The History is the science that studies and systematizes the most important and momentous events of the human past. These events are analyzed and examined according to their antecedents, causes and consequences, and in the mutual action of some on others, with the purpose of correctly understanding the present and preparing for the future. His study is not a simple rote exercise, loaded with facts, names, places and dates without any connection.
What is history
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History is a social science in charge of studying and relating the events that occurred in the past of humanity. It is also said that history is the period that has elapsed since writing was invented (called year zero) to the present time.
The term is also used to identify the narration of events, these can be real or science fiction. It is important to distinguish between history as a literary account and history as science.
As a literary story, it can be fictitious events, such as horror stories, that do not meet a criterion of truthfulness. As a science, historians have the objective of knowing and interpreting history through real facts and events, where objectivity plays a very important role, over the typical fiction of literature.
This is, above all, the possibility that the human being has to know himself. It is to inquire into the past to understand the reason for our present, and above all, to see man in his dimension; its successes, its errors and the capacity that humanity has to be a more perfect, better organized and more just species.
The people who are in charge of reconstructing and explaining the events of the past have used sources of information to help them. Among them we have written history, also known as historiography, which includes written accounts such as memoirs, letters, literature, court files, legislative assemblies, religious institutions, etc.; and the unwritten information obtained from the cultural remains or materials of disappeared civilizations, such as architectural elements, painting, crafts, etc.
Like all social science, it requires for the understanding of the phenomena it encompasses and its interpretation, the help of other social sciences and disciplines that allow us to understand historical events in their total dimension; for example, the help of archeology, paleontology, chronology, mythology, economics, anthropology, among others.
Three ways of classifying history can be indicated or indicated: by human groups and geographical regions (universal or general history, continental, national, regional, of cities); by themes and activities (economic, political, science, law, art history, etc.) and by chronological order of ages and periods (prehistory, protohistory and history)
Importance of History in the World
Its importance as a science is based on the fact that characters, events and processes that developed in the past of a society, nation or period are investigated through it, in a social, economic, political, cultural environment, etc., applying objectivity modern, trying to elucidate them and understand how they can transcend in the future.
As a humanistic science, it is estimated to be the one that has given the human being the most utility, when trying to know its cultural heritage through the civilizations through which it has passed, in addition to this, it allows you to build your own identity by collecting time data past and in this way elaborate their own identity.
For peoples and nations it is very important to know their roots and this is achieved through history, for example the history of Mexico, where the processes of independence awakened in many Mexican and Caribbean citizens, waves of enthusiasm, but their hopes had to face, throughout the nineteenth century, the many problems inherited from the colony. In the vast Mexican territory, the absence of a national capable of structuring the State, aggravated the tensions between the centralist and the federalists, at the same time that the powerful neighbor to the north, the United States, pressed the border and seized an important part of the Mexican territory.
After the whirlwind unleashed by the Mexican revolution and the triumph of Carrancista constitutionalism, the consolidation of Mexico as a federal state took a giant step forward. Also in the Caribbean, the emancipation efforts from the old Spanish metropolis of the new Creole ruling elites, only succeeded in throwing the islands into the arms of the United States.
Origin of the Need to Collect Data
Since the human being began to appreciate the importance of this and its influence on the development of new ideas, the option of collecting or safeguarding the data of any progress (which would later become history) became a necessity.
Making use of paper, as the first element, the human being has been protecting the moments of greatest importance in its history, and it is until the implementation of the first technologies that this process has become a procedure of equal importance but of less effort.
That is why, the history of the computer is so important at this point, since the beginning of modernity until now, it is the tool par excellence that has been used to write and store its evolution.
This is how, from paper and pencil, passing to typewriters and reaching the computer, man has stored large amounts of data that contain the most important events in history and that have contributed to its evolution.
History of History
The history of Greek culture developed in the Balkans, a peninsula located in southeastern Europe. This began approximately from the 12th century BC and it is estimated that it lasted until 146 BC when they were subdued by the Romans, making it one more province of their empire.
Throughout the II Millennium BC, the Mediterranean world acquired a hegemonic role in the development of Cretan and Mycenaean cultures, considered as the fundamental and protohistoric basis of classical Greece. The fact that the Greeks were victorious over the Achaemenid Persians in the medical wars, eroded the Eastern influence in the ancient world.
From the 5th century BC, the Mediterranean managed to shine with all splendor in classical Greek culture, which had in Athens the capital of the world, the Hellenic. The prestige of the East was still intact, but the Macedonian Alexander the Great ambitions to unite the two great cultural centers of antiquity in a single empire.
On the imperial dreams of Alexander, Rome managed to build an empire, after defeating and annihilating the Afro-Asian culture of Carthage and establishing with the Roman Empire, the largest cultural and political unity that humanity had known until then. Rome applies the qualification of barbarians (foreigners) to all the peoples that were outside its borders.
