What types of Written history and what is history
By Mlungisi Zwelihle Gumede
This article is about history and types of written history. People tend to think that history is only about the past events of which is something wrong or not true. In this short writings questions like what is history?, will be answered and discussed fully. Types of written history such as narriative history, Didactic history and Genetic history will be discussed.
What is history?
History have been defined in different ways by historians and scholars of history. The definition of this term differ from one person to another and from one historian to another. According to some historians the word history comes from the Greec word "Historia" which means knowledge acquired through investigation. Defining the word history is problematic, it is a problem because people define the term history in various ways. Some have defined history as the events of the past. The actual happenings of the past and record or account of those events. The process of writting and recording of history is called historification.
Another historian by the name of Thomas Guinsburg has defined history as the record of the past, however long ago and however recent. Jawahalal have defined history as the struggle of mankind through generations against nature, against wild beast and against everyone who had tried to keep him down. According to Henry Johnson history is everything that happened.
History is the knowledge of the past events which are recorded in one form or another. History is sometimes refered to as the science that first investigate andthen record events; from the definition it emerges that most central issues is action of people. These events takes place at a particular time and in a specific geographical location. There are many different types of history for instance, geography history, economic history, political history, cultural history and almost history of everything.
Types of written history
Historians have introduced various methods of producing history and these includes narriative history. Herodotus a Greec historian who was latter refered to as the father of history was the first historian to develop narriative history. Narriative is a type of history that looks at historical events as serries of interesting information that follows each other in the order of time and space. In simpler terms narriative history is a story told in a written form and this is the oldest type of history. It began to be written when letters of alphabet were discovered.
Narriative history have been used in many instances to provide an account of the actions of leaders, in many instances this is usually for the purpose of glorifyng actions of the leaders for example in the history of zulu actions. Historians have produced a narriative account of the leadership of king Shaka, in this leadership the purpose is to glorify the military tactics in the building of zulu nation, Some historians have used narriative history to account step by step how African societies were conquered by European nations.
Another type of written history is didactic history. The word didactic comes from the Greec word "didaskein" which mean to teach. The type of history that comes out from this word is didactic history which is sometimes refered to as instructive history. The main purpose and the main aim of didactic history is to treat historical events as precedents for individual actions for society at movement. Scholars have argued that didactic history provides the best value for the teaching of history, this is the case because if history is written didactically it serves the role of a teacher because it enables us to base our conduct on a perfect understanding of existing condition.
Some historians have argued that another importance of didactic history it arises from the fact that a historical situation of today maybe similar to historical situation of yeasterday. Our knowledge of yeasterday can help us to handle present situations. Another importance of this type of history is that knowledge is kept in stores through memory can be a useful tool for correcting our conduct in the present situations.
Didactic history can be considered as the store house of lessons that we could use to shape our understanding. Didactic therefore is a universal teacher of humankind that enables us to get lessons from the successes and failure of others
Didactic history benefit both young and the old, for the old it serves as a nurse and support to the expirience they already have, for the young it serves as the tuber and it enrich the young minds with expirience. This type of history was influencial during the period of the state formation in Eourope.
Another type of writen history is genetic history. Genetic history is a type of history that sees history as an elaborate complex of causes and effects showing growth and evolutions; this is seen as the basic phenomenon in the study of history
In the final analysis therefore the term history have been defined in different ways above. However you can still define history in your own way but your definition must have something to do with the past if not that is not the good definition of the term history. Currently there are 3 types of written history. As time goes on historians will introduce or add new types of written history if possiple.
References:
professor Sipho Hamilton Sumelane lecture at university of zululand
This article is about history and types of written history. People tend to think that history is only about the past events of which is something wrong or not true. In this short writings questions like what is history?, will be answered and discussed fully. Types of written history such as narriative history, Didactic history and Genetic history will be discussed.
What is history?
History have been defined in different ways by historians and scholars of history. The definition of this term differ from one person to another and from one historian to another. According to some historians the word history comes from the Greec word "Historia" which means knowledge acquired through investigation. Defining the word history is problematic, it is a problem because people define the term history in various ways. Some have defined history as the events of the past. The actual happenings of the past and record or account of those events. The process of writting and recording of history is called historification.
Another historian by the name of Thomas Guinsburg has defined history as the record of the past, however long ago and however recent. Jawahalal have defined history as the struggle of mankind through generations against nature, against wild beast and against everyone who had tried to keep him down. According to Henry Johnson history is everything that happened.
History is the knowledge of the past events which are recorded in one form or another. History is sometimes refered to as the science that first investigate andthen record events; from the definition it emerges that most central issues is action of people. These events takes place at a particular time and in a specific geographical location. There are many different types of history for instance, geography history, economic history, political history, cultural history and almost history of everything.
Types of written history
Historians have introduced various methods of producing history and these includes narriative history. Herodotus a Greec historian who was latter refered to as the father of history was the first historian to develop narriative history. Narriative is a type of history that looks at historical events as serries of interesting information that follows each other in the order of time and space. In simpler terms narriative history is a story told in a written form and this is the oldest type of history. It began to be written when letters of alphabet were discovered.
Narriative history have been used in many instances to provide an account of the actions of leaders, in many instances this is usually for the purpose of glorifyng actions of the leaders for example in the history of zulu actions. Historians have produced a narriative account of the leadership of king Shaka, in this leadership the purpose is to glorify the military tactics in the building of zulu nation, Some historians have used narriative history to account step by step how African societies were conquered by European nations.
Another type of written history is didactic history. The word didactic comes from the Greec word "didaskein" which mean to teach. The type of history that comes out from this word is didactic history which is sometimes refered to as instructive history. The main purpose and the main aim of didactic history is to treat historical events as precedents for individual actions for society at movement. Scholars have argued that didactic history provides the best value for the teaching of history, this is the case because if history is written didactically it serves the role of a teacher because it enables us to base our conduct on a perfect understanding of existing condition.
Some historians have argued that another importance of didactic history it arises from the fact that a historical situation of today maybe similar to historical situation of yeasterday. Our knowledge of yeasterday can help us to handle present situations. Another importance of this type of history is that knowledge is kept in stores through memory can be a useful tool for correcting our conduct in the present situations.
Didactic history can be considered as the store house of lessons that we could use to shape our understanding. Didactic therefore is a universal teacher of humankind that enables us to get lessons from the successes and failure of others
Didactic history benefit both young and the old, for the old it serves as a nurse and support to the expirience they already have, for the young it serves as the tuber and it enrich the young minds with expirience. This type of history was influencial during the period of the state formation in Eourope.
Another type of writen history is genetic history. Genetic history is a type of history that sees history as an elaborate complex of causes and effects showing growth and evolutions; this is seen as the basic phenomenon in the study of history
In the final analysis therefore the term history have been defined in different ways above. However you can still define history in your own way but your definition must have something to do with the past if not that is not the good definition of the term history. Currently there are 3 types of written history. As time goes on historians will introduce or add new types of written history if possiple.
References:
professor Sipho Hamilton Sumelane lecture at university of zululand
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