Can historiography be objective? An examination of the thought of Carl Lotus Becker and Kenneth Scott Latourette.

摘要

The purpose of this dissertation was to compare and evaluate the perspectives of Carl Lotus Becker and Kenneth Scott Latourette regarding the possibility of writing history objectively. For this purpose, chapter I identified foundational issues related to the problem and surveyed historiographical patterns in America. The chapter examined both the influence of new relativistic perspectives and the collapse of the naive dream of pursuing neutral objectivity.;Chapter II described Becker's relativistic view of writing history in which he addressed the nature, location, and time of a historical fact. Becker concluded, "History is the memory of things said and done." However, this relativistic view of a historical fact has limits and Becker later cancelled his position.;Chapter III delineated Kenneth Scott Latourette's position on objectivity. Latourette combined a Christian perspective with a global-empirical approach. His empirical analysis of the influence of Jesus following the geographic extension of Christianity and the continuing reciprocal influence of Christianity and culture influenced subsequent historians and encouraged them to pursue the past from perspectives beyond a uniform objectivity. The dissertation concludes with the emphasis that if the task of the historian is to give people a memory and keep it honest, speculation about historical theory should be reigned in by relentless search for corroborative detail.