CHAPTER THREE

MULTIPERSPECTIVITY

PSYCHOLOGY 1B Baltazar Ray Kenenth C. Readings in Philippine History

 With several possibilities for interpreting the past,
another important concept that we must note is
multiperspectivity. This can be defined as a way of
looking at historical events, personalities,
developments, cultures, and societies from a
different perspective. This means that there is a
multitude of ways by which we can view the world,
and each could be equally valid and at the same
time, similarly partial as well.

PSYCHOLOGY 1B Baltazar Ray Kenenth C.

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 Historical writing is, by definition, biased, partial
and contains preconceptions. The historian
decides on what sources to use, what
interpretations to make more apparent, depending
on what his end is. Historians may misinterpret
evidence, attending to those that suggest that a
certain event happened, and then ignore the rest
that goes against the evidence. Historians may omit
significant facts about their subject which makes
the interpretation unbalanced.
PSYCHOLOGY 1B Baltazar Ray Kenenth C.
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 Historians may impose a certain ideology on
their subject, which may not be appropriate to
the period the subject was formed. Historians
may also provide a single cause for an event
without considering other possible casual
explanations of said event. These are just
many of the ways a historian may fail in his
historical inference, description, and
interpretation.
PSYCHOLOGY 1B Baltazar Ray Kenenth C.
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 With Multiperspectivity as an
approach in history, we must
understand that historical
interpretations contain
discrepancies, contradictions, and
ambiguities and are often the focus of
dissent.
PSYCHOLOGY 1B Baltazar Ray Kenenth C.
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 Exploring multiple perspectives in
history requires incorporating
source materials that reflect different
views of an event in history, because
singular historical narratives do not
provide for space to inquire and
investigate.
PSYCHOLOGY 1B Baltazar Ray Kenenth C.
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 Different sources that encounter
each other may create space for
more investigation and research
while providing more evidence for
those truths that these sources
agree on.
PSYCHOLOGY 1B Baltazar Ray Kenenth C.
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 Different kinds of sources also provide
different historical truths—an official
document may note different aspects of the
past than, say, a memoir of an ordinary person
on the same event. Different historical agents
create different historical truths, and while
this may be burdensome work for the
historian, it also renders more validity to the
historical scholarship.
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Taking these in close regard in the
reading of historical
interpretations, it provides the
audience with a more complex, but
also a more complete and richer
understanding of the past.

PSYCHOLOGY 1B Baltazar Ray Kenenth C.

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 Thank you!

PSYCHOLOGY 1B Baltazar Ray Kenenth C.

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Readings in Philippine History