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Sun 17 Feb, 2013 03:21 am
Context:
Frank Dikötter (English pronunciation: /diːˈkʌtər/ Chinese: 馮客) is a Dutch historian and author of Mao's Great Famine. The book won the 2011 Samuel Johnson Prize.[2] Dikötter is Chair Professor of Humanities at the University of Hong Kong, where he teaches courses on both Mao Zedong and the Great Chinese Famine,[3] and Professor of the Modern History of China from the School of Oriental and African Studies at the University of London.
Dikötter is considered to be a
revisionist historian, having stressed the benefits of opium smoking in Patient Zero, as well as calling for the rehabilitation of Republican China under Chiang Kai-shek in The Age of Openness.[4][5]
More:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_Dik%C3%B6tter
@oristarA,
oristarA wrote:
Context:
Frank Dikötter (English pronunciation: /diːˈkʌtər/ Chinese: 馮客) is a Dutch historian and author of Mao's Great Famine. The book won the 2011 Samuel Johnson Prize.[2] Dikötter is Chair Professor of Humanities at the University of Hong Kong, where he teaches courses on both Mao Zedong and the Great Chinese Famine,[3] and Professor of the Modern History of China from the School of Oriental and African Studies at the University of London.
Dikötter is considered to be a
revisionist historian, having stressed the benefits of opium smoking in Patient Zero, as well as calling for the rehabilitation of Republican China under Chiang Kai-shek in The Age of Openness.[4][5]
More:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_Dik%C3%B6tter
"Revisionist" is generally used as a negative adjective to describe radical revisions of history. Historians generally revise the histories they study as new information comes to light, and this process usually doesn't incite the use of this term. It's used a lot against Holocaust deniers or diminishers.
Not necessarily negative or derogatory. In historiography, (the study of the methodology and development of "history" as a discipline) historical revisionism is the reinterpretation of orthodox views on evidence, motivations, and decision-making processes surrounding a historical event. Though the word revisionism is sometimes used in a negative way, constant revision of history is part of the normal scholarly process of writing history.
The American historian James McPherson said "Revision is the lifeblood of historical scholarship. History is a continuing dialogue between the present and the past. Interpretations of the past are subject to change in response to new evidence, new questions asked of the evidence, new perspectives gained by the passage of time. There is no single, eternal, and immutable "truth" about past events and their meaning."
The historian and philosopher of science Thomas Kuhn has pointed out that in contrast to the hard sciences, in which there tends to be (except in times of paradigm shift) a single reigning paradigm, the social sciences are characterized by a "tradition of claims, counterclaims, and debates over fundamentals."
Holocaust deniers often resist the 'denier' label and prefer to call themselves "revisionist", and this can sometimes lead to confusion.
I see NewHopeR asked this on UsingEnglish.com today, and got a broadly similar answer.
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