Objectivity, truth and bias for HSC History Extension
“Students evaluate debates about objectivity, truth, bias and relativism in history, including empiricist, relativist and postmodern positions”
The debate over objectivity runs from empiricism (Ranke, Elton, and Evans's chastened version) which holds that evidence constrains interpretation and truth is approachable, through relativism and present-mindedness (Carr's selecting historian, Becker's every man his own historian) which insists all history bears the mark of its author's standpoint, to the postmodern challenge (Hayden White's emplotment, Foucault's discourse, Jenkins's scepticism) which questions whether history refers to the past at all. The strongest position is usually a critical empiricism that accepts perspective yet maintains that evidence still makes some accounts false, as Holocaust denial shows.
Picture three witnesses describing a car crash. The first insists that if you just look at the skid marks, the dashcam footage and the wreckage carefully enough, you can work out exactly what happened, no opinions needed, that is the empiricist. The second says: hold on, which bits of evidence you even bother collecting, and which details you think matter, depends on who you are and what you already believe, so your "objective" report is never fully neutral, that is the relativist. The third witness goes further and says the whole "story" of the crash, who is the hero, who is to blame, is basically a narrative you are choosing to tell, like picking whether to frame it as a tragedy or a farce, and the "facts" barely constrain that choice at all, that is the postmodernist. Historians have been having exactly this argument about the whole of the past for over a century. The safest, most defensible position for an exam answer is the middle one with a floor: yes, your perspective always shapes your account, but the evidence is still real and can prove some stories flatly wrong, Holocaust denial being the clearest example.
What this dot point is asking
This dot point addresses one of the central debates in Constructing History: can history be objective and tell the truth about the past, or is every history shaped, even determined, by the perspective of its author? It asks you to map the spectrum of positions, from confident empiricism through moderate relativism to radical postmodern scepticism, to attach named historians and philosophers to each, and then to argue a defensible view of your own. This is the most philosophical of the key debates, and the Extension exam frequently turns on it, so you must be able to hold the positions in tension rather than caricaturing any of them.
The answer
At one end of the spectrum stands the empiricist tradition, which holds that the past is real, that evidence constrains interpretation, and that the historian, through disciplined method, can approach an objective and truthful account. Leopold von Ranke is its founder, with his ambition to show the past as it essentially was through critical use of the archive. In the twentieth century Geoffrey Elton defended this position vigorously in The Practice of History, insisting that the historian's job is to recover the intentions and actions of people in the past on the basis of the surviving evidence, and that the discipline has rigorous rules that discipline interpretation. More recently Richard Evans, in In Defence of History (1997), restated a chastened empiricism: historians can never achieve total objectivity, but evidence genuinely limits what can be truthfully said, and some accounts are simply wrong.
E.H. Carr's instruction, study the historian before you begin to study the facts, and his claim that the facts of history never come to us pure, are from What Is History? (1961) and are the canonical statement of the relativist, present-minded position. Pair them with Elton's empiricist reply for the core objectivity debate.
The relativist and present-minded position
In the middle of the spectrum sits the position, often called relativist or perspectivist, that all history is written from a standpoint and bears the marks of the historian's own time. E.H. Carr, in What Is History? (1961), argued that facts do not speak for themselves; the historian selects, arranges and interprets them, and the questions asked are shaped by the present. His famous advice was to study the historian before you study the history. The American historian Carl Becker went further with the phrase that every man is his own historian, stressing that the past is reconstructed in the present mind. This position does not deny that the past was real, but it insists that our access to it is always mediated by perspective, selection and the concerns of the age.
The postmodern challenge
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. This position provoked fierce reaction: Geoffrey Elton called it a threat to the discipline, and Keith Windschuttle, in The Killing of History (1994), attacked postmodern relativism as corrosive of the possibility of historical truth.
