This page responds to the question, "Why study history?" The responses -- a work in progress -- come from Westminster College people. Since this is a collective view, it contains a variety of elements, including optimism and thoughtfulness, pessimism and hopefulness, frivolity and insight. And Much Whimsey!
Dear Reader: Please Send your own contribution: I'll add it to this page. If you would like your name to appear with your contribution, add your name at the end of your email. Cheers All, & Enjoy The Party of the Mind as you Scroll Down! M&M.
Email M&M at , or by clicking on: mmarkowski@westminstercollege.edu
As ever, Susan Cottler, Jeff Nichols and Michael Markowski would be happy to talk further with you about history and your interests.
To a Site on Writing History-Research Papers...
To the Westminster College site that responds to the same question.
WHY STUDY HISTORY?
To learn the secret of the universe: As Mahatma Ghandi put it into one word: "Desirelessness." Power, money, sex, things, fame, respect -- all mean nothing, and to desire them will bring you back in the next life as a mosquito to be swatted down further on the cycle of life.
"If you know your history, then you would know where you're coming from." Lyric from Buffalo Soldier by Bob Marley and the Wailers. m&m.
R. G. Collingwood: We study history for human self-knowledge, to fulfill the Greek maxim "KNOW THYSELF"
Studying history is like a Time Machine -- you see things you never would have otherwise.
Because it's FUN!
"To find out what it was actually like then."-- Leopold von Ranke
It beats using Prozak.
There is no law of history any more than of a kaleidoscope. -- John Ruskin.
To learn the history, and the appropriate use, of stemware.
Critical thinking, a most important component of history, usually becomes a part of a history student's pulse and breathing.
To familiarize oneself with, and consequently to strictly follow, the New England rules of good fashion and dialect. SC
To learn to express oneself vividly and with impunity. Susan Cottler
History is unpredictable and varied, as is the Present. So History is a good place to learn more about the Present.
It allows you to live many lives -- justifies multiple personalities in the historian.
If you study history, you will be able to converse provocatively at a cocktail party, thus experiencing a brief period of popularity. Susan Cottler.
Hegel: "The history of the world is none other than the progress of the consciousness of freedom."
To search for your own past lives.
No corporate Power-Ties allowed!
To create discourse.
"We are all constantly making and remaking our own history." Jeff Nichols.
Encourgages Tolerance
It serves no particular purpose except to provide you with a sense of yourself. -- Carl Degler.
Voltaire: For every REAL Historian, there are a thousand thoughtless chroniclers. (And for every thoughtless chronicler, there are too many thoughtless readers...)
To tell a damn fine story. -- Herodotos
For Herodotos, to tell damn lies! -- Pseudo-Thucydides
"To deepen the arts of thinking, reflecting and communicating." Markowski
History is philosophy learned from examples. -- Thucydides
Thucydides' History is learned by exasperation and results mostly in boredom. Pseudo-Herodotos
"To create debate, if not resolution, which is sweet nectar to the Party of the Mind."
Become a winner at arguing your case and enjoy beating the pants off Gerry Spence.
I studied history too, and generally don't lose -- my cases or my pants! -- Gerry Spence
To explore and learn more about issues/events we once participated in, e.g., the Vietnam War.
"Fellow Citizens, we cannot escape history." Abraham Lincoln
Get to find out about kinky sex lives.
Dare to know! E. Kant
Because the Library of Congress gave THREE different letters to catalogue history books, while all other disciplines only have one letter. (C=History and Auxiliary Fields; D=General History; E=American History)
It's the best program to graduate from at Westminster.
To discover new facts, ideas, meanings, patterns in the human past.
H. G. Wells: "Human history becomes more and more a race between education and catastrophe."
To read great books and get to talk about them with an interested group.
What history teaches: humanity must curb the bestial side of its nature.
"A people without history is like the wind on the buffalo grass." -- A Sioux Saying
To deepen and widen spiritual insights.
The study of history invites you to think, as opposed to the television which invites you to become a receptacle, mostly of mind-trash.
"You can have no control without knowledge -- in particular, historical knowledge." Georgie Anne Geyer speaking at a WC Commencement.
To compare values I hold dear with values others have held
History's not 'bunk' -- Fords are!
As Martha Stewart says, "It's a really good thing!"
History is the witness that testifies to the passing of time; it illumines reality, vitalizes memory, provides guidance in daily life, and brings us tidings of antiquity. -- Cicero
Plants draw much of their sustenance from their roots, as people do from history. To ignore those roots could lead to worse than ignorance: imagine cutting a plant off from its roots....
Study history, then judge humanity and all of its worth by what it has done, and what it has done to itself, and the future is already told. (right....)
I found this quote from Harry Truman: "There is nothing new in the world, except the history you don't know." See you next fall, Chance Tolman
Only a good for nothing is not interested in his past. Sigmund Freud
"Through studying World history in depth this semester, I have concluded that you must study history to learn from the past. Through doing this you can use what worked for certain cultures in the past, apply them and then throw out what didnt work. Thus creating an even stronger culture in the future. Machiavelli stated,"Whoever wishes to foresee the future must consult the past; for human events ever resemble those of preceding times. This arises from the fact that they are produced by men who ever have been, and ever shall be, animated by the same passions, and thus they necessarily have the same results." Besides the fact that history is very intresting and fun to study, we must study history for a larger purpose, to have a bigger, brighter, and more successful future." -- Nathan Sanchez
Because no matter which historical event one studies, you will inevitably have no choice but to conclude that Papa Freud was right; it really is all about the sex.
-For as long as space endures and for as long as living
beings
remain, until then may I too abide to dispel the misery of
the world. -Shantideva, 8th century Buddhist monk
Both the above from: Jeremy Rottini, MS, Intensive Child, Youth, & Family, North Range Behavioral Health