The Modern Researcher

The Modern Researcher, by Jacques Barzun and Henry F. Graff The Modern Researcher, by Jacques Barzun and Henry F. Graff, is a guide written for graduate students of history on researching and composing research reports.# I. Principles and Methods# Chapter 1: Research and Report# A great quote on the applicability of this work outside the field of history: [As] the philosopher William James pointed out, history is the great humanizer: You can give humanistic value to almost anything by teaching it historically. Geology, economics, mechanics, are humanities when taught with reference to the successive achievements of the geniuses to which these sciences owe their being. Not taught thus, literature remains grammar, art a catalogue, history a list of dates, and natural science a sheet of formulas and weights and measures. [p. 9] Chapter 2: The ABC of Technique# More on the purpose of writing and how that purpose should effect what you write and how you write it: Any account, report, or other piece of serious factual writing is intended to take effect on someone at some time. It must consequently meet that someone's demands. Those demands can for convenience be summed up in a pair of questions: Is the account true, reliable, complete? Is it clear, orderly, easy to grasp and remember? All the devices and methods that the researcher combines under the name of technique exist to satisfy these requirements? [p. 14] Apart from the purpose of writing is the purpose of your writing: [Your] subject is defined by that group of associated gacts and ideas which, when clearly presented in a prescribed amount of space, leave no questions unsanswered WITHIN the presentation, even though many questions could be asked OUTSIDE it. [p. 16] Chapter 6: Handling Ideas# This chapter contained a correction of a common quote. The context was the subtlety of ideas and quotes. Lord Acton does not say, "Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely"; he says, "Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely." (Letter to Bishop Creighton in Acton, Historical Essays and Studies, London, 1907, 504) A slight but consequential difference,

for it allows the possibility that a business executive or a public officeholder will not be corrupted by wielding power. [p. 148] Chapter 8: Pattern, Bias, and Materialism# A fabulous quote in the section on Bias: "Impartiality is a dream and honesty a duty. We cannot be impartial, but we can be intellectually honest." - Gaetano Salvemini [p. 187] II. Writing, Speaking, and Publishing# Chapter 9: Organizing# A fabulous paragraph of differentiating yourself from the rest of the herd: If your first words are "This book..." they will not be able to distinguish your review from twenty others, and they will be entitled to conclude that you have not expended much thought on enlisting their attention. The opening statement takes the readers from where they presumably stand in point of knowledge and brings them to the book under review. The briefest possible description of its aim, scope, and place in the world therefore follows the baited opening sentence and completes the first paragraph. [p. 221] Chapter 10: Plain Words# More on the style of writing, respecting your reader, and thinking about what you write: Jargon, clichés, and tricks of speech, as you can see, are not simply sets of words or faults of writing, but forms of escape. They denote a failure of courage, an emotional weakness, a shuffling refusal to be pinned down to a declaration. The cowardice come out on paper like fingerprints at the site of the crime. [p. 240] Chapter 15: Modes of Presentation# A concise list of research advice: 1. Do not wait until you have gathered all your material before starting to write. 2. Do not be afraid of writing down something that you think may have to be changed. 3. Do not hesitate to write up in any order those sections of your total work that seem to have grown ripe in your mind. 4. Once you start writing, keep going. Resist the temptation to get up ad verify a fact. Leave it blank.

5. When you get stuck in the middle of a stretch of writing, reread your last two or three pages and see if continuity of thought will not propel you past dead center. [p. 387-388] Preface to the Sixth Edition v Acknowledgments vii List of Figures xiii PART I Principles and Methods of Research 1 Research and Report: Characteristics 3 The Report: A Fundamental Form 3 The Historical Outlook Underlies Research and Report 5 Reporting History in Daily Life 5 The Past Is All-Inclusive 7 The Research Reporter and Scholar 8 Historical Writing: Its Origins and Demands 10 2 The ABC of Technique 15 The Prime Difficulty: What Is My Subject? 15 I Have All My Material—But Have You? 19 The Practical Imagination at Work 22 A Note Is First a Thought 26 Knowledge for Whom? 31 Hard Work Makes Royal Roads 34 3 Finding the Facts 37 The Detective and the Clues 37 Library and Internet 39 A Surfeit of Sources 45 Defining the Quarry 46 Cross-Questioning the Book 48 Professional Informants: Reference Books 51 Up-to-Date Reference Works 53 Contemporary Opinion Now and Earlier 59 Finding One's Peers and One's Ancestors 59 Facts and Numbers from Maps 62 What Else Do I Need? 63 4 Verification 67 How the Mind Seeks Truth 67 Collation, or Matching Copy with Source 70