Holding a position
The mark of a strong Extension response is not to declare one camp simply right. The most defensible position is usually a critical empiricism that absorbs the relativist insight: the past was real and evidence genuinely constrains what can be said, yet every account is selected, framed and shaped by the historian's perspective and present. Evans's formulation is useful here, that recognising the historian's subjectivity does not collapse into the claim that any account is as good as any other, because evidence still allows us to call some accounts false. The Holocaust is the standard test case: its denial is not a legitimate interpretation but a falsehood the evidence refutes, which shows that radical relativism has limits.
Worked example 1 - a short-answer response (6 marks)
Question. Explain the postmodern challenge to historical objectivity, with reference to Hayden White.
Model answer. Hayden White, in Metahistory (1973), argued that historians impose narrative forms, such as tragedy, comedy, romance or satire, onto the raw material of the past, a process he called emplotment; because the same events can be emplotted in different narrative modes, the meaning of a history comes as much from its literary structure as from the evidence itself. This is a more radical challenge than E.H. Carr's relativism, since it questions whether evidence can discipline narrative meaning at all, and it undermines the empiricist claim that rigorous method alone secures a truthful, objective account. The challenge provoked strong reaction: Geoffrey Elton called such postmodern positions a threat to the discipline, and Keith Windschuttle, in The Killing of History (1994), attacked postmodern relativism as corrosive of historical truth itself.
Marker's note: markers reward White's term "emplotment" correctly explained with the text and date, an explicit link to WHY this challenges objectivity (narrative form competing with evidence), and at least one named response or critic. Describing White's view with no mention of emplotment's implication for truth caps mid-band.
Worked example 2 - a data/stimulus response (5 marks)
Question. Read this extract from Richard Evans's reply to postmodernism (2002): "If there is such a thing as historical untruth, there must also be such a thing as historical truth... [the objective historian] puts preconceived ideas... to the test of whether or not they are supported by the evidence." Analyse what position this extract represents and how it responds to the postmodern challenge.
Model answer. Evans reasons from the existence of clear historical falsehoods to the necessary existence of historical truths, and defines objectivity procedurally, testing preconceptions against evidence, rather than claiming a historian has no perspective at all. This represents a "chastened empiricism": Evans concedes total objectivity is unattainable, since perspective inevitably shapes which questions a historian asks, but insists evidence still disciplines interpretation enough to rule some accounts false. This directly counters postmodernists such as Hayden White and Keith Jenkins, who suggest historical narrative is not tightly bound by evidence, positioning Evans between Ranke's confident empiricism and the postmodern challenge without collapsing into either.
Marker's note: about 2 marks for accurate close reading of the truth/untruth logic and the procedural definition of objectivity, and about 3 marks for correctly placing the position as a response to postmodernism with the "chastened empiricism" concept named.
Worked example 3 - an extended-response paragraph (assess)
Question (paragraph only). To what extent can historians achieve objectivity? Write one body paragraph weighing the postmodern challenge against its limits.
Model paragraph. The postmodern challenge, that historians impose literary structure on the past through what Hayden White calls emplotment, exposes a genuine limit on naive empiricism: no history is a transparent window onto "what happened." Yet this challenge itself has a limit. Holocaust denial could, on a purely relativist logic, be treated as merely an alternative narrative emplotment of the same events; but Richard Evans's rebuttal, that "if there is such a thing as historical untruth, there must also be such a thing as historical truth," and the overwhelming documentary and testimonial evidence for the Holocaust, show that some historical claims are simply false, whatever narrative form is chosen. This demonstrates that while narrative and perspective shape every history, as White, Carr and Becker rightly insist, evidence still disciplines interpretation enough to distinguish defensible history from falsehood, which is exactly the "chastened empiricism" that offers the most defensible position on the spectrum.
Marker's note: markers reward a thesis that WEIGHS the postmodern challenge against a demonstrated limit (not a description of "some people think history is subjective"); a named test case (Holocaust denial); and an explicit synthesis position (chastened empiricism), not an unresolved "both sides have a point."
