Month: October 2013
Travel Narratives and Diaries
Travel narratives definitely have a unique role in history. This is because no one narrative will be identical to another. There are many factors that contribute to the nature, attitude, and overall quality of the narrative. For example in Long Way Down, will never compare to, lets say, two people backpacking to Africa with little money and almost no formal training. The fact that Ewan McGregor and his friend Charley Boorman had on call resources will, of course, change the way they viewed the trip. For example, because they had assistants gathering visas and passports for them, they probably have no idea what it is like to do something like that. The story these two men would tell would be entirely different from a story that another man who had to do it alone would tell.
Travel narratives and diaries are fantastic pieces of historical evidence because they are so “in the moment,” even after decades have passed. They create a visual image and help understand conditions of a specific time period. If I wanted to argue that living conditions in the Congo have always been rough, I could look at travel narratives of those who have passed through the area. For example, I could begin with a diary of Henry Morton Stanley as he explored the Congo, and I could go on to find others in more recent times.
The only issue with narratives is bias. But isn’t there a problem with bias in everything? I think that narratives and diaries are still great pieces of history, as long as the one analyzing is aware of bias. For example, if someone was prejudice against Africans, they could easily say, “Africa was the worst experience of their trip.” However, in no way does this mean that Africa is a “bad” place to visit. Like everything else, narratives should be analyzed and taken with a grain of salt.
I believe that going on these extended trips can make just about anyone see the true beauty of the world. But there is no doubt that each person will see it in a different way.
“Why didn’t I learn this in high school?”
Learning qualitative and quantitative methods definitely broadened my understanding of history. Like theory, it makes you think a little harder, look a little deeper and be more critical. It is a fantastic tool for research in general, however, it is especially helpful when constructing an argument. For example, if I wanted to argue that the great depression weakened men’s masculinity, I could look at photographs, art, diaries etc. In analyzing these pieces of evidence I would be able to code them (like we did in class) with categories such as, masculine, non-masculine, poor, and wealthy. In doing so I could conclude the percentage of men that were non-masculine versus the percentage of men who were masculine. I could then correlate these numbers with the percentage what were wealthy or poor. For example: X% of poor men were non-masculine, or, X% of masculine men were poor. There are so many correlations to make that it is almost fascinating. It really opens your mind to a million possibilities.
Some people would ask “well why do we have to deal with numbers when we can just analyze visually and have a discussion?” I was one of these people until I realized the importance of these methods. Never did I ever think that “putting a number on it,” would be helpful, because the thought of working with numbers gives me a headache. They really do have a way of making history come to life, in that, looking at percentages can better an understanding of events, trends and culture.
These methods are most certainly valuable because while they offer a different approach, they force the mind to think a little differently; look at something from a different perspective. More often than not, it’s very refreshing and actually beneficial to the work you’re doing. This is because you may have an opinion about something, then put numbers on it and feel completely differently. In my opinion, you can never over-analyze, you can only under-analyze.
I have actually come to really like these methods because of the notion of coding. I enjoy that it is entirely up to you what you want to use as categories. You can look at the same image a million times and get different results every single time using various codes. At the risk of sounding too cliché, the sky really is the limit when analyzing qualitatively and quantitatively.
I could use these methods for all topics in history. Since I am going to be teaching high school history, I would love to get a better grip on how to use these methods so that I can better relay content to my students. I would have loved to have learned this stuff when I was in high school. Every day I learn something new in college and I ask myself “why didn’t I learn this in high school?” I think that these methods not only help historians further their research, but it can also be extremely helpful for students when learning history content.
Courtney Allen 