Philosophy of History

Course Number: 
HUL 351
LTP structure: 


Any TWO courses from HUL2XX category
Allocation Preferences: HUL251, HUL258, HUL253, HUL256

Course Objective

What kind of understanding of the past does history provide? Is it speculative or analytical? What constitutes historical evidence and how does it confine historical understanding? Questions of objectivity are the central focus of this course: that of historians themselves— constructionist and objectivist— as they debate methodological issues and disagreements about the aim of their discipline, and that of philosophers whose interest in history springs from their attention on history‘s objectivist ideals and "the objectivity crisis" in history providing a philosophical rationale for reframing the two oppositions that dominate debates about the status of historical knowledge.

