Mindanaotoday.com | Does history dominate from one against the other?
By: RAI Bollozos Sanchez
HI there!
For most schools, the semester of the academic year 2022-2023 has begun.
In my case, I have already started the discussions for my history subjects.
Other than deliberating the classroom policies, school regulations, and academic requirements, I began my historical dialogues with history’s definition, meaning, and essence.
Before I move forward and discuss the events in Philippine history. I propose three questions.
These are: (1) what is the difference between the “past” and “history”?; (2) if the “past” and “history” is different from one another, how “history” cannot be “absolute”?; (3) if history cannot be held “absolute,” what can be done to make it inclusive?
In my introduction with the “meaning and essence of history,” I used the last elections to see the importance of historical understanding in choosing our leaders.
As a proposition, I told my students that from the “filing of candidacy” to the “last day of the campaign period,” history has been attributed to convincing the Filipinos “who” and “not” to vote.
Or should I say, commonly, many ascribed their knowledge of history as far superior to the understanding of others?
Their historical experience cancels the other’s knowledge as far more ignorant than theirs, alluding to their historical superiority while the others are historically dumb.
Hence, would their understanding of the past represent a universal understanding of history?
I argue that history could be accredited to convincing people of the right persons to vote.
However, there is no such thing as one’s knowledge of history being far more dominant than the others.
Greg Jenner, a British public historian, says both the “past” and “history” are two different things.
The “past” is what happened and cannot be changed. While “history” is an intellectual discipline and a pursuit to explain “human occurrences” to expound on “what, how, and why” they happened.
Since it explains “human occurrences,” interpretation of the past may vary from one perspective to another.
Thus, the distinction of “past” against “history” deposits the idea that one is “absolute” while the other “is not.”
Yes, it is true that regardless of generation, one can no longer change the past. It already happened and, therefore, is unchangeable.
On the other hand, history “changes all the time” as it spawns various interests from generation to generation.
For example, we can no longer negate that the “Martial Law in the Philippines” indeed happened and was one of the darkest moments in Philippine history.
Conversely, pockets of historical experiences must be presented, exposed, and argued further.
One has to specify various circumstances during the “Martial Law” not to make history representational but inclusive among all “human experiences.”
“Human experiences” vary from one instance to another.
One may be the “victim while the others are the victors,” but the question is, “what interests may it protect?”
Nevertheless, “experiences” are vague, ambiguous, and imprecise.
The role of the historian is to process these ambiguous “experiences” by trying to look for evidence, not to deposit the truth but instigate a debate in the “community,” making the understanding of history evolves and opening a new spectrum of “inclusivity” among those who also experience “their own side of history.”
Historical inclusivity never necessitates dominance of “historical knowledge.”
Many of us, our experiences in understanding history, claim superiority of historical knowledge over those we think are historically impertinent.
Still, one has forgotten that history is also the discipline of understanding nuances—it may be biased from one side but a lie to the other.
Nonetheless, the goal of history is not to put into perspective a sense of “exclusivity” but a sense of realizing to find meaning in a more modern concern.
In short, as humanity evolves, understanding the past varies from the diverse experiences of others.
Well, as many think that the dominance of “historical knowledge” is superior to the others, that would perhaps make me feel about writing “The Psychology of Historical Thought.”
Maybe then…
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