Originally posted by kookingpot
View Post
I have some reservations about your expertise in the social sciences. You keep saying you have lots of experience in the academic realm, but it seems to me that all you have is access to an archive. You don't seem to understand how the social sciences work, the importance of secondary literature (not just primary sources), or anything that one should get from higher level education in history or other social sciences.
Yes, primary sources are the basis upon which historians build their arguments. But secondary sources are equally important. You have to know what other people are saying on a subject before you can enter the conversation. Your insistence on not reading the pertinent secondary literature in this case reveals a lack of understanding of how the study of history works at the higher levels. You have to read other people's work, understand what evidence they use, and evaluate their arguments, even if it is to criticize and explain its flaws (as many on this side do).
Primary source documents are limited by the fact that you don't always necessarily know the full context of the documents in question. Primary sources are biased. (ALL sources are biased. Again, the first thing you learn in an upper-level history class). You can't necessarily take primary source documents at face value all the time, you have to carefully evaluate each one. Relying solely on primary source documents is faulty methodology, as they teach in introductory methods classes in graduate school. Others are doing the exact same thing, looking at the same sources, and making their own interpretations. Being a historian (and here we are in fact being historians, as far as I am concerned), is not just a matter of collecting information from primary sources, but of interpreting them and arguing for your interpretation. This also relies on understanding what arguments have already been put out there. You have to read secondary literature to understand how the rest of the scholarly world views the primary sources.
Here's the important part. You don't have to agree with the secondary literature. By all means, criticize away. Find the flaws, expose the flaws, that is how the scholarly conversation works. But you have to read it in order to be able to engage with it, and to be able to situate your argument in the ongoing scholarly conversation. By not reading it, you are closing off an important resource, and making yourself willfully ignorant on many issues. When I was in graduate school, this was the first thing my advisor said to me.
By repeatedly insisting that you don't want to read the secondary literature because you "don't want your understanding contaminated" reveals that you don't understand how the study of history actually works. Even if it's just to say that all the secondary literature has been deficient in some way, you have to have read it to have any sort of meaningful impact. You have to be familiar with all the theories that are out there, even if you think they are erroneous. You have to know why you think they are erroneous, and the reason can't be "because I know I'm right, so they have to be wrong". You can't just say someone's theory is wrong because you "know" yours is right. You have to understand what evidence led them to that conclusion, and understand where their evidence is strong and where it isn't. And to do that, you have to have read their work. This is the process of peer review, an ESSENTIAL part of anything remotely resembling an academic discussion. It helps you to evaluate where your evidence is strong and where it isn't. (hint: the v-shaped cuts = chevrons is not strong evidence. You need a lot more.) If you read more widely, you would have read more opinions on these, on many different sides, and see the strength of the evidence that you have. If you understand the things that make others' arguments strong or weak, you can situate your own work in that same discussion, and see where your own work is strong or weak.
There are many, many reasons why reading secondary literature is important, and very, very few reasons it would not be good. The importance of secondary literature is drilled into you in upper levels of education in the study of history. It is a grave mistake to ignore it willfully, and detrimental not only to the reception of your own argument, but to your formulation of a theory as a whole. And this mistake makes me doubt the quality of your expertise in the social sciences.
Yes, primary sources are the basis upon which historians build their arguments. But secondary sources are equally important. You have to know what other people are saying on a subject before you can enter the conversation. Your insistence on not reading the pertinent secondary literature in this case reveals a lack of understanding of how the study of history works at the higher levels. You have to read other people's work, understand what evidence they use, and evaluate their arguments, even if it is to criticize and explain its flaws (as many on this side do).
Primary source documents are limited by the fact that you don't always necessarily know the full context of the documents in question. Primary sources are biased. (ALL sources are biased. Again, the first thing you learn in an upper-level history class). You can't necessarily take primary source documents at face value all the time, you have to carefully evaluate each one. Relying solely on primary source documents is faulty methodology, as they teach in introductory methods classes in graduate school. Others are doing the exact same thing, looking at the same sources, and making their own interpretations. Being a historian (and here we are in fact being historians, as far as I am concerned), is not just a matter of collecting information from primary sources, but of interpreting them and arguing for your interpretation. This also relies on understanding what arguments have already been put out there. You have to read secondary literature to understand how the rest of the scholarly world views the primary sources.
Here's the important part. You don't have to agree with the secondary literature. By all means, criticize away. Find the flaws, expose the flaws, that is how the scholarly conversation works. But you have to read it in order to be able to engage with it, and to be able to situate your argument in the ongoing scholarly conversation. By not reading it, you are closing off an important resource, and making yourself willfully ignorant on many issues. When I was in graduate school, this was the first thing my advisor said to me.
By repeatedly insisting that you don't want to read the secondary literature because you "don't want your understanding contaminated" reveals that you don't understand how the study of history actually works. Even if it's just to say that all the secondary literature has been deficient in some way, you have to have read it to have any sort of meaningful impact. You have to be familiar with all the theories that are out there, even if you think they are erroneous. You have to know why you think they are erroneous, and the reason can't be "because I know I'm right, so they have to be wrong". You can't just say someone's theory is wrong because you "know" yours is right. You have to understand what evidence led them to that conclusion, and understand where their evidence is strong and where it isn't. And to do that, you have to have read their work. This is the process of peer review, an ESSENTIAL part of anything remotely resembling an academic discussion. It helps you to evaluate where your evidence is strong and where it isn't. (hint: the v-shaped cuts = chevrons is not strong evidence. You need a lot more.) If you read more widely, you would have read more opinions on these, on many different sides, and see the strength of the evidence that you have. If you understand the things that make others' arguments strong or weak, you can situate your own work in that same discussion, and see where your own work is strong or weak.
There are many, many reasons why reading secondary literature is important, and very, very few reasons it would not be good. The importance of secondary literature is drilled into you in upper levels of education in the study of history. It is a grave mistake to ignore it willfully, and detrimental not only to the reception of your own argument, but to your formulation of a theory as a whole. And this mistake makes me doubt the quality of your expertise in the social sciences.
Leave a comment: