1	Historiography American History Honors AP United States History
2	Definition? History is the occurrence Historiography is the study of how people look and write about the occurrences
3	One Perspective… According to Bernard Bailyn: History is… (1.) Everything that has ever happened; (2.) Understanding of what happened.
4	Does History Change? NO – but interpretations do How? Is this “revisionist”?
5	Examples of “Schools” Various “schools of history” exist Two different examples: Marxist School (Karl Marx, Communist Manifesto) Annales School – events are insignificant, look towards the “long duree”
6	Schools of History Progressive – 1890-1930 Consensus – 1946-present New Left – 1960-present
7	Who was the first? The first historian was the Greek, Herodotus, who wrote about the Persian Wars in The Histories
8	Evolution of History Becomes a profession during the Renaissance Secular The Enlightenment – historians and historiographers: Voltaire, David Hume, Edward Gibbon
9	What’s the point??? There are many ways that history has been recorded or interpreted over the years No one right answer exists to an interpretation Historical accounts can sometimes be slanted towards the author
10	Who writes history? Winners? Motivations? Can it be dangerous?
11	Historical Bias? Thomas Jefferson – statesman or philanderer? Lincoln – emancipator or racist? Use of the Atomic Bomb? Did it save lives or was it needless slaughter? Historians can fall into the left-right scale (just like politics!)
12	What should we do? Analyze the sources Assess the historian’s interpretation Assess the validity of those interpretations Research other viewpoints
13	What you really want to know… Will historiography be on the AP exam? Yes and no You need to know a “consensus” of American History Social history is becoming more prevalent Only historians on previous AP exams: Charles Beard Frederick Jackson Turner
14	Final Thought… According to historian R.G. Collingwood, “Nothing capable of being memorized is history.”