Book 1

BOOK 1
Learning Objectives:
Chapter 1
Introduction to History: Definition, Issues, Sources, and Methodology
To understand the meaning of history as an academic discipline and to be familiar with the
underlying philosophy and methodology of the discipline.
To apply the knowledge in historical methodology and philosophy in assessing and
analyzing existing historical narratives.
To examine and assess critically the value of historical evidences and sources.
To appreciate the importance of history in the social and national life of the Philippines.
This chapter introduces history as a discipline and as a narrative. It presents the definition
of the history, which transcends the common definition of history as the study of the past.
This chapter also discusses several issues in history that consequently opens up for the
theoretical aspects of the discipline. The distinction between primary and secondary
sources is also discussed in relation to the historical subject matter being studied and the
historical methodology employed by the historian. Ultimately, this chapter also tackles the
task of the historian as the arbiter of facts and evidences in making his interpretation and
forming historical narrative.
Definition and Subject Matter

History has always been known as the study of the past. Students of general education often
dread the subject for its notoriety in requiring them to memorize dates, places, names, and
events from distant eras. This low appreciation of the discipline may be rooted from the
shallow understanding of history's relevance to their lives and to their respective contexts.
While the popular definition of history as the study of the past is not wrong, it does not give
justice to the complexity of the subject and its importance to human civilization.
History was derived from the Greek word historia which means "knowledge acquired
through inquiry or investigation." History as a discipline existed for around 2,400 years and
is as old as mathematics and philosophy. This term was then adapted to classical Latin
where it acquired a new definition. Historia became known as the account of the past of a
person or of a group of people through written documents and historical evidences. That
meaning stuck until the early parts of the twentieth century. History became an important
academic discipline. It became the historian's duty to write about the lives of important
individuals like monarchs, heroes, saints, and nobilities. History was also focused on
writing about wars, revolutions, and other important breakthroughs. It is thus important to
ask: What counts as history? Traditional historians lived with the mantra of "no document,
no history." It means that unless a written document can prove a certain historical event,
then it cannot be considered as a historical fact.
But as any other academic disciplines, history progressed and opened up to the possibility
of valid historical sources, which were not limited to written documents, like government
records, chroniclers' accounts; or personal letters. Giving premium to written documents
essentially invalidates the history of other civilizations that do not keep written records.
Some were keener on passing their history by word of mouth. Others got their historical
documents burned or destroyed in the events of war or colonization. Restricting historical
evidence as exclusively written is also discrimination against other social classes who were
not recorded in paper. Nobilities, monarchs, the elite, and even the middle class would have
their birth, education, marriage, and death as matters of government and historical record.
But what of peasant families or indigenous groups who were not given much thought about
being registered to government records? Does the absence of written documents about
them mean that they were people of no history or past? Did they even exist?
This loophole was recognized by historians who started using other kinds of historical
sources, which may not be in written form but were just as valid. A few of these examples
are oral traditions in forms of epics and songs, artifacts, architecture, and memory. History
thus became more inclusive and started collaborating with other disciplines as its auxiliary
disciplines. With the aid of archaeologists, historians can use artifacts from a bygone era to
study ancient civilizations that were formerly ignored in history because of lack of
documents. Linguists can also be helpful in tracing historical evolutions, past connections
among different groups, and flow of cultural influence by studying language and the
changes that it has undergone. Even scientists like biologists and biochemists can help with
the study of the past through analyzing genetic and DNA patterns of human societies.
BOOK 2
LESSON 1
THE MEANING OF HISTORY
HISTORY is derived from the Greek word historia which means learning by inquiry. The
Greek philosopher, Aristotle, looked upon history as the systematic accounting of a set of
natural phenomena, that is, taking into consideration the chronological arrangement of the
account. This explained that knowledge is derived through conducting a process of
scientific investigation of past events.
The word History is referred usually for accounts of phenomena, especially human affairs
in chronological order. There are theories constructed by historians in investigating history:
the factual history and the speculative history. Factual history presents readers the plain
and basic information vis-à-vis the events that took place (what), the time and date with
which the events happened (when), the place with which the events took place, and the
people that were involved (who). Speculative history, on the other hand, goes beyond facts
because it is concerned about the reasons for which events happened (why), and the way
they happened (how). "It tries to speculate on the cause and effect of an event" (Cantal,
Cardinal, Espino & Galindo, 2014).
History deals with the study of past events. Individuals who write about history are called
historians. They seek to understand the present by examining what went before. They
undertake arduous historical research to come up with a meaningful and organized
rebuilding of the past. But whose past are we talking about? This is the basic question that
the historian needs to answer because this sets the purpose and framework of a historical
account. Hence, a salient feature of historical writing is the facility to give meaning and
impact value to a group of people about their past. The practice of historical writing is
called historiography, the traditional method in doing historical research that focus on
gathering of documents from different libraries and archives to form a pool of evidence
needed in making a descriptive or analytical narrative. The modern historical writing does
not only include examination of documents but also the use of research methods from
related areas of study such as archeology and geography.
THE LIMITATION OF HISTORICAL KNOWLEDGE
The incompleteness of records has limited man's knowledge of history. Most human affairs
happen without leaving any evidence or records of any kind, no artifacts, or if there are, no
further evidence of the human setting in which to place surviving artifacts. Although it may
have happened, but the past has perished forever with only occasional traces. The whole
history of the past (called history-as-actuality) can be known to a historian only through
the surviving records (history-as-record), and most of history- as-record is only a tiny part
the whole phenomenon. Even the archaeological and anthropological discoveries are only
small parts discovered from the total past.
Historians study the records or evidences that survived the time. They tell history from
what they understood as a credible part of the record. However, their claims may remain
variable as there can be historical records that could be discovered, which may affirm or
refute those that they have already presented. This explains the "incompleteness" of the
"object" that historians study.
HISTORY AS THE SUBJECTIVE PROCESS OF RE-CREATION
From the incomplete evidence, historians strive to restore the total past of mankind. They
do it from the point of view that human beings live in different times and that their
experiences maybe somehow comparable, or that their experiences may have significantly
differed contingent on the place and time. For the historian, history becomes only that part
of the human past which can be meaningfully reconstructed from the available records and
from inferences regarding their setting.
In short, the historian's aim is verisimilitude (the truth, authenticity, plausibility) about a
past. Unlike the study of the natural science that has objectively measurable phenomena,
the study of history is a subjective process as documents and relics are scattered and do not
together comprise the total object that the historian is studying. Some of the natural
scientists, such as geologists and paleo-zoologists who study fossils from the traces of a
perished past, greatly resemble historians in this regard, but they differ at certain points
since historians deal with human testimonies as well as physical traces.
2. Secondary sources, on the other hand, are materials made by people long after the events
being described had taken place to provide valuable interpretations of historical events. A
secondary source analyzes and interprets primary sources. It is an interpretation of
second-hand account of a historical event. Examples of secondary sources are biographies,
histories, literary criticism, books written by a third party about a historical event, art and
theater reviews, newspaper or journal articles that interpret.

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Definition and Subject Matter

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