The Greeks developed their history in three periods which are:
- Archaic or Primitive Greece: this period of Greek culture is located between the 12th and 8th centuries BC, it was called the Homeric age, because the poems written by Homer, including the Iliad and the Odyssey, reflect what the Age was Middle Greek, as a dark and mythological period in its history.
- Classic or apogee Greece: between the 5th and 4th centuries BC In this period, Greece underwent its maximum cultural development, which served as the basis of Western culture. The events of the Medical Wars also developed until the Macedonian hegemony.
- Hellenistic period: it takes place between the 4th and 1st centuries BC. It covers all events from the death of Alexander the Great to the conquest of Greece by the Romans.
Historical periods
It is the period of time elapsed between one historical event and another that produces changes in the structure of society. According to historians, each of the cultures establishes its own historical periods.
Prehistory
It began with the first evidence of human activity and ended when the first written texts appeared. In addition to this, there is the paradox that most of man's history is prehistory, since they consider that, in comparison, his written period occupies a short span of time, only about five thousand years within a total period of more than two million years.
Prehistory is one of the youngest of its branches, born more than a century ago. However, it collects the facts of humanity's most remote past that are, perhaps, the most difficult to interpret. Although this stage is the longest in the history of mankind, the documentation available to redo it is not much. There are documents of which there are only some stone instruments and in the best of cases, with the remains of animals that served as food.
Under these conditions, it is difficult to determine which were the ways of life, for this reason, instead of talking about culture, we must refer to industrial accessories, since there are only tools and tools, sometimes so primitive, that the information that is provided can be very scarce.
History
The appearance of writing was a momentous step in the life and history of man. This invention made man begin to communicate and express his ideas through graphic representations, it is not possible to say exactly which peoples, or at what time the writing was devised. Despite this, there is research where it is indicated that the Mesopotamian and Egyptian peoples were the ones who perfected the writing.
The first technique used in writing, to express ideas, was pictography, then they went to ideographic signs or characters; When the Phoenicians invented the alphabet, writing became general, facilitating all kinds of cultural activity.
Among the most important signs of writing are the hieroglyphs of the Egyptians and the cuneiforms of the Mesopotamians.
The invention of writing dates back approximately 3,500 years before Christ, this allowed the thought of the men of that time to be preserved and began the history of mankind.
The stages in which history is divided are known as ages, each one of them is separated by great events.
Old age
This period marks the beginning of writing (from the year 218 BC Christ to the end of the 5th century AD Christ), in this period three great civilizations emerged, such as the Greek, the Roman and the Persian.
Middle Ages
This period ranges from the fall of Rome in AD 476 to the fall of the Eastern Roman Empire in 1453. The Middle Ages is also divided into High, Full and Low Middle Ages.
Modern age
It includes from the end of the Middle Ages and the beginning of the Contemporary Age, that is, from the discovery of America to the outbreak of the French Revolution in 1789.
Contemporary age
From the end of the 18th century with the French Revolution until today.
What is a Historian
A historian, in the social sciences, is a person whose north is the investigation of the past, a specialist in the study, interpretation, analysis and proper documentation of facts and events that occurred in the history of humanity.
There are several specialties that historians can focus on, generally focusing on specific periods and being in the ability to carry out analyzes from a given political, economic or artistic perspective. Among the periods in which historians focus are the classical, medieval and pre-Columbian.
Duties of a historian
1. Identify, interpret and analyze events from the past through historical research. This is possible:
- Collecting data from reliable sources, such as records, archives, newspapers, news and photographs, to be analyzed and interpreted.
- Verify and validate the data for your organization.
- When it comes to a region or country, research the historical events of a certain time.
- Preserve the manuscripts, records and writings to be studied.
- Show historical discoveries through books, papers, and lectures.
2. Provide advice and talk about the conservation of history, in museums and other historical places. In addition, organize groups and foundations for this purpose.
3. Prepare magazines and publications on the research carried out.
4. Through interviews with individuals, documentations and book publications, collect all the necessary information for the development of a bibliography of reliable sources.
In the same way, it is important to highlight some of the qualities that a historian must have, these are:
- Extensive knowledge in historical studies and theories.
- Communication skills.
- Capacity for research and development of projects.
- Must be analytical with problem solving skills and critical thinking.
History as Academic Discipline
To carry out any study of a past event, it is necessary to carry out research and analysis of different materials such as: published works, written documents, stories, photographs. Everything you need to build various aspects of the past of a society or time.
The study of history allows us to know the past, understand the present and even project the future, with lessons learned from books. In this way, students understand that society is the product of a past, but at the same time, research and studies continue to build a future.
Studying what history is stimulates the curiosity of students and at the same time helps them better understand the social processes of their time and their nation.
It is closely linked with other disciplines such as sociology, geography, economics and philosophy.
History can also be studied from a literary point of view, that is, it is what is told, and thus, chronologically reconstructing all the events of an event from the beginning to the end, an example of this can be the stories of love.
