[Meta] How will references to personal experience and anecdotes be moderated, as events 20+ years old increasingly include those AH users are connected to?

by edwardtaughtme
qed1

There are already fairly clear guidelines in place for discussion personal anecdotes under Rule 6. It more or less boils down to: if it's not published or otherwise independently available to researchers, it's not allowed.

Do you think that an ageing user base will demand some particular change to the existing rule?

dol_amrothian

I think there's something to be said for the practice of situating and contextualising yourself in a historical argument, so that when you're responding to a question about something you remember personally, you can own that stake in the response and how it shapes your answer. It's a thing we're asked to do in religious studies a lot, especially when talking about religions and religious groups to which we have a personal connection -- so, for example, I would upfront state that I'm an observant American Jew of Sephardic heritage and I worship within the Conservative movement when I'm talking about or teaching about Judaism, because that information shapes me and pretending it doesn't does everyone a disservice. It's been enormously powerful and productive in my work to own my biases and where I'm situated in relationship to my topic as I proceed, and it's a thing I suggest my students interrogate early on as they write papers and do research. Why this? What draws you to it? What might be shaping your perspective? And aside from identity markers that I think we all could recognise as having an impact (see: prior example), lived experience is something a lot of people miss as shaping their perspective.

It's easy to pretend to be objective about things that happened five hundred years ago, and for the past century, historians and social scientists have been encouraged to think of ourselves as objective arbiters of knowledge. But recognising that true objectivity is impossible for a human being, and it's even harder to maintain it in the face of something you've personally experienced is the first step towards being honest and clear about how your stance and situation shape how you study and tell history. And making that stance and situation known when responding to a question about a lived event (especially an event in which one was directly involved) is the best way to avoid pure anecdotes, but also to make it clear that some of the expertise comes from experience as much as sources. Someday, we'll all be primary sources. I try to remember that when I write, personally.