A common mistake is to collapse the debate into objective versus biased and to treat any perspective as fatal bias. The relativist insight is not that history is worthless but that it is always perspectival, and the empiricist reply is not that historians are neutral but that evidence still constrains them. Avoid the cruder error of arguing that because all history is interpreted, all interpretations are equally valid; the limits of relativism, shown by Holocaust denial, must be acknowledged.
Do not confuse Carr's relativism with Hayden White's postmodernism; Carr still believes a real, evidence-constrained past exists and can be more or less well interpreted, while White questions whether narrative form itself can be disciplined by evidence at all. Treating them as the same position loses the "degree of scepticism" distinction markers look for.
Avoid naming a historian (Ranke, Carr, White) with no attributed text, date or quotation; "some historians think facts speak for themselves" earns little compared with "Carr argued in What Is History? (1961) that facts do not speak for themselves."
- Name the position, the person, and the formulation, every time
- "Relativism (Carr, What Is History?, 1961): facts do not speak for themselves" is markable; "some people say history is subjective" is not.
- Use the spectrum, not a binary
- 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.
- Always test relativism against its limit
- 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.
- Commit to a defensible synthesis
- 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.
Using this in an answer
When you write, name the position, the historian and the key formulation, then weigh the positions against each other and commit to a defensible synthesis. Set Carr's selecting historian against Elton's disciplining evidence, then bring in White's emplotment and Evans's reply. Demonstrating that you can hold objectivity and perspective in productive tension, rather than choosing a side and ignoring the other, is exactly the higher-order judgement the dot point and the exam reward.
Exam-style questions
Questions in the style of NESA exam questions on this dot point, each with a worked answer. They are written by ExamExplained unless tagged "Past paper"; the year shows the paper a question is modelled on.
2021 HSC-styleTo what extent can historians be certain about the past? Integrate Sources A and B and at least ONE other source throughout your argument. (Source A: Katie Engelhart, 'History on Trial', BBC History Magazine, 2013. Source B: Richard J. Evans, in the Great Debate on History and Postmodernism, University of New South Wales, 2002.)Show worked answer →
This 25 mark Section I question is the objectivity and truth debate in exam form: "can historians be certain about the past?" A band 6 answer (21 to 25) gives a critical, sustained judgement and integrates both sources plus at least one other.
- Stage the empiricist versus sceptic clash
- Source B is Richard Evans defending objectivity straight from his reply to postmodernism: "if there is such a thing as historical untruth, there must also be such a thing as historical truth", and an objective historian "puts preconceived ideas... to the test of whether or not they are supported by the evidence". Source A (Engelhart) supplies the doubt: "History is uncertain; lawyers want guilt or innocence."
- Bring in the relativist and postmodern poles
- For a complete answer add at least ONE further named position - Carr (the historian's questions shape the facts), Becker (every age rewrites history), or Hayden White (history is narrative emplotment). Set these against the empiricists Ranke and Elton.
- Judgement
- Argue a defensible middle position rewarded by markers: absolute objectivity is unattainable because perspective and bias are real, yet evidence and method discipline interpretation, so history can be truthful and defensible without being certain. Sustain this throughout.
Practice questions
Original practice questions graded from foundation to exam level, each with a full worked solution. Try them before revealing the solution.
foundation3 marksDefine the empiricist position on historical objectivity and name the historian who founded it.Show worked solution →
Definition (2 marks). Empiricism holds that the past is real, that surviving evidence constrains what can truthfully be said about it, and that a historian, through disciplined method, can approach an objective and truthful account.
Founder (1 mark). Leopold von Ranke, whose ambition was to show the past "as it essentially was" (wie es eigentlich gewesen) through critical, disciplined use of the archive.
