Talk:Historical revisionism/Archive 2

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Page 2

See the Archive for talk on this article before this time stamp. Philip Baird Shearer 13:34, 29 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Contradict

This article contradicts itself.--AI 22:07, 7 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Feel free to explain. Stbalbach 00:43, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Need for more/better examples

This article could be improved significantly if more examples were added, and if the current examples were siginificantly expanded. IMO, as is I feel the examples section of this article is weak, and a reader new to the subject might come off with an impression of "huh?", "so what?" or "that's it?" -- Ithacagorges 16:49, 21 Aug 2005 (UTC)

I don't have the sources (or the time to find said sources at the moment), but there is a particularly popular piece of historical misinformation regarding the United States Army intentionally giving smallpox invested blankets to Native American tribes (I believe the Mandan were named specifically). This view was promoted by Ward Churchill, see the section of his article titled Fabrication and plagiarism.

Black History

There is a stream of so-called 'black history' -- I am not referring to the legitimate history of the African Americans -- that tries to imply that Plato, for example, was African, and that Africa was far more culturally advanced than admitted by mainstream history. I don't have references to that, but it would be an interesting subject of this article as well.

Those kind of things tend to pop up during 'black history month' on college campusses (spelling?)

--80.228.154.61 09:35, 13 September 2005 (UTC)

I would put Martin Bernal under Historical revisionism (political) Septentrionalis 01:40, 14 September 2005 (UTC)

revert

The edit as of 15:13 Nov 19 does not seem to add to the page at all. I will revert it.--droptone 04:28, 20 November 2005 (UTC)

Two pages? historical revisionism (political) is plain historical revisionism

I agree there is no reason justifying two different entries, historical revisionism and historical revisionism (political). Of course history is a matter of debate, and the official history is more than often the history of the winners (Napoleon may have said that; so did Marx, Walter Benjamin and many others). That history (as a discourse or a social science) change with time is the subject of historiography. This evolution on the writing of history is dependent on the discovery of new facts, but also in a change of ideas and understanding: the two are very difficult to dissociate, as any change in written history can be suspected of political motives. Henceforth, it is foolish to distinguish between a "good" neutral so-called "historical revisionism" and a "bad" "historical revisionism (political)". Historical revisionism is always political in nature, as is history in itself.

Now, that historians constantly rewrite history (some historians study this: historiography) does not mean that this should be called "historical revisionism". This is plain historical work. Revisionism, if words make sense, refers to the rewriting of history following a policy agenda, and denial of Holocaust is the most famous example of it. A Wikipedia entry on "historical revisionism" should include everything put in "historical revisionism (political)", and all comments about history being in itself a revisionist science, far from being deleted, should be replaced in the "history" article (or maybe "philosophy of history"), as they belong to the day-to-day works of history. Not doing this is simply letting this entry becoming a forum for revisionists. As show the talk-archives, naming David Irving has been interpretated here, by some, to be an act of POV. However, he has been condemned for something that justice calls "historical revisionism", he is therefore a good example of it. Nobody seems to consider that quoting the stupid and dangerous lies of "The Holocaust of Industry" (in the (politics) entry) is a Nazi POV !!! It should be written here that revisionism is condemned by law in a lot of country. Moreover, as someone already said, Japanese historic revisionism should certainly be stated!

Now, if after all this someone still really wants to defend historical revisionism, why not just write something to defend such extremist POV by a more neutral sentence such as: "Advocates of historical revisionism point out that their work is condemned as politically incorrect ?" This is the only NPOV way to defend those extremist POV that i can think off... Kaliz 20:59, 11 December 2005 (UTC)

Historical revisionism is a legitimate scholarly term that has been co-opted by certain parties to give fringe wacko theories undeserved legitimacy. That is why it has been separated to a different article. It's about isolating it so we can have a decent and relevant article about the legitimate term and meaning, as recognized by mainstream historians. In fact "historical revisionism (political)" could be renamed to somthing entirely different, because its really not history at all, its propaganda. How about we rename that article historical propaganda, because thats what it is, it has nothing to do with legetimate history. --Stbalbach 21:33, 11 December 2005 (UTC)

Performing a Merge I just checked and realized that its been a year since the Merge was proposed. Since I don't see any strong support in favor of keeping this page, I'm going to do the merge. Actually, I'm going to dump the text into historical revisionism, save it, then open it up again and delete it. There's a lot of great examples of historical revisionism here, and maybe they deserve their own page. But this is not an encyplopedia entry. Lampros 03:17, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

Huh? I am reverting your merge for the following reasons:

  1. The merge tag was just put up today.
  2. There is opposition to the merge.
  3. The discussion of the merge is in the other article.

