Page 56 - Balancing between the present and the past

Chapter 3
the past and thus hinder successful HPT (Reisman & Wineburg, 2008). Although we can never be perfectly non-presentist (e.g., VanSledright, 2001; Wineburg, 2001), students must understand that the past differs from the present when interpreting historical phenomena and the decisions of historical agents (Seixas, 1996; Seixas & Morton, 2013). Students who are aware of the difference between the past and the present and acknowledge their present-oriented perspective might demonstrate this awareness by explaining that people in the past did not know what we now know or that people thought differently in the past.
The second component is to exhibit historical empathy. Historical empathy refers to placing oneself in the position of people in the past to understand their motives and values regarding their decisions and actions (e.g., Cunningham, 2009; Endacott & Sturtz, 2014). Although some scholars have argued that historical empathy can never be fully achieved and is idealistic because it is impossible to put oneself in the shoes of a historical agent (e.g., Kitson, Husbands, & Steward, 2011; Riley, 1998; Wineburg, 1998), many scholars have concluded that historical empathy contributes to insights about historical agents’ decisions (e.g., Brooks, 2011; Endacott & Brooks, 2013; Kohlmeier, 2006). However, though history education research has debated the extent to which historical empathy is an affective or cognitive achievement (e.g., Virja & Kouki, 2014), we consider historical empathy as a combination of affective and cognitive processes, following the conceptualization of scholars such as Endacott and Brooks (2013). It is further posited that connecting with known and familiar emotions of people in the past as an affective process might promote historical empathy and understanding of historical agents’ decisions (Riley, 1998; Skolnick, Dulberg, & Maestre, 2004). Furthermore, considering the roles and positions of different historical agents in society and how such positions may have affected their views on historical phenomena as a more cognitive process could also contribute to historical empathy and to the understanding of historical agents’ actions (Bermúdez & Jaramillo, 2001). In this study, we use the concept of historical empathy as putting oneself in the shoes of a historical person by considering his or her emotions, role, and position. For analytical reasons, we consider the reconstruction of a historical context as a distinct component.
The third component is the reconstruction of the historical context. Yeager and Foster (2001) argued that students must possess historical context knowledge, which includes knowledge about chronology, before they can interpret historical phenomena
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