Writing history means composing a story, and a story requires a point of view

The argument

The second argument concerns the form history takes. Proponents of this position argue that a history is not a list of established facts but a narrative that explains, and that explanation requires choices no evidence can settle. A chronicle of everything that happened would be unreadable and would explain nothing, so the historian must select, arrange, compress and connect. Proponents argue that each of those operations is an interpretation. Deciding that one event caused another, rather than merely preceding it, is a judgement about how societies work. Deciding how much space a episode receives tells the reader how much it mattered. Calling a leader cautious rather than indecisive, or a revolt a rebellion rather than an uprising, settles a question of evaluation inside a word that looks descriptive. Proponents argue that such words cannot be avoided, because a history written entirely in neutral vocabulary would convey no account of anything, and the available vocabulary comes loaded. They add that this is why the field keeps rewriting the same periods. Proponents argue that if objectivity were achievable, well-documented events would eventually be settled and stay settled, whereas in fact each generation produces new accounts of them, not usually because new documents appear but because the questions, sympathies and concerns of the writers have changed. On this account history is continuously rewritten because it is written by people whose present shapes what they find significant in the past, and that is not a flaw to be corrected but the nature of the activity. The argument concludes that because history must be composed rather than merely recorded, it cannot be written objectively.

Premises

Counter-arguments

Critics answer that the argument slides from interpretation to arbitrariness, since interpretations are themselves better or worse supported and historians routinely show one to be mistaken by appeal to the record. They add that loaded vocabulary is a problem historians have addressed explicitly by defining terms and explaining the choice, which is an application of method rather than a failure of it. On the point about rewriting, critics argue that revision in light of new questions is how any field of knowledge advances, and that continuing inquiry is evidence of a discipline working rather than proof that its object cannot be known.

Rejecting the premises

[Rejecting P1] Selecting and arranging material is not the same as distorting it, and a selection can be defended or faulted by reference to the record. [Rejecting P2] Loaded vocabulary is a difficulty historians address explicitly, by defining terms and explaining the choice, which is an application of method rather than a failure of it. [Rejecting P3] Revision in light of new questions is how any field of knowledge advances, and continuing inquiry is evidence of a discipline working rather than proof that its object cannot be known. [Rejecting C] At most it follows that no single history is final, which is compatible with each being written objectively.