--Stbalbach 04:17, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

If the discussion of the merge is in the other article, then the "merge" template should also be in the other article, shouldn't it? :) Kaliz 12:57, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

Just cut-paste from the other page. Kaliz 14:17, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

You have not given a reason for the POV tag. --Stbalbach 14:24, 12 December 2005 (UTC)


Merge & POV check

I put back the POV check because we don't even agree if there should be a POV check or not. The debate on the merge of the two articles (merging with historical revisionism (political)) proves that they are people who object to this supposed "legitimate" sense of historical revisionism (which does not mean that history is not a matter of debate: but this is not the primary sense of historical revisionism, whether among historians or non-historians (or we are not reading the same historians). The questions of historiography and historic debate should be adressed in the historiography entry or in a entry about philosophy of history (there is such a category in Wiki, so why not use it). This article (as written for the time being) is obviously a matter of philosophical and historian debate, not something which can be written as a NPOV, since not all think there really is a "legitimate" historical revisionism. As i allowed myself to write in the other page, some (Marx, Walter Benjamin, Michel Foucault, to name a few) think that any attempt to write history, or to rewrite history, has got political aims. As such, there is no "neutral" historical revisionism: revisionism is political by nature. See also revisionism: it was used by Karl Kautsky and Eduard Bernstein in marxist controversy, then used to refer to irredentism and refusal of actual state-borders, then to the Holocaust denial and other genocides-denial : all of those uses are political uses. Kaliz 14:26, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

No matter what you personally believe, the term "historical revisionism" is used, in its legitimate sense as defined here, by some historians and others, particularly in the USA. Are they right? Wrong? That would be original research to comment on. Our job is to report what other people do. Your attempt here to de-legitimize the term, by putting it on equal level with wacko holocaust deniers and others who are involved in political propaganda, is really against how Wikipedia operates. We dont tell the world how things should be, we report on how things are. --Stbalbach 14:53, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

If such really is the case, why don't you add in this entry that it is used in this so-called "legitimate sense" "by some historians and others, particularly in the USA" ? You may be right, but please understand that from an European point of view, historical revisionism means denial of historical facts. I am not "trying" to de-legitimize this term: from my personal POV, you are the one trying to legitimate this term! If you are honest, you will then recognize that we have a POV debate here. If you precisely indicate in the introduction that what you are refering to in this entry is a "legitimate sense" used in the USA, but that in others parts of the world such as Europe historical revisionism always refer to historical revisionism (political), I will stop bugging you as I don't consider myself qualified enough to tell you what it means in the US. But I certainly considers myself qualified enough to tell you what it means in Europe! Does that sound right to you? However, you will still need to put a citation from some US mainstream historians refering to this "legitimate" sense. Is that fine? Kaliz 15:04, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

I'm not sure what ismeant by "in Europe" here. In the UK, the terms "historical revsionist" or "revisionist history of X" are commonly used to refer to a new or non-mainstream model being adopted to explain some historical phenomenon. Paul B 08:46, 15 December 2005 (UTC)
Thanks. I thought that was the case but was not sure. Will clarify. --Stbalbach 14:55, 15 December 2005 (UTC)
Yes I'm aware that in Europe the term has negative connotations, that it does not have in the USA. I think the distinction between the two is, one is history revised by historians for legitimate historical reasons, and the other is history revised by non-historians for political or propaganda reasons. Such as your example in France, with French politicians trying to revise history for political reasons. But the term is so commonly used in the USA, in its legitimate sense, im not sure what kind of specific source there is, but will try. I would actually prefer to rename historical revisionism (political) to somthing else like historical propaganda which would solve a lot of problems (but create some new ones with those editors who believe otherwise). --Stbalbach 15:14, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

Legitimate historical revisionism

Here are a couple articles that show that historical revisionism is a legitimate undertaking, with the term being co-opted by certain history "deniers" for political purposes:

Perhaps we should rename historical revisionism (political) to historical deniers since this seems to be the latest description being used for these types of things, and a more appropriate one. --Stbalbach 15:25, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for the sources. I will check them up a bit later. About your proposition to rename political historical revisionism, as you said, you are aware that it would be problematic. If I understand your POV, than it is more a matter of US versus European definition (which wouldn't be the first time; the way Holocaust denial is legally adressed in the US and Europe (see also the Chomsky controversy) shows that we don't generally share the same ideas - this is no wonder to me, as Europe was a lot more implicated in this genocide than the US, and is thus much more sensitive (rightly so, from my POV) to denial of this major state crime). I think that if this explains our controversy (as yet we are waiting for others POV), we should clearly put a disambig sign saying, for this entry: this article concerns the US sense of the word "historical revisionism" (and, therefore, the same sign on the other entry: this article concerns the European sense of the word "historical revisionism"). You should be aware that not doing this can be considered (at least in Europe) as a way of trying to justify those wacko theories that you rightly reprove. This terrible ambiguity should be fixed! However, there will still be this point to adress: in Marx, Benjamin or Foucault POV, history is always political and revision of history always has political aims... Kaliz 15:39, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

Keep in mind this is the English wikipedia, not the German or French wikipedia. Im not sure what your objection is, other than a cultural linguistic mis-understanding. Also, whats your objection to renaming the historical revisionism (political) article to historical deniers? I mentioned it might be problematic, only because the holocaust deniers might object to it. --15:54, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

If a "legitimate" historian should accidentally trip across some documents that would brand him "illegitimate", what should he do? Who should he call for advice? Is he still an historian if he suppresses the new facts he has found - accidentally found?

