “Cultural Studies” emerged with Richard Hoggard, the founder of the Birmingham Centre of Contemporary Cultural Studies.

WILLIAM H SEWELL JR. AND HIS ANALYSIS ON 
THE CONCEPT(S) OF CULTURE

William H Sewell Jr. in his book Logics of History, Chapter five entitled ‘The Concept(s) of Culture’, made a detailed analysis of concepts of culture in contemporary academic discourse. Sewell argued that in one meaning, culture is a theoretically defined category or aspect of social life that must be abstracted out from the complex reality of human existence. Culture in this sense is always contrasted to some other equally abstract aspect or category of social life that is not culture, such as economy, politics, or biology. Culture in this sense-as an abstract analytical category-only takes the singular. Whenever we speak of "cultures," we have moved to the second fundamental meaning. In that second meaning, culture stands for a concrete and bounded world of beliefs and practices. Culture in this sense is commonly assumed to belong to or to be isomorphic with a "society" or with some dearly identifiable sub-societal group, eg., Indian Culture or middle-class culture. The contrast in this usage is not between culture and not-culture but between one culture and another culture.

Culture as a Category of Social Life

Culture as a category of social life has itself been conceptualized in a number of different ways. Sewell presented these concepts as follows:

Culture as learned behaviour: Culture in this sense is the whole body of practices, beliefs, institutions, customs, habits, myths, and so on built up by humans and passed on from generation to generation. In this usage, culture is contrasted to nature: its possession is what distinguishes LIS from other animals.

Culture as all institutional sphere devoted to the making of meaning: This conception of culture is based on the assumption that social formations are composed of clusters of institutions devoted to specialized activities. Culture is the sphere devoted specifically to the production, circulation, and use of meanings. The cultural sphere may in turn be broken down into the sub-spheres of which it is composed: say, of art, music, theatre, fashion, literature, religion, media, and education. The study of culture, if culture is defined in this way, is the study of the activities that take place within these institutionally defined spheres and of the meanings produced in them. This conception of culture is particularly prominent in the discourses of sociology and cultural studies.

Culture as creativity or agency: This usage of culture has emerged with the Marxist materialistic determinism. The scholars working within these traditions have carved out a conception of culture as a realm of creativity that escapes from the otherwise pervasive determination of social action by economic or social structures.

Culture as a system of symbols and meanings: This has been the dominant concept of culture in American anthropology since the 1960s. It was made famous above all by Clifford Geertz, who used the term "cultural system" and elaborated by David Schneider.  It was contrasted to the "social system," which was a system of norms and institutions. Geertz and Schneider distinguished the cultural system from the social system. Culture as a system of symbols and meanings further created the studies like semiotics, structuralism and postmodernism.

Culture as practice: This concept is developed as a reaction against the culture as a system of symbols and meanings. This idea viewed “culture as a tool kit”. Here, culture is a sphere of practical activity shot through by wilful action, power relations, struggle, contradiction and change.

Culture as System and Practice

This concept considers culture as a dialectic of system and practice. System and practice are complementary concepts. To engage in cultural practice means to utilize existing cultural symbols. To the employment of a symbol can make a practice. Hence, practice implies a system. System and practice contribute to an indissoluble duality or dialectic.

The Autonomy of Culture

The cultural dimension of practice is autonomous from other dimensions of practice in two senses. First, culture has a semiotic structuring principle that is different from the political, economic, or geographical structuring principles that also inform practice. Second, the cultural dimension is also autonomous in the sense that the meanings that make it are shaped and reshaped by a multitude of other contexts.

Cultures as Distinct Worlds of Meaning

Cultures are contradictory: Cultural worlds are commonly beset with internal contradictions.

Cultures are loosely integrated: Societies are composed of verities of cultural activities. Hence, the Integration of cultures was a difficult task and it depends on its nature.

Cultures are contested: The conflicts of race, class, gender, etc. are frequent in the cultural sphere. Thus it is a sphere of conflict and resistance.

Cultures are subject to constant change: In complex and dynamic societies, cultures are quite changeable.

Cultures are weakly bounded: Cultural transactions between societies are a common feature. Thus the boundaries of cultures are weakly organised.

Conclusion

According to Sewell, many cultural practices are concentrated in and around powerful institutions like religion, media, state, etc. Cultures give the impressions of identity, struggle, resistance, and movements. Cultures are used as instruments for societal development.

Quotations: Its Forms and Usages

Arthur Marwick in his The New Nature of History points out that “the relationship between ‘history’, ‘the past’ and ‘sources’ make it necessary for all historical knowledge to contain direct quotations from the source material.” Quotations are frequently used by research scholars and students in the body of their study as well as in footnotes. Quotations of a lengthy nature are often found in the appendices.