71 76 79 81 85 90 97 101 101 104 105 108 110

Rumor, Legend, and Fraud Falsification on the Increase Attribution: Putting a Name to a Document Explication: Clearing Up Details in Manuscripts Destroying Myths Identification: Giving Due Credit for Authorship The Snare of Pseudonyms 5 Handling Ideas Fact and Idea: An Elusive Distinction Large Ideas as Facts of History Technical Terms: All or None The Technique of Self-Criticism Reporters' Fallacies: How to Avoid Them The Scholar and the Great Ideas

113 117 117 122 127 131 133 139 142 144 146 149 149 151 153

6 Truth, Causes, and Conditions The Types of Evidence Probability the Guide Clio and the Doctors Assertion versus Suggestion Note Qualifiers in All Conclusions Skepticism under Control Subjective and Objective: The Right Meanings Knowledge of Fact and Knowledge of Causes On Cause and Measurement 7 Pattern, Bias, and Revisionism The Reason of Historical Periods and Labels The Conditions of Pattern-Making The Sources of Bias and Its Correctives The View from Inside

157 160

Revisionism Good and Bad

The Philosophy and "Laws" of History 161 PART II Writing, Speaking, and Publishing 8 Organizing: Paragraph, Chapter, and Part

169 169 174 177 179 183 188 193 193 195

The Function of Form and of Forms The Steps in Organizing The Chapter: Role, Size, and Title Composing: By Instinct or by Outline? Troubleshooting after Lapses The Book Review and the Paragraph 9 Plain Words: The War on Jargon and Clichés Keep Aware of Words The State of the Language Jargon: Origin and Sources

196 198 200 203 206

Be Strict about Signposts Picture All Verbal Images Decide Which Images Are Alive Give Up Omnibus Words and Dressing Gowns

Observe Idiom and Implications 207 10 Clear Sentences: Emphasis, Tone, and Rhythm 211 Live Sentences for Lively Thoughts 211 Mismatching of Parts 214 Five-Legged Sheep and Other Monsters 216 Modern Prose: Its Virtues and Vices 218 Punctuating for Smooth Reading 222 Carpentry or Cabinetmaking? 224 The Sound of the Sense 229 11 The Arts of Quoting and Translating 235 Three Recurrent Tasks 235 The Philosophy of Quoting 236 The Mechanics of Quotation 239 Difficulties and Dangers of Translation 243 Dictionaries and "False Friends" 245 Literalism and Paraphrase

247

To Translate Is to "Carry Over" 249 12 The Rules of Citing: Footnotes and Bibliography 257 Types and Functions of Footnotes 257 Footnote Form and Forms 260 Footnoting: When, Where, How Much? 266 The Bibliography: Varieties and Forms 268 13 Revising for Printer and Public 275 Errors and Their Ways 275 Judging the Merits of a Work 277 Revision: Maxims and Pointers 279 Revision: Marks and Symbols 280 The Professional Touch 281 The Handle to a Writer's Works 287 Revision: The Printer and You 289 The Final Pages: The Index 290 Copyright: To Protect and Defend 291 14 Modes of Presentation 293 Composing: By Hand or by Machine? 293 Advantages versus Drawbacks 293 A Few Rudiments for Beginners 295 The Whole Circle of Work: Editing a Classic 297 Speaking What You Have Learned 298 Heading Committees and Seminars 301 The Etiquette of Leadership 304 Making the Most of Time 305 A Few More Recommendations 309 InfoTrac® College Edition Terms 311 Index 313