The aspiration to relate the past "as it really happened" has been the central goal of American professional historians since the late nineteenth century. In this remarkable history of the profession, Peter Novick shows how the idea and ideal of objectivity was elaborated, challenged, modified, and defended over the past century. Drawing on the unpublished correspondence as well as the published writing of hundreds of American historians, this book is a richly textured account of what American historians have thought they were doing, or ought to be doing, when they wrote history--how their principles influenced their practice and practical exigencies influenced their principles. Published with the support of the Exxon Education Foundation.
FREE Two-Day Shipping for students on millions of items. Learn more |
| ||||||||||||||||||
 Sell Back Your Copy for $12.25
Whether you bought it on Amazon or somewhere else, you can sell it back through our Book Trade-In Program at the current price of $12.25.
|
Book Description
Special Offers and Product Promotions
- Buy $50 in qualifying physical textbooks, get $2 in Amazon MP3 Credit. Here's how (restrictions apply)
Frequently Bought Together
Editorial Reviews
Review
"Professional historians and aspiring professionals will welcome this immensely informative and thoughtful book." E. Cassara, Choice
"Peter Novick has written an unprecedented and invaluable study of the idea of objectivity among historians...He has written a rich and powerful narrative. No other scholar has made such a marvelous contribution to our understanding of the history profession during its first century." David W. Noble, Reviews in American History
"This is a work marked by admirable clarity, wide-ranging and imaginative research, and thoughtful judgements. At one level it explores a question of central concern to scholars of many disciplines--the quest for objectivity in research and writing. Displaying impressive command of intellectual history, Novick situates this quest in broader currents of American thought over the past century. That Noble Dream is finally a serious and often provocative treatment of the professionalization in the United States of the discipline of history." From the Allen J. Beveridge Award Citation
"This is a work marked by admirable clarity, wide-ranging and imaginative research, and thoughtful judgements. At one level it explores a question of central concern to scholars of many disciplines--the quest for objectivity in reading and writing. Displaying impressive command of intellectual history, Novick situates this quest in broader currents of American thought over the past century. That Noble Dream is finally a serious and often provocative treatment of the professionalization in the United States of the discipline of history." From the Allan C. Beveridge Award Citation
"Peter Novick has written an unprecedented and invaluable study of the idea of objectivity among historians...He has written a rich and powerful narrative. No other scholar has made such a marvelous contribution to our understanding of the history profession during its first century." David W. Noble, Reviews in American History
"This is a work marked by admirable clarity, wide-ranging and imaginative research, and thoughtful judgements. At one level it explores a question of central concern to scholars of many disciplines--the quest for objectivity in research and writing. Displaying impressive command of intellectual history, Novick situates this quest in broader currents of American thought over the past century. That Noble Dream is finally a serious and often provocative treatment of the professionalization in the United States of the discipline of history." From the Allen J. Beveridge Award Citation
"This is a work marked by admirable clarity, wide-ranging and imaginative research, and thoughtful judgements. At one level it explores a question of central concern to scholars of many disciplines--the quest for objectivity in reading and writing. Displaying impressive command of intellectual history, Novick situates this quest in broader currents of American thought over the past century. That Noble Dream is finally a serious and often provocative treatment of the professionalization in the United States of the discipline of history." From the Allan C. Beveridge Award Citation
Book Description
The evolution of the "idea" and "ideal" of objectivity is traced over the past century from a selection of unpublished as well as published writings of hundreds of American historians.
Product Details
Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
|
More About the Author
Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
78 of 83 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
"That Noble Dream" is Peter Novick's magisterial history of the American historical profession and its alternating romance and dissaffection with "objective" historical scholarship from the late nineteenth century to the 1980s.
The German historical profession with its domineering Herr Professor and impressive array of analytical "techniques," Mr. Novick tells us, provided the initial model for American historiography. In Leopold von Ranke, young American scholars found a paragon of "wissenschaftlich" (interpreted as scientific) empirical scholarship. (Oddly, Ranke was neither a strict empiricist nor particularly scientific in his approach to writing history.) Transferred to the other side of the Atlantic, a mythical interpretation of German historiography served to legitimate an inductive, empirical approach to history that puported to uncover the past "wie es eigentlich gewesen" -- the way it actually was. Eschewing both hypothesis and epistemological speculation, American historians enthroned "objectivity" as the goal of their infant profession.
Mr. Novick explains that the ideal of objectivity was reinforced by an ideologically homogenous group of professional historians who used objectivity as the yardstick for career advancement and as a "prophylactic against conflict" within their ranks. Among other convictions, it was firmly believed that objective scholarship would serve to protect American students from the evils and distortions of propaganda.
