Lost time is never found again.

~ Benjamin Franklin

MAJOR VIEWS/PHILOSOPHIES IN THE STUDY OF HISTORY

CYCLICAL VIEW

PROVIDENTIAL VIEW

PROGRESSIVE VIEW OR LINEAR

VIEW

RELATIVIST VIEW

CYCLICAL VIEW

History repeats itself.

All human events occur in cycles.

Famous exponents were

Herodotus and Spengler.

HERODOTUS Father of History

First historian - to collect his materials systematically, test their accuracy to a certain extent and arrange them in a well-constructed and vivid narrative.

OSWALD SPENGLER 

German historian and philosopher

PROVIDENTIAL VIEW

History is determined by God.

It consists of recording the death

struggle between good and evil.

It is widespread during the Middle

Ages.

ST. AUGUSTINE

Man relegated to the role of the pawn in a game of high stakes.

PROGRESSIVE OR LINEAR VIEW

Mankind as responsible for the advancement of civilization. It places complete faith in human abilities rather than in divine intervention.

Mankind is getting better and better.

PROGRESSIVE OR LINEAR VIEW

This view holds that each new generation should build upon the achievements of the preceding; it must be better because it has more with which to start.

PROGRESSIVE OR LINEAR VIEW

Vico, Leibnitz, and Marx were leading exponents.

RELATIVIST VIEW

History classifies and groups together facts about the past in terms of current needs or contemporary concerns.

“History creates its own subject”.

RELATIVIST VIEW

“Each new situation implies a reinterpretation of the past. – thus, relationship o the past is in a constant state of change(Dumont).

This implies the subjective nature of the historical knowledge.

RELATIVIST VIEW

History doesn’t deal with causal analysis. – “cause-and-effect relationship” – but on discourse.

This view states that one does not have a fixed theory or fixed position against which historical data could be measured.

"We study the past to understand the present;we understand the present to guide the future."

- William Lund

THANK YOU!