Hi. I am someone who has lurked and very occasionally asked questions on this forum for some time. One thing that has frustrated me is the way personal anecdotes are always deleted. I realise that there are good reasons for this but I sometimes see very interesting personal accounts being deleted.
I think this is regretful. I understand that they are neither objective or scientific but personal accounts of the lived experience of people who saw historical eras are the bread and butter of certain fields of history. We dedicate large resources into gathering oral histories and some people might be willing to comment on a website that wouldn't comment elsewhere (I get that it is difficult to authenticate them). I think it is somewhat unfortunate that an awful lot of material from people who have lived through interesting periods and are willing to tell their stories is simply deleted. I have seen personal accounts of life in the Soviet Union and (just today) Jimmy carters election and how people reacted to it that while anecdotal, and not of academic standard, nonetheless seems to deserve better than being deleted.
Would the staff here be open to a forum being created specifically for personal historical anecdotes in answers to questions. Then when people give personal anecdotes as answers they could be directed and moved to this alternative forum instead of simply being repulsed and deleted. Obviously it would only be for the past century but many questions that lend themselves to anecdotes could be placed on both forums. I would be willing to create and moderate this forum if the fact that I am not really known here doesn't put people off but would want to know if it would gain approval here (as it would probably work best if associated to this larger forum.
Does anyone have any suggestions of criticism of this idea? What would be a good name? Would people be open to it?
You're welcome to launch whatever subreddit you wish, of course. Personal anecdotes are enormously popular on reddit. r/AskReddit is, after all, quite literally the most popular sub.
But that's just it: we're not AskReddit, we're AskHistorians. People come here with questions about history, and can expect that answers will be verifiable and comprehensive. Personal anecdotes, in isolation, fail both of these tests. First, as you note, it's impossible to authenticate personal stories. When professional historians collect oral history or comb individual stories out of textual sources, they have methodologies for contextualizing and interpreting the stories that help overcome some of the difficulties (and this is a process that can take decades to hone for a particular text/account! Given the number of complaints we get when a 2-hour old thread has no answer, I can't imagine what a decades-long approval time frame would do to the reddit hivemind).
Second, individual anecdotes lack context. There's no way to judge whether a particular account is representative or exceptional. But going even further, there's little grasp of its significance in terms of broader issues. It's the difference between learning facts about the past, and understanding the past. Historians are in the business of the latter, and this sub is AskHistorians.
If you're interested in joining the mod team, the best way to do that is to demonstrate your interest in the sub through active, frequent engagement. :) We notice.
I understand that they are neither objective or scientific but personal accounts of the lived experience of people who saw historical eras are the bread and butter of certain fields of history.
The problem here is that you have no way of verifying if /u/chikindiner was there in 1998 when the Undertaker threw Mankind off Hell In A Cell, and sent him plummeting 16 ft through an announcer’s table.
An oral history of redditors is undermined by anonymity.
Personal anecdotes become primary sources. As a researcher, I depend on them to complete my work. I think a new sub for them would be amazing!
I realize that they don't fit here, but I do not agree that they lack content.
Please let me know when you do!
Alright I have created the subreddit here r/historicalanecdotes. I have just realized it has a very similar name to r/historyanecdotes whose existence I have just been informed of. I don't think this will be a problem as the purposes are different but if someone disagrees we could start again with another name.