An Analysis Of Frances G. Couvares Interpretation Of American History

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Writing Prompt #1 The way we perceive history are through the eyes of those who write it, but we also have no knowledge if they’re being biased or not. In Frances G. Couvares’ work Interpretations of American History, he talks about historiography and how historians write history. This essay will talk about the providential, the rationalist, the nationalist, and the the professional, the four stages that helped shape how we write American history and the importance it has to historiography. Providential is the first stage that when talking about the writing of American history. Written by ministers and magistrates throughout the 17th and 19th centuries, this from of history was to create a closer connection between man and god. The puritans were the ones who started writing like this, whatever happened to them they would think that it was a work of god. One example of this is William Bradford’s Of Plimouth Plantation. Bradford was the governor of the plantation and would lead the group of pilgrims to the new land, they would all believe that their misfortunes was god’s punishment and they were prosperous because of god’s gift. Historians in the 19th century such as Elizabeth Peabody and Hannah Adams saw providential history as an extension of the Protestant …show more content…

This soon became a justification for colonization but George Bancroft, one of 19th century’s most distinguished historian started to believe in romantic nationalism after studying in Germany. The idea of romantic nationalism is that all races are to spread freedom across the globe. This ideology is what also made them enemies to the jacksonian democracy. Many women historians started to manifest romantic nationalist thinking, one example is Helen Hunt’s Century of Dishonor, where she wrote about the relationship between the whites and indians. (Couvares