Nathan Uglow
Ashgate
Hardback
272
2001
The discipline of history defines itself in terms of proof not trust. However in the eighteenth century it became embarrassingly clear that the capacity of the past to appear as a totality under the critical control of the present eluded historical practice at every stage from research to judgement and to the critical reception of that judgement. Was history a practical but uncritical resource (the ?Temple of Fame?) or a self-enclosed critical project ever shy of ultimate truth? Technical manuals and journal reviews repeatedly reasserted fundamental criteria for acceptable historical practice but failed to eradicate confusion between coping with and exploiting the information differentials between historical actors historians and readers of historical texts.
Ashgate
Hardback
272
2001
The discipline of history defines itself in terms of proof not trust. However in the eighteenth century it became embarrassingly clear that the capacity of the past to appear as a totality under the critical control of the present eluded historical practice at every stage from research to judgement and to the critical reception of that judgement. Was history a practical but uncritical resource (the ?Temple of Fame?) or a self-enclosed critical project ever shy of ultimate truth? Technical manuals and journal reviews repeatedly reasserted fundamental criteria for acceptable historical practice but failed to eradicate confusion between coping with and exploiting the information differentials between historical actors historians and readers of historical texts.