Quotations are words or sentences containing ideas or opinions of prominent scholars borrowed to highlight or substantiate the thesis or thoughts of a researcher or writer. Louis Gottschalk in Understanding History: A Primer of Historical Method says that quotations can be used for the “picturesqueness of language, exactness of word or phrase, original testimony, new information, moot points and the like.”

In General, a quotation – whether a word, phrase, sentence, or more – should correspond exactly to its source in spelling, capitalization and interior punctuation. Short quotations are to be placed within double inverted commas. A quotation within such a quotation is to be put within single inverted commas. In the case of a third quotation, which is placed within the second quotation, is to be within the double inverted commas. In case quotations are quite lengthy it can be placed in a separate paragraph.

When to Use Quotations

a)     Quotations can be used when the quotation itself became the subject of discussion.

b)     To validate a point, statement, or argument.

c)    Quotation can be used when the original words of an author are expressed so consciously and convincingly that the student cannot improve on these words.

d)    Direct quotations can be used for documentation of a major argument where the footnote would not suffice.

e)    Quotations are used when students are required to comment upon, refute or analyse ideas expressed by another writer.

f)   Direct quotations may be used when paraphrasing might cause misunderstanding or is liable to be misinterpreted.

g)    Direct quotations can be used when citing scientific and mathematical data or formulas.

h)  Quotations are used when doubt or disagreement arises as to the real meaning or a statement or assertion.

i)    Direct quotations can be used in biographical studies to highlight the style or elegance of an author or statesman’s language or speech.

How to Quote

1)   Quotations should be accurate in words, spelling, punctuation, etc. In case of errors, they are to be reproduced as in the original and the user can point out the errors by using the word ‘sic’ immediately after the error. The name of the author of the quotation is also to be given.

2) If the tense of the quotation does not fit the introduction of the quotation, interpolations/insertions may be used in square brackets.

3)  Omissions made in the original quotation forms when certain portions are considered irrelevant are indicated by three full stops (…) referred to as ‘Ellipsis’. When the quotation consists of more than one sentence and the beginning words of the second sentence are omitted, four full stops or ‘Ellipsis’ are used (….).

4)   Quotations are not to be used out of the context giving scope for misrepresentation of the original statement.

5)    The source of the quotation should be easily identifiable.

6)  Extensive quotations from the published works require the permission of the copyright holder.

Use of Quotations: Precautions and Limitations

             i) In historical narrative or exposition, it is the historian’s re-interpretation of what the documents teach that ought to be the prime objective. The reader’s interest will lag if lengthy quotations are regularly introduced as Louis Gottschalk opines.

          ii) Except where the writer has a special reason for quoting his source, his conclusions from his sources and not the sources themselves are what the lay reader generally wants to know.

           iii) While Quotations are common and often effective in research papers, use them selectively, the MLA Handbook advises. Over quotations can bore your readers and might lead them to conclude that you are neither an original thinker nor a skillful writer.

    iv) Barzun and Graff in the Modern Researcher say with all the force at their disposal that “quotations are illustrations, not proofs”. They further state that quotations “must as far as possible be merged into the text”.

         v)  Arthur Marwick in The New Nature of History opinions that “on the whole quotations should be kept to an absolute minimum in both popularisations and undergraduate essays”. The opinion that a case is somehow clinched by citing the direct speech of one or two authorities is as erroneous as it seems to be widespread. Marwick points out that one of the most common errors beginning Ph.D. students fall into is the overuse of direct quotations. This is because it is simpler to copy out and reproduce large chunks of material than to think very carefully about which particular phrases one needs to quote and why. However, quotations need not be so brief and out of context as to be misleading.

        vi) Quotations should not stand out prominently or conspicuously but should be a spontaneous part of the main study or discussion. For this purpose, the quotation should either be preceded by or followed by an intelligent comment or remark.

To conclude, the writer is permitted to shine, when required, in borrowed feathers but it should not be overdone. Excessive quotations do more harm than good to the research study and question the very intelligence and originality of the author.    

Ashis Nandy and ‘Towards A Third World Utopia’

Ashis Nandy is an Indian political psychologist, social theorist, and critic. A well-trained clinical psychologist, Nandy has provided theoretical critiques of European colonialism, development, modernity, science, technology, nuclearism, cosmopolitanism and utopia. Nandy has been associated with the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, New Delhi. 

Nandy’s work has alternated between human destructiveness and human potentialities. And he has combined these interests with efforts to move out of conventional scholarship, to build into his work categories and sensitivities used in marginalised knowledge systems surviving in the backwaters of the world. His earlier books include Alternative Sciences: Creativity and Authenticity in Two Indian Scientists (Oxford University Press, 1995), The Tao of Cricket: On Games of Destiny and the Destiny of Games (Oxford University Press, 2000), An Ambiguous Journey to the City: The Village and Other Odd Ruins of the Self in Indian Imagination (Oxford University Press, 2000), Romance of the State and the Fate of Dissent in the Tropics (Oxford University Press, 2008), Time Warps (Rutgers University Press, 2002), and Traditions, Tyranny and Utopias (Oxford University Press, 1988).

