mba1382 wrote:
Mark: To convey an understanding of past events, a historian should try to capture what it was like to experience those events. For instance, a foot soldier in the Battle of Waterloo knew through direct experience what the battle was like, and it is this kind of knowledge that the historian must capture.
Carla: But how do you go about choosing whose perspective is the valid one? Is the foot soldier's perspective more valid than that of a general? Should it be a French or an English soldier? Your approach would generate a biased version of history and to avoid that, historians must stick to general and objective characterizations of the past.
Mark's and Carla's positions indicate that they disagree about the truth of which one of the following?
(A) The purpose of writing history is to convey an understanding of past events.
(B) The participants in a battle are capable of having an objective understandilg of the ramifications of the events in which they are participating.
(C) Historians can succeed in conveying a sense of the way events in the distant past seemed to someone who lived in a past time.
(D) Historians should aim to convey past events from the perspective of participants in those events.
(E) Historians shouid use fictional episodes to supplement their accounts of past events if the documented record of those events is incomplete.
Question first
The two people disagree about the truth of what?
Breaking things down
Mark: Historians should capture experiences of people involved
Carla: Historians may get biased, so they should stick to facts and be objective.
Scan the options
(A) The purpose of writing history is to convey an understanding of past events.Mark agrees with this. Carla doesn't seem to agree or disagree.
(B) The participants in a battle are capable of having an objective understanding of the ramifications of the events in which they are participating.Carla disagrees because she thinks the perceptions of participants of an event will be based on which side of the battle/conflict they are on. Mark does not comment, so we do not know his stand.
(C) Historians can succeed in conveying a sense of the way events in the distant past seemed to someone who lived in a past time.This is a VERY tricky option with clever wordplay. Nobody talks about "succeeding". Even mark uses the word "try". So nobody agrees with this.
(D) Historians should aim to convey past events from the perspective of participants in those events.Mark agrees, Carla does not. WINNER!
(E) Historians should use fictional episodes to supplement their accounts of past events if the documented record of those events is incomplete.Nobody cares about fictionalizing!