Marking spine: an accurate definition naming evidence as a constraint (2), Ranke correctly named (1). Naming Elton or Evans instead of Ranke as the "founder" loses the mark, though both may be added as later defenders.
foundation4 marksExplain E.H. Carr's claim that 'facts do not speak for themselves' in What Is History? (1961).Show worked solution →
The claim (2 marks). Carr argued that historical facts do not have an inherent, self-evident meaning; the historian selects which facts to include, arranges them, and interprets them, so the resulting account always bears the mark of the historian's choices.
Implication (2 marks). Because selection is unavoidable, and the questions a historian asks are shaped by the concerns of their own present, all history is written from a standpoint; Carr's advice to "study the historian before you study the facts" follows directly from this.
Marking spine: the "no self-evident meaning, selection is unavoidable" point (2), the present-mindedness implication with the "study the historian" instruction (2). Simply stating "Carr said history is biased" without the selection mechanism caps at 2.
core5 marksRead this extract from Richard Evans's reply to postmodernism (Great Debate on History and Postmodernism, UNSW, 2002): 'If there is such a thing as historical untruth, there must also be such a thing as historical truth... [the objective historian] puts preconceived ideas... to the test of whether or not they are supported by the evidence.' Analyse what position this extract represents and how it responds to the postmodern challenge.Show worked solution →
A 5-mark 'analyse' rewards close reading of the extract PLUS its place in the wider debate.
Close reading (about 2 marks). Evans argues from the existence of clear historical falsehoods (untruths) to the necessary existence of historical truths, and defines objectivity procedurally, as a method of testing preconceptions against evidence, rather than claiming a historian has no perspective at all.
Historiographical significance (about 3 marks). This is a "chastened empiricism": Evans concedes that total objectivity is unattainable (perspective shapes questions and emphasis) but insists evidence still disciplines interpretation enough to rule some accounts false, directly countering postmodernists such as Hayden White and Keith Jenkins, who suggest historical narratives are primarily literary constructions not tightly bound by evidence. Evans's position sits between Ranke's confident empiricism and the postmodern challenge, absorbing the relativist insight about perspective without collapsing into "any account is as good as any other."
Marking spine: accurate close reading of the truth/untruth logic and the procedural definition of objectivity (2), correct placement of the position as a response to postmodernism with the "chastened empiricism" idea (3).
core6 marksExplain the postmodern challenge to historical objectivity, with reference to Hayden White.Show worked solution →
The challenge (about 3 marks). Hayden White, in Metahistory (1973), argued that historians impose narrative forms, such as tragedy, comedy, romance or satire, onto the raw material of the past, a process he called emplotment. Because the same set of events can be emplotted in different narrative modes, the meaning a history conveys comes as much from its literary structure as from the evidence itself, which questions whether historical writing offers direct, unmediated access to "what happened."
Significance for the objectivity debate (about 3 marks). White's argument is more radical than Carr's relativism because it suggests the historian's narrative choices are essentially literary and cannot be fully disciplined by evidence, undermining the empiricist claim that method alone can secure a truthful, objective account. This provoked strong reaction: Geoffrey Elton called such postmodern challenges a threat to the discipline, and Keith Windschuttle, in The Killing of History (1994), attacked postmodern relativism as corrosive of the very possibility of historical truth.
Marking spine: emplotment correctly explained with the text/date (3), the challenge linked explicitly to the objectivity debate plus at least one named response/critic (3). Describing White's view without the term "emplotment" or its implication for truth caps at 4.
core6 marksCompare the relativist and postmodern positions on whether history can be objective.Show worked solution →
Relativism (about 3 marks). E.H. Carr and Carl Becker hold that the past was real, but that our access to it is always mediated by the historian's selection, questions and present-day concerns ("every man his own historian," Becker). This position does not deny that some accounts are more defensible than others, only that no account is a view from nowhere.
Postmodernism (about 3 marks). Hayden White and Keith Jenkins go further, questioning whether historical narrative can refer to the past in any straightforward way at all, since narrative form (emplotment) and discourse (Foucault's link between knowledge and power) shape historical meaning as much as, or more than, the evidence does.
