Quick questions on Objectivity, truth and bias for HSC History Extension

(1961) and are the canonical statement of the relativist, present-minded position. Pair them with Elton's empiricist reply for the core objectivity debate. :::

At the radical end stands the postmodern or linguistic challenge, which questions whether historical writing can refer to the past at all in any straightforward way. Hayden White, in Metahistory (1973), argued that historians impose narrative forms, tragedy, comedy, romance, satire, on the chaos of the past, so that the meaning of a history comes as much from its literary emplotment as from the evidence. Michel Foucault treated historical knowledge as bound up with power and discourse rather than neutral truth. Keith Jenkins pushed the sceptical case furthest, arguing that history is a discourse about the past, not the past itself, and that claims to objectivity are illusory.

Do not reduce the debate to "objective vs biased"; place empiricism, relativism and postmodernism along a spectrum of increasing scepticism, and show you understand the difference in DEGREE between them.

Holocaust denial is the standard, examiner-recognised test case for showing that relativism cannot be taken to its logical extreme; use it to anchor your final judgement.

The strongest closing position is usually "critical" or "chastened" empiricism (Evans): perspective is real, but evidence still makes some accounts false. An answer that simply lists three positions with no judgement will not reach the top band.