Cleaning Up

I'm trying to cleanup the page a little bit, I hope I'm maintaining NPOV while doing so. Changes:

  • Tried to make the first section more readable, while perserving the distinction between European and US definitions. First I did a "minor cleanup", which seeks to make the first paragraph more readable, without removing the information about different uses of the term. Then I saved that and did a "major cleanup" which deleted big chunks of the article. These were peices which were poorly written, vague, not NPOV, or didn't seem to offer much to a new reader. I left the lists there, although I think they should be rewritten. Lampros 20:47, 12 December 2005 (UTC)
Lampos, the article before was not perfect, but it was not bad. If you had replaced it with somthing better, I would not mind but your revision was really confusing and somewhat inaccurate. --Stbalbach 22:56, 12 December 2005 (UTC)
I guess I disagree, I feel its terrible. But, can we compromise and go with my "minor cleanup" version? Lampros 01:56, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
Ok I rewrote the intro and made it simple. Two meanings. Two articles. Not complicated. The lead section should just be an introduction/summary, with the body of the article containing the real content and explanation. Hopefully that will avoid further confusion in the future. I deleted a section you had wanted deleted in your major edit. --Stbalbach 05:59, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
OK, I changed the first paragraph a little just to try to make it read more clearly. Tell me what you think. I think the "historical revisionism" section contains a lot of opinions ("all history is inherently revisionist") and is generally more analylitical than factual. I'd ask you to consider revising it. Lampros 02:16, 14 December 2005 (UTC)
Actually, I did make one content change in the first paragraph. I removed "by professional historians". I don't think historical revisionism does not have to be practiced by professionals in order to be legitimate. Lampros 02:27, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

Why?

The term Revisionism leaves me bored and confused: it seems to crop up mostly in newspaper opinion pieces, where the snotty right/left winger is taking on an arrogant left/right winger, over some historical event that plays host to their mutual contempt. Where did the term derive from, where was it first used? historical revisionism (political) should be moved to Historical Propaganda, and Historical Revisionism should be moved to Historical Accuracy. It's difficult enough to tidy up the facts, without this pair of yobs barging in and smashing all the crockery.--shtove 01:23, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

See talk page comments Talk:Historical revisionism (political)#Historical semanticism. --Stbalbach 01:58, 11 January 2006 (UTC)
Regarding changing the names of the articles: these are the terms widely used, so we use them here. We reflect usage, rather than invent better terms. --KM

I'm not inventing terms - just suggesting the use of clear terms instead. Anyway, I spoke out of frustration. Nothing hangs on it.--shtove 18:09, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

Frustrated with dealing with the intellectual elite? It must be catching. I wish their IQs were as high as we had been led to believe.

Hey! Where's the Cold War?

During the later phases of the Cold War, and especially just after the fall of Communism in Russia, there were a number of histories which were called "revisionist." For a time, this was the main usage heard, and clashed with the usage of the term by holocaust deniers. Some people, not knowing the difference between a description and a label, were confused. Knowing that "Cold War Revisionists" were on the left, the use of the term by holocaust deniers indicated its use by the so-called right. But "revisionism" is from the "accepted notions," not in any given direction. This is just what seemed most important to me about the term. --Sobolewski 19:28, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

historical revisionism (political). -- Stbalbach 21:45, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

Yes, all of them, what about them?

"Often historians who are in the minority, such as feminist historians, or ethnic minority historians, or those who work outside of mainstream academia in smaller and less known universities, or the youngest scholars, who have the most to gain and the least to lose, by shaking up the establishment." -- what about them all? --Gutza T T+ 13:22, 25 October 2006 (UTC)

Atomic Attacks on Japan

I'm not sure this section is a good example of revisionism. The reason is, the "old" view is still widely held and valid, the US certainly did drop the bomb to end the war quickly - it may have also had other motivations, which are now coming to light, which adds to a more nuanced picture of events. There will always be new perspectives and theories, just like in Decline of the Roman Empire, but these are not really revisionistic. Revisionism, strictly speaking, is where you take an established idea and discount it based on new evidence. Otherwise it is just the normal process of better understanding the many nuances and complexity of history. So I guess the question is, is there a school of thought saying the US did not drop the bomb because it wanted to end the war early? -- Stbalbach 14:38, 29 November 2006 (UTC)


Historical denial is when you take an accepted piece of propaganda and expose it. You really piss people off - all they can do is holler and scream. Any fact of history is rarely totally assailable ( little pieces, etc )- propaganda, however, is loads of fun to dump on ( a soft target and especially if the supporters are powerful and can only look stupid and whiny and you can see their blood pressure zoom ). —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 159.105.80.219 (talk • contribs) 16:48, 1 December 2006 (UTC)


Stbalbach, the text I added was relevant to the subject. Most reviewers specifically described Gar Alperovitz's work as "revisionist." In fact, BookList labeled him "the dean of revisionist scholars." The specifics I illustrated are not "nuances," they are assertions that directly contradict previous historical accounts:
- US leadership did NOT believe that the atomic option was inevitable, militarily necessary, or tactically superior to conventional warfare.
- US leadership did NOT believe that a long, drawn-out invasion of mainland Japan was the likely alternative.
To answer your question, No, the US did not drop the bomb to end the war, quickly or otherwise. According to the historians I referenced, conventional warfare was recommended by the Pentagon as the best means to end the war. Truman dropped the bomb for one reason--to intimidate Stalin. And that's definitely a "revisionist" view. JulietCastro 20:15, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

