Editorial Reviews
Review
'A brilliant and fascinating book.' Laurence Veysey
'A judicious appraisal of men and circumstances, erudite and wide-ranging. Irreverent but not nastily irreverent, with an admirable delicacy of touch.' William H. McNeill
'An astute and provocative account of how the historical profession in America has dealt with its founding myth and central norm - the ideal of objectivity.' Dorothy Ross
Book Description
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 Drawing on the unpublished correspondence as well as the published writing of hundreds of American historians, this book is a richly textured account of what American historians have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.
That Noble Dream: The 'Objectivity Question' and the American Historical Profession (Ideas in Context),Peter Novick,Quentin Skinner,Lorraine Daston,Dorothy Ross,James Tully,Cambridge University Press,0521357454,Historiography,History & Theory - General,History - U.S.,Objectivity,Political Science,Politics/International Relations,United States,Historiography--United States,History of ideas, intellectual history,Political Science / History & Theory
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