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History is a crucial subject that encompasses the study of societies, communities, and human behavior over time, rather than just the actions of rulers and battles. It serves as both a science and an art, aiming to explain the present by analyzing the past through evidence. Understanding history is essential for comprehending current social, political, and economic conditions, as it highlights the cause-and-effect relationships between past events and present circumstances.

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04

History is a crucial subject that encompasses the study of societies, communities, and human behavior over time, rather than just the actions of rulers and battles. It serves as both a science and an art, aiming to explain the present by analyzing the past through evidence. Understanding history is essential for comprehending current social, political, and economic conditions, as it highlights the cause-and-effect relationships between past events and present circumstances.

Uploaded by

Javeedkhan Pattan
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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History – Its Concept,

Nature and Significance 1.2 CONCEPT OF HISTORY


History is considered an indispensable subject in the complete education of
NOTES man and it has been defined differently by different scholars. According to
modern concept, history does not only contain the history of kings and queens,
battles and generals, but also the communities and the societies are the subject
of study of history as well. History is a unique subject possessing the
potentialities of both science and art. As an inquiry after truth, history is a
science and as a narrative account of the past, it is an art or a piece of literature.
History is a study of man. It is concerned with man in time and space. It
explains the present in the light of the past. Continuity and coherence are the
necessary requisites of history. The scope of history is vast; it is the story of
man in relation to totality of his behavior. It starts with the past; makes present
its sheet-anchor and points to the future. It is the story of man in time, an
inquiry into the past based on evidence. Indeed, evidence is the raw material of
history teaching and learning. It is an inquiry into what happened in the past,
when it happened, and how it happened. It is an inquiry into the inevitable
changes in human affairs in the past and the ways these changes affect,
influence or determine the patterns of life in the society. History is, or should be
an attempt to re-think the past. History aims at helping students to understand
the present existing social, political, religious and economic conditions of the
people. Without the knowledge of history we cannot have the background of
our religion, customs institutions, administration and so on. The teaching of
history helps the students to explain the present, to analyze it and to trace its
course. Cause-and-effect relationship between the past and the present is lively
presented in the history. History, thus, helps us to understand the present-day
problems both at the national and international level accurately and objectively.
1.2.1 Meaning of History
The origin of the word history is derived from the Greek word “Historia”
which means knowledge through inquiry, investigation, research,
exploration, and information. But what inquiry or investigation is it? It is the
inquiry or investigation of the past. Is history equal to the past? No never. It is
the record of valuable past. Then what is the difference between the past and
valuable past? The past refers to a period of time what has happened before and
the valuable past refers to the time and events which happened in past and left
some valuable legacy for the present and future. Therefore, E.H. Carr rightly
viewed history as “a continuous process of interaction between the
historian and his facts, an unending dialogue between the present and the
past”. This line signifies the positive correlation between past and present for
analyzing historical events. We cannot make a watertight compartment
between these two. The past is intelligible to us only in the light of the present
and we can fully understand the present only in the light of the past. The
German equivalent of the word history is Geschichte which means an
intelligent and intelligible narration of past events. History is, thus, a
Self-Instructional
4 Material

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