Writing Historical Essays: Questions, Thesis, and Evidence Evaluation, Schemes and Mind Maps of History

Download Writing Historical Essays: Questions, Thesis, and Evidence Evaluation and more Schemes and Mind Maps History in PDF only on Docsity! HOW TO WRITE YOUR HISTORY ESSAY 1. How to think about your question The word "history" comes from the Greek word for "inquiry." Therefore a historical essay is not a bald chronicle of facts and events. On the contrary: like a scientific article, it identifies an issue or problem, explains how it will analyse the issue or resolve the problem, and then proceeds to do so, based on sound reasoning and verifiable evidence. In planning your essay, your first task is to identify a question or issue. This is best done by finding a topic of interest to you, doing some preliminary reading around the topic, and then discussing viable options with your professor or TA. For example, suppose you are interested in warfare in the Renaissance/Early Modern period in Europe. Your topic is "warfare in the Renaissance". Using the Library catalogue and the databases (and consulting your Liaison Librarian, professor or TA), you find a few general works on early modern warfare, and spends a couple of evenings getting acquainted with your topic. You begin to formulate an idea: not only were armies in this period getting bigger and more professional, but they were beginning to be trained in a new way, using drill methods. This leads to a chain of questions: why was methodical, mass drill becoming so important? did it have anything to do with the development of hand artillery (muskets etc.)? or was it the emergence of citizen infantry armies? How were drill methods disseminated (did the invention of printing play a role? Protestant emphasis on literacy?)? What were the contemporary expectations of and attitudes towards these new military practices? were they resisted? Now, discuss this "menu" of questions with your professor or TA. Which one seems most interesting, and most feasible? Your next step is to clarify your question. In so doing, it helps to think about what kind of question it is (is this a "why" question, e.g. Why was divorce so readily available in Rome? or is it a "what" question, e.g. Were the Vikings traders or raiders -- i.e. what were they?) You also need to the think carefully about the terms of the question: e.g. if your question is: "Was Alexander the Great a creative military leader?" you have to define "creative", and to think of what that term might mean in the context of ancient warfare, and ancient political leadership. Bear in mind as well that answering a question is not the same as taking a side in a debate. There are, of course, some points of resemblance: people have different views on how a question ought to be answered, and your job is to discover your own point of view and explain why you hold that point of view. This is your thesis, i.e. the point of view which ties the evidence together in the most satisfying way. Debaters start with a thesis, and then find evidence to defend it; historians start with the evidence and work towards a thesis. Don't try to force a thesis: steep yourself in the evidence, read up on the points of view offered by other historians, and then try to articulate the point of view which makes most sense to you, and which you are able to demonstrate makes most sense. Don't worry if you start your research without a clear thesis, or if you change your thesis in mid-stream. It is enough to start with a good question. Let the thesis come out of the material, and out of your own activity of thinking-through-writing. 2. Getting to a thesis Here are some tips. First, think out, on the basis of your background reading on the subject, how you might answer your question. For example, suppose your question is "Was becoming a nun a form of liberation for medieval women?" What evidence would persuade you one way or the other? Evidence that women chose or expressed preference for the cloister over marriage? or conversely, evidence that they felt imprisoned and disempowered as nuns? Secondly, consider limiting your scope to a "case study". For example, if your question is "Why did early modern Europe enclose Jewish communities in ghettos?" you might look at some global explanations for the ghetto phenomenon, and then test them by examining one ghetto in detail, e.g. the ghetto of Venice. Alternately, consider a controlled comparison, e.g. if you are considering the question "Why were the ancient Greeks so ethnocentric?" you could compare Greek attitudes to the Persians versus Greek attitudes to the Egyptians. Thirdly, ponder your material and look for a pattern that makes sense. For example, if your question is "Did Matilda's bid to claim the throne of England fail because 12th century Europe could never accept a female ruler?", your reading could lead you to the following pattern: "Matilda's claim to the throne was never explicitly challenged because she was a woman; but the fact that she was a woman made it impossible for her to acquire the political allies she needed to assert that claim. In that sense, you could say that she failed because she was a woman." That is your thesis. 3. How to construct an answer Answering historical questions is in some respects like arriving at truth in a court of law. We cannot revisit the past to obtain first-hand experience of historical events, any more that we can re- experience a crime. We must rely on evidence furnished by witnesses. Evidence is furnished by two different kinds of witnesses, whose probity must be critically tested in different ways. If you were a trial lawyer or prosecutor, you would summon two kinds of witnesses: 1. First-hand witnesses of the crime or people with direct experience of the event and the actors. 2. Experts in various technical fields related to the events of the crime (doctors, ballistics experts, psychiatrists...) The first-hand witnesses are there to report what they experienced; the expert witnesses are there to evaluate this evidence in the light of their expert knowledge. The court depends on first-hand witnesses for the elements of the story itself. But it will quickly learn that their accounts will not necessarily agree, due to deliberate or unconscious editing and distortion. In other words the "facts" they relate are embedded in "meanings" which shape those facts in different ways. To try to correct for this, the court depends on expert witnesses to evaluate the coherence and accuracy of the witnesses' stories. However, experts vary in quality, and have their own biases and agendas. Likewise, historians listen to two kinds of evidence: 1. Primary sources: i.e. documents produced at the time of the event, by people involved with, close to, or contemporary with the event.