History is the study of the bits and pieces the past has left us and the competing arguments about what they mean.
The first category is finite, the second virtually limitless. There is a tendency to find the one true ‘right’ interpretation of past events but this is based on a flawed premise.
There are some facts that are indisputable, D-Day definitely happened on June 6th 1944, for example. However, historians tend to be interested in other questions when it becomes clear that something is a settled fact.
Instead of searching for ‘right’ answers as a student, it’s probably more useful to think about stronger or weaker explanations for historical change. I’ll talk more about those in a later post:
Explaining History Podcast 