The Role of Historians :: essays research papers

The Role of HistoriansProfessional historians spend their lives pursuing the meaning of thepast for the present." Everything that exists in nowadayss world has some origincoming from the past. Everything that exists today and seems to be unique ofits time has some basis from the past. It is a known fact that history has atendency of repeating itself, and so to prep ar us for the future we need tounderstand the past. History can give a person an answer to almost everythingthat is going on in the present, with what we foretell a historical investigation.History not only states facts but explains disciplines such as sociology,religion, psychology, anthropology and so on. It explains to us why certainevents happened, such as the reason why six millions Jews died in the SecondWorld War. The reason history gives us is anti-Semitism. The Nazis were a groupthat had as a goal to purify the world of what we call minorities and so to keepit a White, straight, Christian world. History expl ains the evolution of things,people, beliefs, laws and many more in order for us to understand why certainthings are the way they are.     In this article, we come across a few major points. Each of them isintroduced in a very original way. The author uses a actual journey into thepast as a means of comparing it to the present. One of the many points is an indepth definition of history related profession. What are they attempt toaccomplish and how they work to get what they are looking for. "Professionalhistorians spend their lives pursuing the meaning of the past for the present."Historians study facts and records that previous generations have left, to find divulge what kind of lives they led and how they solved their problems.     The way a historian works is very determined and simple to understand.A historian needs to first study an important question he wants to answer. Thenhe needs to find research on the subject that already exists and which he canget price of admission to. Next he has to judge the source that he has obtained, is itcredible? Is it genuine? The article explains that there are two basic forms ofhistorical evidence that exist, first-string and secondary. Primary evidence recordsthe actual words of someone who participated or witnessed the events in question.Or it can also be newspaper accounts, diaries, official statements, photographs,videotapes. Secondary evidence, on the other hand, records the findings ofsomeone who did not observe the event but who investigated primary evidence,