It's not the mainstream view. The examples here are showing how revisionism has overturned mainstream established beliefs and are now the new mainstream. I can't comment if what your saying is right or wrong, all I know is that any general history book doesn't say Truman dropped it because of Stalin. People use the term revisionist for a lot of reasons, one is to give their views legitimacy (rightly or wrongly). And he may even be right. It's just too controversial or not well established to be a good example in this article. -- Stbalbach 15:04, 6 December 2006 (UTC)


That is primarily because published "books" are usually released long after something is know. The historian who gets too far ahead of the crowd gets his little hand slapped.—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 159.105.80.63 (talk • contribs) 17:02, 26 January 2007 (UTC)

Red Scare

I deleted this because it is a straw-man argument and not an example of revisionist history. There is no cited evidence for the sweeping assumption that communist espionage was "generally considered paranoia"; on the contrary, going back to World War II, any common-sense observer understood that the U.S. and Soviet Union spied on each other. What was in question was the depth and degree of the spying, and the number of spies. The "Red Scare", by contrast, was a domestic political situation in which McCarthy made sweeping claims that Soviet espionage was vast and all-intrusive, and used this to assail his political enemies from the Senate Floor. Therefore, by itself, the fact that the Soviets spied on the U.S. is not revisionist history since there was never any broad consensus otherwise.3Tigers 11:47, 18 February 2007 PST

There is a difference between 'keeping in contact with a crazed enemy' and 'plotting to annulated everything american'.

-G

Reverted Chinese attempts to re-write history

For the same reasons it was reverted[1] at Historical revisionism (negationism) discussed here. These articles are not a platform to list everything someone happens to think is revisionism. We are listing uncontroversial, sourced and fully accepted examples only. -- Stbalbach 02:09, 20 March 2007 (UTC)

Please check these sources:
[2]
http://hnn.us/articles/7077.html]
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/korea/FI11Dg03.html] Cydevil 03:03, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
I found the article http://hnn.us/articles/7077.html mentioned above interesting, and I think it could be the basis for an example of nationalism causing two differing interpretations of history. The tone of the section Stbalbach removed is confrontational and has an non neutral point of view, so I do not think that that version should be included here. However if it were to be re-written with the emphasis of how today's nationalism causes different interpretations of the same historical events in a region of Asia (Just as nationalism effects the views on the Battle of Waterloo in Europe) -- and providing it does not go in for Korea is right/wrong "so yar-boo sucks to the other lot", then I think it could be a useful addition to the examples in the article. --Philip Baird Shearer 14:08, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
Why Koguryo is regarded as "Korean" is not nnecessarily because of Korean nationalism. Look at all the other tertiary sources, such as Britannica, and non-Korean history/archaeology books on Korea. The conventional view is that Koguryo was a "Korean" state, and Chinese had the same view until the 80s. The change came with an ideological shift of defining China as a "multi-ethnic unitary state", so this is a good example of shifting ideologies. Also, when Mark Byington says that "Korea is misguided", he's referring to the wide-spread suspicion among Koreans that China's doing this to justify a possible annexation of North Korea. He's not referring to the conventional view that Koguryo is a Korean state. Cydevil 23:57, 20 March 2007 (UTC)

See the Goguryeo article (modern politics section and article lock-down for edit warring), this is controversial issue, until they get their house in order in the Goguryeo article, I don't see why it should be included here, its a debate spilling out into other articles, this article should not become a new front in a POV war. -- Stbalbach 02:09, 21 March 2007 (UTC)

given the fact that Cydevil is missing my point, I agree with Stbalbach that we are better off not including a contriversial example like this on this page. --Philip Baird Shearer 15:04, 21 March 2007 (UTC)

Irish history concerning relations with Britain

  • Does this example help to illuminate the issue?
  • Even if it does, is it worth the bother, or will it become one for endless POV wars? --Philip Baird Shearer 11:28, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

Irish revisionism

I'm kind of concerned about using the Irish revisionism as an example of revisionism. It looks more like an conscious attempt to change history for a political purposes (ie. Historical revisionism (negationism)), than a legitimate academic discovery of new facts. -- Stbalbach 22:48, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

