In class, there was many a time when my friends and I pondered over why we studied history, boring stories about people who were now dead, countries that no longer exist and rules and regimes which have no influence in the present whatsoever. The question always met with the answer that the study of history was “To prevent history from repeating itself”, a statement made with the assumption that if man were to not be aware of what happened in the past, history would infinitely keep repeating itself, an ideology found in several religions. One which I have never fully understood. The reason being that it would require stagnation of human intellect and thought for the same decision to be taken century after century. It would need man to possess the exact same mental framework as the previous person who took the decision..... or to revere and emulate the previous person or his image that was carried forward into the future through the study of history. A contradiction which has never fully been tackled. Study of history might be the reason for repetition of history.
There’s an English idiom, “ Let the sleeping dogs lie” , and I would like to assume thoughts of egoism and superiority of races, genocide and the like were evolutionary tools necessary for survival in prehistoric times but a hell hole for trouble in the present times. It would be better off for humanity as a whole to try to avoid bringing up as a part of academic learning, instances of times when these feelings overpowered that of humanity in nations. We risk the birth of a new generation of people who hold the previous generations as their inspiration.
The Study of history to understand our past, to unravel mysteries of who we are and why we are, Study of the philosophies and methods of survival of previous civilizations, their culture and customs to further our understanding of our own past is what I perceive as its principle goal. Study of our past as an academic exercise for children who have a hard differentiating good from bad is an exercise heavily laden with risks.
The one thing that humans can do that animals can’t is to visualize the future, the consequences of decisions we make. This enables humans to think in ways different from animals whose thoughts focus solely on the present. We use history, both personal and learned as the framework for the visualization, which makes learning history an essential requirement to make a long term decision, but does a child need that? I would argue that a child should be allowed to experience as much as possible before carrying the additional weight of history.
