Sunday, May 20, 2012
Theses on the philosophy of history.
The passage that I chose is Benjamin third thesis."The third thesis reflects his
concern arguing that historians should not distinguish between major and
minor events. Injustice is revealed by looking at the minor events of
people who you have never heard of. This also suggests that awareness of
these things are obscured or concealed by something else, the major
events: the official histories of kingdoms and nations." He is trying to argue that people always remember major event while overlooking the minor ones. I choose this passage because it relates to everyone, we all remember a major event in the country for example, the 9/11 was a bad memorable day in the US history, but is it the only memorable day in individual life? We celebrates the July 4th every year, but do we remember the day that we turned eighteen, that we gain our own independent? I think the major event will always take priority over the minor event in every country or most household.
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Wow, your post is short yet spicy. Great Job. I agree completely with you on your interpretation of Benjamin quote, unfortunately we have been shaped like this, I mean society overall. We have even drawn examples from history in and how we study things. We only try to remember the painful things and also the major points in our life, which in one way or another have to do with extreme. Extreme joy or extreme pain that's how we remember things, most things recorded in history is a landmark historic event other than that it is not deemed important to record, for example why can an African American can only trace their genealogy only so far back? That is a rhetorical question.
ReplyDeleteits sounds interesting on how you integrate the Benjamin quote with your reflection. i agree with u totally on your point. Major histories take preference on the minor ones and this is injustice.
ReplyDeleteI agree 100% with what is said above, and Commend you on your passage selection. For me the line "Injustice is revealed by looking at the minor events of people who you have never heard of." says it all.
ReplyDeleteThis is a very profound way of interpreting the third thesis and I can relate to what you are saying about the distinction we bring in recognizing big and small events. I would call it our human frailty that we do not weigh them on the same scale but based on the enormity of the situation we make our judgements.
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