It's an ongoing debate here in Ireland, but with no political angle. Deliberately, I quoted Kevin Whelan's work on 1798 as he outlined the various revisions long before Irish independence; before the politics became important. Each revision mentioned / discovered new 'facts' and chose to ignore most previous analyses. Of course one can split hairs over whether something is negationist or not. I have supplied a reference and if you disagree after you have read it, then delete it. Deleting a point before you read a source is just vandalism.Red Hurley 13:46, 14 April 2007 (UTC)
Ok what got me was this: Since 1970 some commentators and historians have sought or promoted a revisionist approach, often deprecated as anti-national which makes it sound like negationism. I read it more closely and I think I understand what your saying, that there is a school of revisionism trying to overturn the nationalistic scholarship of the past with social, micro, economic, womens, etc.. which would be a good example of revisionism. BTW sorry if you saw it as vandalism, I posted this note and wait about a week or so and didn't hear back so removal of the text was the next logical step. -- Stbalbach 15:42, 14 April 2007 (UTC)
That's fine, thanks. KW analysed revisionism itself - that is why he should be mentioned. I was also guilty of adding in the new scientific analyses as in: " Carbon dating, the examination of ice cores and tree rings and measuring oxygen isotopes in bones in the last few decades have provided new data with which to argue new hypotheses. The new area of 'ancient DNA', recovering partial results, allows scientists to argue for example whether or not humans are partly descended from Neanderthals. The reader must watch out for multi-disciplinary academic papers that end with cautious or generalised results." History no longer derives from dots of ink on a page.Red Hurley 07:27, 15 April 2007 (UTC)

Request "Accusations of Historical revisionism"

I don't know if this should go here, on this article, or on Historical revisionism (negationism) or Historical revisionism (negationism). But I believe current events and people have been accused of rewriting history, notably both George W. Bush [3] (On the Iraq war and his terms in office) and Vladimir Putin [4]. I do not know much on these two accusations other then that I know they have been criticized by the media for allegedly changing factual events for their benefits. My intentions are not trying to give a POV, or create crazy conspiracy theories, but I was interested on readying more about these accusations.209.249.65.142­~ —Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.249.65.142 (talk) 21:25, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

Holocaust and all the subjects related to this event may be revised just as all other events. I don't deny the fact that many of the Holocaust revisionists are politically motivated, but it has nothing to do with verification of the events of the past. Both ateheist and a religious person can discover a new planet. But their religios preferences havenothing todo with the information abou the celestial body.- Newoy —Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.241.36.5 (talk) 17:07, 7 November 2007 (UTC)

New Historians - A New Paradigm

I have added the New Historians to the See Also section. This is an on-going, active and hotly debated historical revisionism issue predominantly within Israel, but with immense wider implications. It is based largely on Accession of New Data, but has added new dimensions to all other legitimate revisionism influences, particularly Causation, Nationalism and Ideology. Although this article notes revisionism is a struggle historically, the status quo side of the New Historians debate, to a large degree, has tried to dismiss the new data outright and is currently arguing the interpretation of the data, rather than the facts thereof. The debate has degenerated to the point where the perjorative usage of the word ‘revisionist’ could be considered a relative a compliment.

The importance of this debate has massive implications both within the broader historic context and better knowledge of Israeli History, as well as a better understanding of the Palestinian point of view, their struggle for human rights and self-determination. Similar heated debate within the US has largely been between Jewish historians. Debating the importance or even acknowledging the New Historian’s data outside the Jewish community has often lead to charges of antisemitism. This legitimate historical revisionist debate is contemporaneous with, and in part causal to, the development of neologisms such as self-hating Jew, new antisemitism and post-Zionism.

I believe details of this current debate should be included within the Examples section, lengthy or not. CasualObserver'48 (talk) 15:14, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

Irish Revisionism

Irish revisionism is not a good example in the context of this article. It would be more suited to negationism. The piece is also wrong and misleading anyway on two counts. Firstly, Kevin Whelan actually argues that revisionism was politically motivated and secondly, what lead to an increase in local economic and women's history was actually an aversion to the messy politicised debate around revisionism. Cliste (talk) 23:01, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

Merge Historical revisionism (negationism) here

It looks to me like the two articles Historical revisionism and Historical revisionism (negationism) are an instance of WP Forking which violates WP policy. --Ludvikus (talk) 21:20, 26 April 2008 (UTC)