Marking spine: both positions defined with a correctly attributed named example (3 each). A strong answer notes the difference in DEGREE: relativism insists on perspective within a real, evidence-constrained past; postmodernism questions whether evidence can constrain narrative meaning at all. Naming only one position, or conflating the two, caps around 4.
exam20 marksTo what extent can historians achieve objectivity when writing about the past? Argue a defensible position with reference to at least THREE named historians or philosophers.Show worked solution →
A 20-mark extended response needs a sustained, weighed argument across at least three named figures, culminating in a defensible synthesis, not a description of three positions in sequence.
Band 6 PLAN.
Thesis: Absolute objectivity is unattainable because every historian selects, questions and narrates from a standpoint, yet evidence genuinely constrains what can truthfully be said, so history can be defensible and truthful without being certain; a critical, chastened empiricism is the most defensible position on the spectrum.
Argument 1 (empiricism). Ranke's ambition to show the past "as it essentially was" through the critical archive founded the claim that disciplined method approaches objective truth; Elton defended this in The Practice of History. Evans's In Defence of History (1997) restates a "chastened" version: total objectivity is impossible, but "if there is such a thing as historical untruth, there must also be such a thing as historical truth", so evidence still rules some accounts false.
Argument 2 (relativism). Carr's What Is History? (1961) shows "facts do not speak for themselves"; the historian selects and interprets them, shaped by present-day questions, hence "study the historian before you study the facts." Becker's "every man is his own historian" pushes this further: the past is reconstructed anew in each present mind. This corrects naive empiricism without denying a real past existed.
Argument 3 (postmodernism and its limit). White's Metahistory (1973) argues historians "emplot" events into narrative forms, so meaning comes partly from structure, not evidence alone; Foucault linked knowledge to power and discourse. But this has a limit: Holocaust denial is not a legitimate alternative "emplotment", it is a claim evidence refutes, which is why Evans and Windschuttle (The Killing of History, 1994) insist radical relativism cannot be taken to its logical extreme.
Judgement: naive empiricism (a neutral mirror of the past) is untenable given Carr's selection argument, but radical postmodernism, treating all narratives as equally arbitrary, is untenable given Holocaust denial. The most defensible position is Evans's chastened empiricism: perspective is real, but evidence still makes objectivity an approachable ideal.
Marker's note: reward a sustained THESIS taking a defensible position (not "it depends"); at least three named figures across empiricist, relativist and postmodern positions with attributed texts/quotations and dates; explicit engagement with the limits of relativism via Holocaust denial; and a calibrated final judgement.
exam8 marksAnalyse the limits of historical relativism, using Holocaust denial as a test case.Show worked solution →
An 8-mark 'analyse' needs the relativist position explained, then its limit demonstrated through the test case, with a named response.
- The relativist claim (about 3 marks)
- Relativists such as Carr and postmodernists such as Hayden White argue that all history is shaped by the historian's selection, present-day concerns, or narrative form (emplotment), which could seem to imply that competing accounts of the same events are simply different, equally valid perspectives.
- The limit, demonstrated (about 3 marks)
- Holocaust denial is the standard test case: if relativism were taken to its logical extreme, denial could be framed as merely an alternative "narrative" or "perspective" on the same events. But the weight of documentary, physical and testimonial evidence makes Holocaust denial demonstrably false, not an alternative interpretation, showing that evidence still constrains what can truthfully be claimed regardless of narrative framing.
- The synthesis (about 2 marks)
- Richard Evans's formulation, that recognising a historian's subjectivity does not mean "any account is as good as any other" because evidence still allows some claims to be ruled false, captures why relativism has real force (perspective matters) but real limits (evidence still adjudicates truth and falsehood).
Marker's note: markers reward the relativist claim stated accurately (3), the Holocaust-denial test case used correctly to show the LIMIT of relativism rather than just described (3), and Evans's synthesis or an equivalent named position closing the argument (2).