Modern and Historical Worldviews
Christina Mertz
Honors: Foundations of Western Civilization: HIST 100-50
13 December 2013
Mertz 1
Many people question the value of studying history, for it often seems to have no use in
the modern world. They claim that history “has no serious function,”1 and that studying it is
beneficial only for interest’s sake. History, they say, has no relation to our lives today. What
happened in the past has undoubtedly brought us here, but since it has already been done,
studying it is a useless endeavor that can do nothing to change the more pressing issues of
modern society. They may claim that even if studying history has a value in and of itself, “[i]t
establishes no truths.”2 In many ways, they are right; for we can never be absolutely certain if socalled historical “facts” are actually true or not. However, merely being able to look into a
moment in the past has the ability to change the way we see the world, which, in many ways, is
an even greater benefit than knowing undoubtable facts about that past. Perhaps a shift in
worldview is all that we need to solve an issue, or, using history less pragmatically, perhaps it
simply makes our own worldviews more beautiful. Contrary to many people’s beliefs, then, a
study of history is intimately valuable to us and to our modern lives.
The past certainly has some value for the present, but the common statement that we must
study history to learn from it often fails to hold true. With different people, issues, and systems,
nothing can ever happen the exact same way again; therefore, it is foolish for us to expect that
the lessons we have learned in the past can help us through our future. However, the human race
has built upon the struggles and lessons of the past to create the present. If we had no past to rely
on, we would be constantly circling the same issues, repeating the same mistakes, and coming up
with the same primitive solutions. Through our access to the past, we are able to create new
solutions that build upon all that the human race has learned over the course of time.
1
“Myth, Memory, and History,” History and Theory, 1965 [magazine online], p. 282; available from
http://www.jstor.org/stable/2504346?origin=JSTOR-pdf; Internet; accessed 13 December 2013.
2
“Myth, Memory, and History,” p. 282.
Mertz 2
However, there are other, more subtle ways that history is usable for the present. As
Wineburg discusses, one of the benefits of history is that it is both familiar and strange. Studying
history allows us to “locate our own place in the stream of time and solidify our identity in the
present.”3 Studying history gives us “an endless storehouse of raw materials [that we can shape]
for our present needs.”4 History has the power to “spur us to reconsider how we see ourselves as
human beings.”5 Clearly, then, we can use the past to help us with some challenging modern
questions. Broad questions like the human identity, the impact of individuals, and other such
philosophical points to ponder can be addressed in the context of history, for history allows us
“to go beyond our own image, to go beyond our brief life, and to go beyond the fleeting moment
in human history into which we’ve been born.”6
Another way that history can be used for the present is that it can give us a new lens
through which to see our world. Wineburg points out the possibility that the Egyptians actually
“saw differently” with a “way of seeing that is irretrievably lost.”7 This idea may seem surreal,
but perhaps it is so tantalizing because it is true. For example, I once witnessed an informal
experiment where people named the same color, but, shaped by their particular circumstances
and experiences, they often identified its particular shade differently. This clearly shows that
each person, modern as well as historical, actually does have a unique vision of the world.8 In
the same way, the particular culture and way of life of the Egyptians gave them, individually and
as a collective people an undeniably different worldview than we have today. This is a beautiful
3
“Historical thinking and other unnatural acts,” Phi Delta Kappan, 1999 [magazine online], p. 3; EBSCOhost
(503601214).
4
“Historical Thinking,” p. 3.
5
“Historical Thinking,” p. 3.
6
“Historical Thinking,” p. 16.
7
“Historical Thinking,” p. 7.
8
Mary Carroll-Hackett. Longwood University. Lecture.
Mertz 3
way in which the study of history can change our present lives, for without history, we might
never know that such a way of seeing could even exist.
When we see the past in this untouchably beautiful way, it may suddenly seem harder to
realize that it is our own heritage, but it is this very unfamiliarity that allows us “to reconsider
how we see ourselves as human beings.”9 We must accept that we are heirs of a history that has
been wonderful and miserable, kind and despicable. When we encounter certain parts of history,
perhaps those that are related to our modern lives or those that seem extremely foreign, we are
forced to place our own selves in the contexts of that past. For example, I have found throughout
the course that I often feel a surge of pride when learning about some of the historical characters
most important to me today, like Martin Luther. When we study history, we humanize our past,
giving it names and emotions, and we feel a stronger attachment to our present.
Continuing with this, then, we must take care to be objective in order to study history
most accurately. If we want to use history to learn where we truly come from, we must allow it
to “destroy our false sense of proximity to people of the past.”10 The way many people do history
today is by reading it so selectively that they recreate it in the contexts of their own worldviews,
which are often incompatible with the historical worldviews they claim to be studying. For
example, Wineburg tells of an experiment in which a reader, encountering historical documents
about the war tactics of the colonists, assumed that they would fight in a modern style. However,
he failed to recognize that such historical characters had far different worldviews than the
common worldviews of today. He did not use this unfamiliarity “to ask himself new questions or
9
“Historical Thinking,” p. 3.
Jonathan Kandell, “Was the World Made out of Cheese? Carlo Ginzburg is Fascinated by Questions that Others
Ignore,” New York Times Magazine, (17 November 1991): 47, quoted in Samuel S. Wineburg, “Historical thinking
and other unnatural acts,” Phi Delta Kappan, 1999 [magazine online], p. 6. EBSCOhost (503601214).
10
Mertz 4
to consider new dimensions of human experience.”11 Rather, he allowed “his existing beliefs [to
shape] the information he encountered.”12 Though not the goal studying history, this projection
of our present onto the past is often the result of such a study.
In the end, we make the choice of whether we create our history or our history creates us.
Of course, it can only change us if we study it, so in that way, we always have a role in its power
over us. Reading historical documents and looking only for the specific information that we want
is another way in which we create our own history, but when we do so, we are building an
inaccurate history. Ideally, history should help us to recognize that modern and historical people
alike see the world differently. If we allow ourselves to be shaped by these differences and to see
the world through this irreplaceable historical lens, then history makes us, and it makes us better.
11
12
“Historical Thinking,” p. 6.
“Historical Thinking,” p. 6.