This has been discussed before. They are two different meanings as described in the introduction, possibly with common different meaning on different sides of the pond. In the UK it has a common pejorative meaning -- Few if any historians in the UK would want to be labelled as "revisonist" in the mass media because of the negative connotations the word has gained through its use to describe people like David Irving.
It was also decided to keep them as two distinct articles (originally Historical revisionism and historical revisionism (political) because it was argued by some (and I came around to agreeing with them after initally being against two articles), because the waters are otherwise so muddied that it makes it easy for people who are not familiar with the other term to get confused over which is legitimate and which is illegitimate use of the term, which is precisely why people like Irving like to use the term. So given that there are two usages of the term, we should have two articles on the term for clarity. --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 12:04, 27 April 2008 (UTC)
I would also oppose the merger of the articles for the reasons expressed by Mr. Shearer. Tom (North Shoreman) (talk) 13:51, 27 April 2008 (UTC)
If you can avoid Wikipedia:Forking I definitely would support non-merging. But you cannot have two articles in which one expresses the views of one set of WP editors which the other oppose. You cannot set up a platform in which one merely legitimates the views which are discredited in the other. And that's what we have right now: a duplication designed to say nice things about the subject which are not tolerated on the other? Do no-one understand what I'm saying, or what the purpose is of Wiki policy against Forking? Come on people, someone help me out on this! --Ludvikus (talk) 14:27, 27 April 2008 (UTC)
How should the "Negationism" article relate to Denialism, are they the same thing, or is it one form of denialism? Paul foord (talk) 14:50, 27 April 2008 (UTC)
There is also the article genocide denial. A quick Google of site:uk shows that "Denialism" and "Denialist" are hardly used compared to "revisionism" and "revisionist".
  • about 777 English pages for denialist site:uk
  • about 72,200 English pages for revisionist site:uk
  • about 912 English pages for denialism site:uk
  • about 4,440,000 English pages for revisionism
--Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 15:14, 27 April 2008 (UTC)
"point of view (POV) fork" To be more precise! I'm saying that's what we really have here (right now) by these two (2) articles! --Ludvikus (talk) 14:31, 27 April 2008 (UTC)
This is no more a content fork than any two articles that share a name and are disambiguated. Point of view forking is to do with presenting two different arguments about the same topic. We could move "Historical revisionism" to some other name and have a disambiguation page here, but I think it is reasonable to argue that this is the main topic and not bother, although this is of course an American centric position :-)
I have contributed to both pages and I do not see them as expressing the views of two different sets of Wikipedia editors. They express a differentiation in the use of the phrase not a difference of opinion about a phrase by Wikipedia editors. For example take a relevantly recent section in this article that I introduced Historical revisionism#French attacking formations in the Napoleonic wars and compare that to the Evans quote that I added to the Historical revisionism (negationism)#Techniques used by politically motivated revisionists article. To mix those two sections in the same article would be confusing. If negationism was common in English then we could put it under that and all your arguments would evaporate, but it is not a common expression while Historical revisionism meaning negationism is so we should not do that. --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 15:14, 27 April 2008 (UTC)
I don't support this merge. Historical revisionism (negationism) should remain as named. This page should be renamed to Historical revisionism (academic), as I have proposed in the discussion below. Historical revisionism should redirect to the disambiguation page and disambiguation hatnotes should be added to the articles so readers can find what they're looking for. This naming scheme will keep the two topics properly separate and avoid the problems of similar material creeping into both articles. Ashanda (talk) 22:53, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

Requested move

The following discussion is an archived discussion of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the proposal was withdrawn - the first opposer to the proposal is the proposer. Discussion section left open to encourage further discussion of the issue. JPG-GR (talk) 16:07, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

Historical revisionism → Revisionism — Move to the non-pejorative usage —Ashanda (talk) 20:31, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

Survey

Feel free to state your position on the renaming proposal by beginning a new line in this section with *'''Support''' or *'''Oppose''', then sign your comment with ~~~~. Since polling is not a substitute for discussion, please explain your reasons, taking into account Wikipedia's naming conventions.
  • Oppose, I have an alternative proposal as I have explained below. Ashanda (talk) 21:25, 27 April 2008 (UTC)
  • Oppose. I support the alternative proposed (see discussion below). Tom (North Shoreman) (talk) 22:30, 27 April 2008 (UTC)
  • Oppose Revisionism is used with different adjectives to mean distinctly different things. For example Historical revisionism in both forms is different from Marxist revisionism. Therefore "Revisionism" should remain a disambiguation page. I also oppose the alternative move for the reasons I have given in the discussion section. --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 13:46, 29 April 2008 (UTC)
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Discussion

Any additional comments:
Revisionism & Historical revisionism

I strongly recommend that we Wikipedia:Move the Latter page (this Article) into the Former. --Ludvikus (talk) 19:25, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

  • Revisionism, as a movement (in the USA) was born in 1903, according to Merriam-Webster's. It's is clear to me - from my recollection of historical reading. Sometime latter, somehow, the adjective that preceeds got attached to designate the other meaning. Whether or not there are two - one legit, the other not, is to be established by appropriate citations. --Ludvikus (talk) 19:30, 27 April 2008 (UTC)
Confusion between Revisionism & Historical revisionism

To the best of my historica recollection, Revisionism is the so-called non-pejoritive usage. And Historical revisionism is the pejorative one. Also Marxist revisionism appears to be WP's term for the MW usage I have given herein. --Ludvikus (talk) 19:44, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

