Research Paper on:
History as a Discipline

Unformatted Sample Text from the Research Paper:
the story of mankinds past. More specifically, history is a chronicle of past events that is compiled using many different approaches. These approaches include the documentation and analysis  of material artifacts such as monuments, buildings, newspapers, literature, etc. It is important to remember, however, that history is distinct from prehistory. The material forms on which historians  base their efforts do not exist for that segment of mankinds past that is classified as prehistory. They do exist for the segment of our past we know as  history but the interpretation of them can often be complex. The historians charge, of course, involves specific tools, sources, and methodologies that allow as accurate as possible interpretation of history.  It is not uncommon, however, to find that each new generation of historians has the tendency to rewrite some aspects of history. Sometimes this rewriting process results in  a more accurate accounting, an accounting made possible by new developments and understandings in the discipline, but sometimes it results in what is termed "revisionist history", an accounting that is  tilted to accomplish a specific goal or agenda. The appropriate approach for the historian is one that considers all factors when interpreting past  events. For an interpretation of ancient literature, for example, the historian should consider such factors as authorship, language, structure and form, sources, and literary meaning. All texts, after  all, are the product of a particular time, place, and circumstance. Their literary meaning, however, does not exist in a vacuum. Indeed, this meaning is expressed in a  particular context and that context is subject to a considerable number of variables. To gain the most accurate understanding of history the historian must take not only ancient texts