It was not long before a reaction developed against these pseudo-Rankean "data gatherers," as they pejoratively came to be known. In the years before the Great War, the new progressive historians (notably Beard and Becker) questioned the idea of cold, indisputable facts and thereby planted the seeds that later would grow into the antithesis of objective scholarship, namely relativism. The new historians were denoted, somewhat unkindly, as "presentists," because of their use of history for the purpose of progressive reform.
With the entry of the United States into the the first World War, objectivity was unceremoniously displaced by propaganda, as America's historians were expected to display a sufficiently patriotic fervor. The profession of the interwar years witnessed the rise of cultural and cognitive relativism in the wake of the new scientific ontology. The quest for certainty and absolutes gave way to the "pragmatic tradition," which saw truths as multiple and perspectival. Becker and Beard, together with their loyal vassals, derided the old-school, inductive approach, which claimed that "facts spoke for themselves."
But World War II initiated a renewed courtship between the profession and its first love. With the rest of American society, historians turned "toward affirmation and the search for certainty." A considerable dosage of moral rearmament, it was believed, would be required to counter the fascist threat, and historians, like others, queued up to the podium in order to denounce the menance of moral relativism.
The totalitarian leviathan, of course, did not disappear after 1945, and Communism proved as good a reason to denigrate relativist epistemology as had fascism. The Cold War, Mr. Novick suggests, "was directly related to the celebration of objectivity as the hallmark of thought in the Free World." Once again, it was claimed that the newly objective, non-ideological historiography, as incorporated into western civilization courses, would insulate young minds against propaganda.
Such is a very compacted version of Mr. Novick's copiously detailed narrative of American historiography (complete with all the gossip on your favorite college history professor) and its flirtation with objectivity down to the Cold War. So have we come full circle? One might be inclined to think so if the story ended there. But the book's final four chapters chronicle the American historical profession of the last generation, during which, according to Mr. Novick, the structural supports of objectivity, namely universalism, nationalism, and professionalism, came under attack. A "separatist consciousness" fragmented black history and women's history into ruthlessly guarded sub-disciplines of their own. The profession became "little more than a congeries if groups" that could no longer communicate with each other in mutually comprehended terms. Fueled by a massive production of scholarly works, fragmentation and specialization proceeded at such a pace that by 1980 "in no other discipline did holders of a Ph.D. have less in the way of a common experience." As a consequence, meaningful discussion of the objectivity question on a profession-wide basis "effectively collapsed." What Mr. Novick describes is, in his view, nothing short of a crisis. He points to a handful of "ecumenists," David Hollinger and Thomas Haskell among them, who attempted to identify an "epistemological vital center" in an effort to bring together a chaotic array of hyper-relativists and hyper-objectivists. Alas, he says, precious few were listening.
Mr. Novick's historiographical Weltanschauung is bleak indeed. Toward the end of "That Noble Dream," he presents a contradictory image of some "cosmopolitan," "supra-disciplinary" historians moving beyond traditional boundaries toward a new, universal approach to scholarship, while other historians seek shelter behind the new boundaries of fragmented subcommunities. Interdisciplinary centripetal forces are juxtaposed against intradisciplinary centrifugal forces. Within the profession the "center cannot hold," while outside the profession, a new universalism is being forged.
Can a new common interest replace the objectivity question as a unifying force within the discipline or at least among several disciplines? Though well over 600 pages long, Mr. Novick's book contains a relative paucity of discussion pertaining to teaching. Certainly the multiple needs of students transcend the single need to be protected from propaganda. Perhaps this issue might be capable of bringing together divergent groups of the profession, if only to disagree. The recent debate over the national history standards suggests that America's historians might do well to think very hard about how best to reconnect scholarship with pedagogy. Were it to fail in this essential mission -- in effect a mission to convince the public that history has value and meaning -- the profession might likely revert to what Mr. Novick describes in the first pages of his thoughtful book, that is an association of amateurs.
Robert Ganem (rganem@nea.org)
60 of 64 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
When a professor assigned Peter Novick's "That Noble Dream" as one of the last readings in one of my seminars, I blanched. Who, I inwardly groaned, would force students to read a book this huge in the waning weeks of the semester, a time when the heavy weight of tests, papers, and grading exams rests on your shoulders? "Look at the size of that font! How in the heck are we supposed to get through that thing in a week?" wailed a fellow sufferer, echoing what we all thought as we blearily thumbed through the book. Initial skimming seemed to confirm that this would be one of those scholarly books that take years off your life even as you promptly forget what you read a mere five minutes ago. Now, I've done some power reading during my tenure as an undergraduate and graduate student; I once cruised through Herodotus in two days and Thucycdides in even less time. You learn to accept things like this in the unnatural world of the academy. With lengthy papers due at the same time I opened this book, I decided to power stuff this one. Even now I can hear the knowing snickers of graduate students across the nation who may be reading this review, seminar hardened souls amused to no end that I actually assumed I had to READ the book. I can hear the chorus: just skim through it over the course of a few hours, learn the main argument, take a few notes, and nod sagely in class.
