Why Do I Study History?

I consider this blog to be some quick thoughts and offering some insights into my formal articles.

I shall first pick up from my previous blog post after my first-year reflection.[1] I have since graduated with my BA from SNHU and attended the University of Portsmouth, where I received my MA in Naval History. I vowed previously to return yearly, so why I have I not? I would like to blame this on employment and school, but I wasn’t sure where my writing would go at the time. As historical investigations became my niche, I guess exploring my motives would be suitable.

While exploring one’s own motivation may seem narcissistic, I don’t believe any work in history can be an objective study. Thus, understanding the potential motivations inherent in my own subjectivity allows me an honesty with the subject that may have previously kept me from understanding the inherent biases and heuristics that guided me in my analysis. So why is it that I selected history?

I confess I did not really think much on why I wanted to be a historian, I thought it natural. I loved history growing up, but I am also fond of philosophy, psychology, international relations, economics, sociology, and literature, why not choose one of these?

I didn’t really think much on this topic until I was listening to a lecture series by Kenneth Harl from the Great Courses, The World of Byzantium. In lecture 23, Harl gives credit to Byzantine scholars such as Anna Komnene for the survival of the classics in the Komnene Revival. But he dwells on why Komnene decided to become a historian in the tradition of Thucydides:

And I must say that Byzantine historians tended to be very much like Thucydides. Anna was cut out of power by her brother she did what she—she wrote about what she couldn’t do. She wanted to be empress so when she couldn’t be she became a historian. Just as Thucydides was exiled for incompetence as a general so he wrote a military history of course. That’s typical of historians.[2]

While a small side comment, I had to re-listen to it. I remember I was on an airplane waiting to return home after visiting a friend in North Carolina and I remember pausing it to think about what I had just heard, rubbing my chin under my mask.

In early 2021, I was in my undergrad at SNHU while working full time. I was entering the interesting portions of my degree, specialized history courses. I began to think about why I wrote about what I had written about previously. I had begun drifting towards naval history topics in my assignments. Did I fall into the real Thucydides/Komnene trap? That I wrote about what I had always wanted to be? Was I seeking to fulfill my own unfulfilled desires and living vicariously through my subjects?

I wonder how many historians likely fall into this trap unintentionally? Do not mistake me for being a champion of objectivity, I think history is an inherently subjective matter. Subjectivity has become a bit of a naughty word from well-meaning scholars, but having a subjective lens does not prevent effective analysis. Instead of pretending that one takes an idealized, non-existent, objective viewpoint, one should perform analysis as to why these subjects are important to them; then recognize the potential risk implicit in the personal connection.

I see history as a study into the origin of identity. In a hyperrealistic world, I believe that studying history as an investigation into the origin of our customs, beliefs, and the pillars of our identities will bring new meaning to those who choose to study a total history of their world.Thus, history is a deeply personal investigation into personal historicity. It’s uncovering the origin of my experiences and perceptions. I didn’t pick naval history, particularly social history of lesser known, in a void. I lived next to the sea for much of my childhood in Florida. Some of my favorite books involve going out to sea. Perhaps most importantly, my adult life has been defined by naval service as an enlisted submariner and working within the naval-industrial complex. While not a whaler, I keenly understood and felt the indignation in by Herman Melville expressed in Moby Dick:

No dignity in whaling? The dignity of our calling the very heavens attest... And, as for me, if, by any possibility, there be any as yet undiscovered prime thing in me; if I shall ever deserve any real repute in that small but high hushed world which I might not be unreasonably ambitious of; if hereafter I shall do anything that, upon the whole, a man might rather have done than to have left undone; if, at my death, my executors, or more properly my creditors, find any precious MSS. in my desk, then here I prospectively ascribe all the honor and the glory to whaling; for a whale-ship was my Yale College and my Harvard.[3]

My time as an enlisted submariner is a part of my education, the Springfield was my first school and I continued my education formally. Of course, I picked naval history to pursue. I could choose to reject it or write what I know. But does that make me what Harl called a historian in the mold of Thucydides and Komnene? Am I chasing an unfulfilled desire?

No, the opposite. I am seeking to understand myself through history.

With this guiding principle in mind, my relationship to the town of Groton guided my inquiry in Seapower By Other Means. My relationship to the submarine force guided my study into my submarine topics, particularly my upcoming book and article on submarine hero Henry Breault, and the connection of submarines to commerce warfare led me to researching pre-modern commerce warfare by private men-of-war. Though not the primary goal, I hope it also helps people exploring their own relationships to the world by offering insights they may not have been aware of.

While this ultimately seem selfish, I am always interested in reading a well-researched historical analysis. I learn from reading them, often taking inspiration in surprising manners. In part this article is inspired by Harl, but also authors such as Carlo Ginzburg who wrote when he revisited his older works in Clues, Myths, and the Historical Method:

The narcissism implicit in the act that returns us to our own past has an anti-narcissistic purpose: to reduce the margin, which we always tend to overrate, of our own free will, through the reconstruction of the contextualization that affected us (in part) and in which we participated at the time.[4]

I will end this by asking briefly: what topics do you study in history and what is your connection? Even if you choose not to share here, I recommend a deep analysis on one's self before casting off all lines and embarking on a research voyage.

References:

[1]. Ryan C Walker, “First Year Reflections,” https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/first-year-reflection-ryan-walker/?trackingId=yhaSunbiT9G8vDOglc8bUg%3D%3D

[2]. Kenneth Harl, The World of Byzantium, (Chantilly: The Teaching Company, 2013). Audible version, lecture 23, 11:30-45. This punctuation has been replicated to the best of my ability, but it is a lecture.

[3]. Herman Melville, Moby Dick: Or The Whale, eds. Harrison Hayford, Herschel Parker, G. Thomas Tanselle, (Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 2001), 111-12.

[4]. Carlo Ginzburg, Clues, Myths, and the Historical Method, trans. John and Anne Tedeschi, (Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press, 1989), 1.