Table of Contents

Preface; Introduction: nailing jelly to the wall; Part I. Objectivity Enthroned: 1. The European legacy: Ranke, Bacon, Flaubert; 2. The professionalization project; 3. Consensus and legitimation; 4. A most genteel insurgency; Part II. Objectivity Besieged: 5. Historians on the home front; 6. A changed climate; 7. Professionalism stalled; 8. Divergence and dissent; 9. The battle joined; Part III. Objectivity Reconstructed: 10. The defense of the West; 11. A convergent culture; 12. An autonomous profession; Part IV. Objectivity in Crisis: 13. The collapse of comity; 14. Every group its own historian; 15. The center does not hold; 16. There was no king in Israel; Appendix: manuscript collections cited; Index.

Promotional Information

Novick shows how the idea and ideal of objectivity were elaborated, challenged, modified, and defended over the last century.

Reviews

'A brilliant and fascinating book.' Laurence Veysey 'A judicious appraisal of men and circumstances, erudite and wide-ranging. Irreverent but not nastily irreverent, with an admirable delicacy of touch.' William H. McNeill 'An astute and provocative account of how the historical profession in America has dealt with its founding myth and central norm - the ideal of objectivity.' Dorothy Ross