Well, a funny thing happened on the way to the end of Novick's treatment of the noble profession: I rapidly discovered that this book is brilliant; a veritable cathedral of razor sharp analysis, amazing use of primary source material, and all written with one eye firmly planted on the bigger picture. What human being is capable of this Gibbonesque treatment of the American historical profession? Apparently a University of Chicago professor with a whole lot of time on his hands, a man whose primary field of research has little to do with American history. Well, Gibbon's inspiration for his enormous masterwork came from a visit to the ruins of Rome, so why not an equally impressive history from someone working outside his field? A comprehensive summary of the book is an exercise in futility here, but I think I should take a stab at it since I am studying history and often must summarize scads of material into a few precious paragraphs. My review will be inferior anyway compared to the extremely insightful essay found below on this very page.
Novick begins with an examination of the German methodologies of history---an appropriate starting point because Americans wishing to study the past on an advanced level in the nineteenth century needed to go to school in Europe---in an attempt to discover how the first generation of professional American historians approached their craft. To be sure, amateur historians like Parkman, Prescott, and Adams wrote narrative histories on such huge topics as North America, Mexico, and the early governments of the United States. But in an age where scientific methods came of age, men stood up and rejected the narratives, believing that the very same techniques could, and should, be applied to the study of history. An age of strict objectivity called for an equally rigorous impartiality in looking at the past, and the first trained historians here did so with relish. Worshipping the phrase "wie es eigentlich gewesen," or studying history "as it really was," our academic ancestors attempted to collect as much factual evidence from historical sources as possible, crafting "building blocks" of history so that in the near future men could unearth the universal truth by putting these blocks together. Amusingly, Novick discovers that the American historians misunderstood this magical phrase, that it should translate as "as it essentially is," a different ballgame altogether that means a historian should employ his intuition in his studies. Since this is the exact opposite of how our historians applied the phrase, the entire edifice of our profession balances upon a translation error! Study hard for those proficiency exams, my friends!
Novick's scrupulous treatment of the succeeding years of the profession reveals metatectonic (a word that appears throughout the book, and frankly, I love it and use it whenever possible) themes, but the biggest one may be that big social changes lead to big changes in the academy. While many scholars like to think they create rather than react to societal transformations, Novick proves them wrong repeatedly. War, for example, served to bring about sea changes in how historians studied history. The nightmares unfolding at places like Ypres and the concomitant moral discord after that war led to a short period of "doubt casting" in every field of western human endeavor. Things that seemed indisputable before millions died in the mud suddenly assumed a worrisome etherealness, a hazy uncertainty that ushered in the beginnings of relativism. The Second World War and the subsequent Cold War, with its need for absolute convictions (Hitler and Communism bad, Us good), temporarily quashed proto-relativism in favor of consensus. We are where we are at now, in an age of unbridled relativism, "social construction," and "deconstruction" because of the Vietnam War and the rise of the New Left historians. Novick outlines it all in one page after another, pages rife with the words of the historians who were there when it happened.
A short review fails to relate the impressiveness of this work. There are a few omissions here, one being the pedagogical functions of history as mentioned in a previous review. The other problem concerns the shortage of information about earning credentials in the profession. For information on how much fun that process is, you need to look at Theodore Hamerow's curmudgeonly treatment of life in graduate school, "Reflections on History and Historians."
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Novick's book on the "Holocaust and Modern Memory" is a perfect example of craft and honesty by a great historian. "That Noble Dream" is a much more ambitious book, a summing up of American Historiography. It's a great book, but probably only interesting to historians and even historiographers at that. It's focus in American Historiography (though tens of pages are devoted to the German, English a French roots of Historical Knowledge)may also shy away non-Ivy League readers. Still, a must for those interested in the field.
Most Recent Customer Reviews
This should be a graduate school primer
If you want to be an academic, you probably wrestle with your own validity to touch on subjects as an "expert." This book helps you sort through all of this.
