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History vocabulary · Historiography and Historical Thinking

Whig history

Meaning in history, with examples

nounAdvanced term

In history, Whig history means: An interpretation presenting the past as a progressive path toward valued institutions of the present.

In Turkish: Whig tarih anlayışı, ilerlemeci tarih okuması

How it is used

Usually a critical label; identify the assumed destination rather than merely using it as an insult.

Example sentences

  1. The review criticized the book's Whig history of parliamentary development.

    Present institutions are treated as the expected endpoint.

  2. Including failed alternatives weakened the chapter's tendency toward Whig history.

    Lost possibilities make the outcome appear less predetermined.

Common collocations

  • a Whig history
  • the Whig interpretation of history
  • hindsightUnderstanding of an event or situation that comes only after it has happened, when its results are already known.
  • historiographyThe writing of history, and especially the study of how historians have written about a subject over time, which sources they used and how their views changed.

More terms: Historiography and Historical Thinking

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