Question

In a few sentences, describe a way that a past historical event could inform your understanding of the recent event. Briefly describe a strategy for how you could be conscious of presentism (the use of modern values to interpret past events) in the study of those past events.

Answer 1

In studying history we come across what men were and did, and it helps us understand what we can be and do. Thus, history is the science of the past and the present, but the study of the past and the understanding of the present do not happen in a perfect way, as we do not have the power to return to the past and it does not repeat itself. For this reason, the past has to be “recreated”, taking into account the changes that have occurred over time. Information collected in the past will not serve the present if it is not recreated, questioned, understood and interpreted.