Published 11 months ago by E. Ellis
Incredible Tour De Force
So many of my graduate school cohorts were so intimidated by this great work that they could not even read it. Read more
Published 16 months ago by RepublicConstitution
The Nobel Dream
This book was something I had to buy for a class. It was in good condition but I had to force myself to read it. Read more
Published 17 months ago by bstinson68
Detailed account of the american historical profession
Peter Novick's That Noble Dream: The "Objectivity Question" and the American Historical Profession is book of tendencies. Read more
Published on March 24, 2010 by Ryan Walker
Valuable, but only with cautious scrutiny
This author writing about objectivity seemed to really struggle with it himself. There is so much bias present that it's difficult to discern when Novick is speaking or when he is... Read more
Published on June 25, 2006 by Kia Darling
Deliberate misrepresentation of evidence
Deliberate misrepresentation of evidence and plagiarism are among the most grievous sins a historian may commit. Read more
Published on April 15, 2004
deconstructing decronstruction
For all the attention given in recent years to the social context of discourse, remarkably little has been given to the way in which the context of modern academia shapes the way... Read more
Published on October 26, 2003
Novick's Revenge
While Novick's book is interesting, he is not free of bias and subjectivity himself. One might easily regard his portrayal of the now infamous David Abraham affair as a hack job to... Read more
Published on August 27, 2003
Enjoyed by this layman
In this book, Novick says that he finds the idea of historical objectivity "essentially confused", that many of the philosophical assumptions behind it are "logically and... Read more
Published on December 1, 2000
Inside This Book
(learn more)
First Sentence:
By 1884, the year of the founding of the American Historical Association, the United States had a favorable balance of trade: exports exceeded imports by over $100 million annually. Read the first page Key Phrases - Statistically Improbable Phrases (SIPs): (learn more)
interwar relativists, new black history, cold war revisionism, professional historical scholarship, historical venture, objective historical truth, leftist historians, relativist critique, universalist norms, postwar historians, history revisionism, northern historians, historical objectivity, historical profession, objectivity question, public historian, cognitive relativism, black historians, new historians, area studies programs, disinterested objectivity, white historians Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
New York, United States, University of Chicago, Merle Curti, American Historical Association, Curti Papers, Arthur Schlesinger, American Historical Review, Richard Hofstadter, New Republic, Van Tyne, American Revolution, Carl Becker, Dodd Papers, Franklin Jameson, John Higham, Barnes Papers, Charles Beard, New Left, Becker Papers, Harry Elmer Barnes, Oscar Handlin, Vann Woodward, Woodrow Wilson, Frederick Jackson Turner New!
Books on Related Topics | Concordance | Text Stats Browse Sample Pages:
Front Cover | Table of Contents | First Pages | Index | Back Cover | Surprise Me!
By 1884, the year of the founding of the American Historical Association, the United States had a favorable balance of trade: exports exceeded imports by over $100 million annually. Read the first page Key Phrases - Statistically Improbable Phrases (SIPs): (learn more)
interwar relativists, new black history, cold war revisionism, professional historical scholarship, historical venture, objective historical truth, leftist historians, relativist critique, universalist norms, postwar historians, history revisionism, northern historians, historical objectivity, historical profession, objectivity question, public historian, cognitive relativism, black historians, new historians, area studies programs, disinterested objectivity, white historians Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
New York, United States, University of Chicago, Merle Curti, American Historical Association, Curti Papers, Arthur Schlesinger, American Historical Review, Richard Hofstadter, New Republic, Van Tyne, American Revolution, Carl Becker, Dodd Papers, Franklin Jameson, John Higham, Barnes Papers, Charles Beard, New Left, Becker Papers, Harry Elmer Barnes, Oscar Handlin, Vann Woodward, Woodrow Wilson, Frederick Jackson Turner New!
Books on Related Topics | Concordance | Text Stats Browse Sample Pages:
Front Cover | Table of Contents | First Pages | Index | Back Cover | Surprise Me!
Citations (learn more)
This book cites 246
books:
See all 246 books this book cites
300
books
cite this book:
See all 300 books citing this book
- The American Political Tradition: And the Men Who Made it by Richard Hofstadter on 6 pages
- GATEWAY TO HISTORY (History and historiography) by Nevins on 4 pages
- Truth in History by Oscar Handlin on 4 pages
- The Whig Interpretation of History by Herbert Butterfield in Front Matter, page 273, and page 375
- What is the Good of History?: Selected Letters of Carl L.Becker by Carl L. Becker on page 161, page 234, and page 259
See all 246 books this book cites
- Henry Steele Commager : Midcentury Liberalism and the History of the Present by Neil. Jumonville on 12 pages
- Imagined Histories: American Historians Interpret the Past by Anthony Molho on 11 pages
- Women and the Historical Enterprise in America: Gender, Race, and the Politics of Memory, 1880-1945 (Gender & American Culture) by Julie Des Jardins on 8 pages
- William Appleman Williams: The Tragedy of Empire (American Radicals) by Paul Buhle on 7 pages
- Frontiers of Historical Imagination: Narrating the European Conquest of Native America, 1890-1990 by Kerwin Lee Klein on 6 pages
See all 300 books citing this book
Books on Related Topics
(learn more)
|
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Tags Customers Associate with This Product(What's this?)Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.
|
Sell a Digital Version of This Book in the Kindle Store
If you are a publisher or author and hold the digital rights to a book, you can sell a digital version of it in our Kindle Store.
Learn more
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
Listmania!
|
|