  • I do agree with Ludvikus that the current set of names for these articles is confusing, however I have a different idea for the naming scheme. IMHO Historical revisionism is used in the negative sense rather than the academic sense in common usage. I think it would probably be better for this page to be moved to Historical revisionism (academic) and for Historical revisionism to be aimed at the disambiguation page. Add disambiguation hatnotes to all the articles will aid readers in finding what they're looking for. Ashanda (talk) 21:23, 27 April 2008 (UTC)
How did we, in less than 24 hours, get from a proposed merger with the article Historical revisionism (negationism) (which still has the merger template in place) to simply renaming this single article. Is it Ludvikus' intention to permanently withdraw that proposal? To resubmit it after a name change? I think Historical revisionism (academic) would be an excellent rename for this article, but I am not sure where that leaves the other article. It seems obvious that a discussion of Holocaust Denial should have no place in any article with the word "academic" appended to it, but I didn't believe it belonged in this article with its current name. Tom (North Shoreman) (talk) 22:28, 27 April 2008 (UTC)
That would be my own error, Sorry! The Revisionism page (incorrectly) had a merge template pointing here [5] and I didn't look closely at the merge template on this page when I reformatted the Revisionism merge into a proposed move. I have put the template back up. Sorry! Ashanda (talk) 22:43, 27 April 2008 (UTC)
I have reverted Ludvikus's move of Revisionism to Revisionism (disambiguation), because links from "word" to "word (disambiguation)" tend to lead to alteration to the redirect either through good faith edits or vandalism. --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 09:59, 28 April 2008 (UTC)
I am against moving Historical revisionism to "historical revisionism (accademic)" as this is I suspect a difference in National English, as this quotation from the OED indicates:
"A term used for a revised attitude to some previously accepted political situation, doctrine, or point of view; concr., the name of the policy adopted by a right-wing Zionist group, active during the formative period of the State of Israel; mostly U.S., a movement to revise the accepted versions of American history, esp. those relating to foreign affairs since the war of 1939-45." (first used in 1921) This entry my be of interest:
"1965 New Statesman 1 Oct. 486/2 One linguistic difference between American and British historians lies in the frequency with which they use the word ‘revisionism’. It is common currency in Transatlantic seminars and journals, but hardly ever heard in this country. Ibid., ‘Revisionism’ goes on all the time because of disagreement about the moral and political significance of what happened. "
Given the term use in the US "mostly U.S., a movement to revise the accepted versions of American history, esp. those relating to foreign affairs since the war of 1939-45." and the New Statesman's comment I think that there is no need to move the article unless one is proposing Historical revisionism (USA). I would also object to that title for two reasons first the term is used in the UK as see in this word article but also because in practice it is convenient to keep it at historical revisionism when linking from statements like this taken from Allied war crimes during World War II "The German revisionist historian historian Jörg Friedrich, claims that "Winston Churchill's decision to bomb Germany between January and May 1945 was a war crime."(Luke Harding German historian provokes row over war photos in The Guardian, October 21, 2003)" Making the proposed move to Historical revisionism (academic) would force the editor of the article to choose between Historical revisionism (academic) and Historical revisionism (negationism) when the source that is used does not make it clear which meaning is meant. It is no use saying that in such an eventuality then leave it at the new disambiguation page because we have editors who make it their life's work to remove links from disambiguation pages to point to the underlying articles and they may well get it wrong if the source is not clear.
And it seems to me that in this article "After reviewing the features of post-1989 revisionist interpretations of Romania's role in the Second World War and the Holocaust, the study underlines how this revisionist trend of Romanian nationalist historians has relied on the accounts, largely unfounded, of Dr. Moses Carmilly-Weinberger, the wartime rabbi of the Neolog Jewish community in Cluj, and of Dr. Raoul Sorban, a professor of art history at the University of Bucharest. Randolph Braham succeeds very well in underscoring that the rehabilitation campaign of Marshal Antonescu and his regime, besides belittling or ignoring the sufferings inflicted on the Jews, also has a strong anti-Hungarian dimension, a familiar theme of mainstream Romanian nationalism." which is from an academic website is not making such a clear distinction that the two suggested page names imply.
Also how does one deal with comments like this "The target of much revisionism was popular rather than academic history, as exemplified by John Mitchel’s infamous comment that "The almighty indeed sent the potato blight, but the Engl ish created the Famine."[6] if the article is renamed to Historical revisionism (academic)? Both of the last two articles are from British Academic sites.
So in conclusion. I am against moving historical revisionism to Historical revisionism (academic) because for those cases (and there are lots) where it is not clear which meaning is meant in the cited source, one can default to the main article Historical revisionism and from the introduction of that article, allow the reader to be aware that there are two meanings. This also side steps the problems that otherwise occur with the biographic details of living persons, as with the example above with Jörg Friedrich. --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 09:59, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

I appreciate very much your substantial contribution, work, and dedication, User:Philip Baird Shearer. I'm very new to this Wikipedia page. So please excuse any ommission of others. I outline the following issues I see here:

Here, just a click away, are these 4 headings created by the LOC: [7]
I'll come back with the BL results later. --Ludvikus (talk) 13:09, 28 April 2008 (UTC)
I'm back with some Wonderful results for us Wikipedians - but I hope this will not offend you Brits regarding Yankee imperialism:
  • The British Library uses the subject classification system of the Library of Congress !!! That makes our work so much easier I think.
  • Accordingly I propose that we adopt the usages of these two National libraries of the United Kingdom and of the United States (we can consider other countries (if any) if, or when that comes up, later. --Ludvikus (talk) 13:21, 28 April 2008 (UTC)
This debate is about moving a page and not whether the terms exist. BTW the OED is not just a British English language dictionary it is an English language dictionary. The OED lists a number of distinct meanings for the use of the word revisionism and revisionist. Secondly a quick search of the phrase "Historical revisionism" and "historical revisionist" among Google books shows that the term exists so we are not creating a neologism. As to the use as a description of the writing of men like Irving its use can also be found by doing the correct Google search eg or here in a book written more than a decade ago. I suggest that we leave the creation of lots of new pages and for the moment keep focused on the move or no issue. --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 13:23, 28 April 2008 (UTC)
Ludvikus please stop changing the introduction to these articles until after the move has or has not been agreed. Changing the content like this makes it hard for someone new to this page to see what the debate is about. --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 13:30, 28 April 2008 (UTC)
Dear Philip Baird Shearer, I haven't changed anything - I was out dancing all night - and just got up from my sleep. Haven't even had breakfast yet. Also, why are you discussing the great Oxford English Dictionary when I bring up one of the world's greatest scholarly libraries, the former British Museum? --Ludvikus (talk) 13:40, 28 April 2008 (UTC)
I was referring to this edit Revision as of 20:21, 27 April 2008 (and the previous one included in the same diff). --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 17:15, 28 April 2008 (UTC)
Addendum 1: Neither the LOC nor the BL have the subject heading historical Revisionism. It would appear that it's reduced effectively to Holocaust studies - of the much discredited sort, I might add. Ludvikus (talk) 13:55, 28 April 2008 (UTC)
Addendum 2: Institute for Historical Review [8] - that's obviously who "they" are and where their name comes from - and that's what we should write about (w/o OR). Ludvikus (talk) 14:07, 28 April 2008 (UTC)
Andendum 3: "They" publish the highly prestigiously named jounal - the Journal of Historical Review [9] - that makes our job (as Wikipedians) much easier regarding WHO they are and WHAT their views are or what "theories the expound. Ludvikus (talk) 14:15, 28 April 2008 (UTC)
Addendum 4: There is also the product of Noontide Press: The Journal of Historical Review. Ludvikus (talk) 14:22, 28 April 2008 (UTC)
Addendum 5: Here's what the Anti-Defamation League, a.k.a. ADL, has to say about the whole lot: [10]. Ludvikus (talk) 14:32, 28 April 2008 (UTC)
Addendum 6 There's the following scholarly journal (whose notability may be in dispute):
The Library of Congress> LCCN Permalink
Search the LC Online Catalog Library of Congress Catalog Record Search the LC Online Catalog
View LC holdings for this title in the: LC Online Catalog View this record in: MARCXML | MODS | Dublin Core
Historical review
LC Control No.: 72620026
Type of Material: Serial (Periodical, Newspaper, etc.)
Main Title: Historical review.
Published/Created: [Saint John, N.B.] New Brunswick Historical Society. [n.d.]
Related Names: New Brunswick Historical Society. [from old catalog] » More like this
Description: v. 23 cm.
Current Frequency: Monthly
Notes: PREMARC/SERLOC merged record
Subjects: New Brunswick--History--Periodicals. [from old catalog] » More like this
LC Classification: F1041 .H56
Geographic Area Code: n-cn-nk
LCCN Permalink: A Service of the Library of Congress
--Ludvikus (talk) 14:41, 28 April 2008 (UTC)
Addendum 7 The "John Doe" Historical Review: i.e. English Historical Review, The American Historical Review, ... etc., but only "they" call themselves The Journal of Historical Review - that misleads us. Ludvikus (talk) 14:55, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

WP:Neologism and/or WP:Original research

From what I see now, despite the noble efforts of our Right Honorable UK editor (I love that title for the members of your Parliament), the non-pejorative usage of Historical Revisionism is either such a WP:Neologism, or WP:Original research. I challenge him to give us just One citation of an authority that establishes the matter otherwise. Ludvikus (talk) 15:10, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

Please do a Google book search on "Historical revisionism" and take you pick. But two returned on the first page of the search which clearly have nothing to do with Irving and his ilk:
  • Critical Essays on Israeli Social Issues and Scholarship by Russell A. Stone, Walter P. Zenner - Page 179
  • Interpreting Irish History: The Debate on Historical Revisionism, 1938-1994 by Ciaran Brady
--Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 17:29, 28 April 2008 (UTC)
And an even better one on the next Google page because it explains the terms partly from the point of view of a paradigm and also "not the negation of history": Québec: State and Society By Alain Gagnon Page 56 and also gives a possible explanation for the use of the term in Irish history on the next page. --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 17:37, 28 April 2008 (UTC)
And here is one that uses the term the other way. Particularly the paragraph that starts "The most notorious example of historical revisionism..." which is clearly a use of the word meaning Holocaust denial. So "you pays you money and takes you choice". --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 17:48, 28 April 2008 (UTC)
And from the Holocaust denial page:
"The two leading critical exposés of Holocaust denial in the United States were written by historians Deborah Lipstadt (1993) and Michael Shermer and Alex Grobman (2000). These scholars make a distinction between historical revisionism and denial. Revisionism, in their view, entails a refinement of existing knowledge about an historical event, not a denial of the event itself, that comes through the examination of new empirical evidence or a reexamination or reinterpretation of existing evidence. Legitimate historical revisionism acknowledges a "certain body of irrefutable evidence" or a "convergence of evidence" that suggest that an event - like the black plague, American slavery, or the Holocaust - did in fact occur (Lipstadt 1993:21; Shermer & Grobman 200:34). Denial, on the other hand, rejects the entire foundation of historical evidence..." Ronald J. Berger. Fathoming the Holocaust: A Social Problems Approach, Aldine Transaction, 2002, ISBN 0202306704, p. 154.
"'Till at last the maiden cried 'Enough, enough, I'm satisfied.'" --Philip Baird Shearer (talk) 17:55, 28 April 2008 (UTC)
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