In his popular essay Oppression and Human Liberation: Towards A Third World Utopia, Ashish Nandi posted his views on the emerging third world. To him, the Third World is bound together by the experience of oppression rather than by common cultural traditions. This vision recognized the continuity between the oppressed and the oppressor and sees the institutional and psychological liberation from outer oppression as a matter of self-realization.

Third World. The concept of the Third World is not a cultural category; it is a political and economic category born of oppression, indignity and self-contempt. A Third World utopia must recognize this basic reality. To have a meaningful ‘life’ in the minds of men, such a utopia must start with the historical issue of oppression that has given the Third World both its name and its uniqueness. This paper is a civilizational perspective on oppression, with a less articulate secular theory of salvation as its appendage.

His approach is based on three assumptions. First, as far as the core values are concerned, good and right ethics are not the monopoly of any civilization. All civilizations share certain basic values and such cultural traditions as deriving from man’s biological self and evolutionary experience.

Second, that human civilization is continuously trying to alter or expand its awareness of exploitation and oppression. Oppressions that were once outside the span of awareness are no longer so, and it is quite likely that the present awareness of suffering, too, would be found wanting and would change in the future.

Third, those imperfect societies produce imperfect remedies for their imperfections. Theories of salvation are not uncontaminated by the spatial and temporal location of the theorists. Since the solutions are products of the same social experiences that produce the problems, they cannot but be informed by the same consciousness or, if you allow psychologism, unconsciousness. 

Gender History

Gender history is a type of historical analysis that has developed out of women’s history. In the 1960s and 1970s, gender was often used as a synonym for women’s history. But from the 1980s the term developed as a separate interest among historians and critics in other disciplines. Joan Wallach Scott defined gender as “a social category imposed on a sexed body,” and stated that “gender is a primary way of signifying relations of power.” Gender can be defined as the study of the cultural (including the historical, social, class, intellectual, economic, political, psychological, literary, etc.) organisation, functioning, representation and meaning of sex/body difference. Gender distinction has been explored as a common and omnipresent characteristic of society.

Gender as a category of analysis, is a mechanism by which change over time can be interpreted and represented. Initially, it grew as a part of women’s history in the 1960s. It began in some ways as a branch of social history, and many of the essays include extensive discussions of issues that matter to social historians: the family, work and leisure experiences, marriage patterns, and class differences. It criticized patriarchy, and male dominance and explained why women were hidden from history. Then, Juliet Mitchell and Teresa Brennan, the feminine through their psychoanalysis explained the subjectivity of women through language. From the 1970s and into the 1980s, especially through the early efforts of Sally Alexander and Catherine Hall, women, class and sexual difference came under the scope of a variety of Marxist historians. In this phase of women's history, sex and class often figured as related forms of oppression: the female sex was viewed as a subordinate class, subjugated by a dominant class of men.

By the mid-1980s a gradual breakdown of the category "woman" had begun to propel the turn to gender. The critical questioning of women as organized historical subjects, objects, and political identities was one factor that necessitated the arrival of gender as a keyword of historical analysis. By the early 1990s gender had become a substantial topic among historians and those interested in an interdisciplinary approach to it. Two edited texts from that time, Julia Epstein’s and Kristina Straub’s collection Body Guards: The Cultural Politics of Gender Ambiguity (1991) and Sue Tolleson Rinehart’s Gender Consciousness and Politics (1992), indicate the final arrival of gender consciousness among historians as well as academics.

Gender also made inroads into philosophy in the early 1990s and the most important works are Linda Alcoff and Elizabeth Potter’s edited Feminist Epistemologies (1993), Ann Garry’s and Marilyn Pearsall’s Women, Knowledge and Reality (1996), and Jean Curthoys’s Feminist Amnesia (1997). Most notably French feminist philosophers and critical theorists Luce Irigaray and Hélène Cixous, along with Judith Butler, Diane Elam, Teresa Brennan, Mary Poovey and Donna Haraway, have explored the process of cultural absorption into a dominant gendered discourse, raising questions about how gender historically defines sex.

Gender is now firmly fixed as a part of the historical construction. For example, explorations that link sexuality, gender, and nationalism are revealed in texts like George L. Mosse’s Nationalism and Sexuality: Middle Class Morality and Sexual Norms in Modern Europe (1985) and the multiple-authored Nationalisms and Sexualities (1992). On gender, race, imperialism and colonialism see Anne McClintock et al., Dangerous Liaisons: Gender, Nations, and Postcolonial Perspectives (1997) and Ida Bloom, Karen Hagemann and Catherine Hall, Gendered Nations: Nationalisms and Gender Order in the Long Nineteenth Century (2000).

Like all the concepts that historians use, gender is a modelling device for organising and then representing the past. Gender history is a way of looking at the past that expands our vision.