Reconstructionism, constructionism, and deconstructionism: fun with Munslow's genres of historians

My favourite theorist Alun Munslow (occasionally collaborating with his excellent mate Keith Jenkins) created a way of categorising historians and their work into three genres: reconstructionism, constructionism, and deconstructionism. I found these categories vastly useful in building my work, and in helping me to identify my standpoint as a historian.

My History supervisor Prof. M. got very excited about this board from my exhibition

Reconstructionists and constructionists are the more respectable, conventional kinds of historians, who Munslow sometimes called "historians of a particular kind"... and they sometimes regard us deconstructionists with suspicion.

Don’t worry about trying to remember who’s who - here’s a handy guide to the three categories I modified from a tasty section of my thesis.

Reconstructionist historians:

• Believe in the correspondence theory of representation - they believe that what they create (usually written history) corresponds exactly (or close enough) with the actuality of the past. Imagine that! I whack some ink on a bit of paper and - is it possible for it to accurately and adequately represent some historical character or past event? What if I write the name of my protagonist, William Shaw - are those two words an adequate representation of a whole entire person?
• Believe that, by careful and detached empirical analysis of their sources, they can discover ‘the true story of what really happened back there in the past’. Most of them nowadays are more cautious about this, and say things like 'the most likely story', but it's still there.
• Believe that they can use writing (usually of a specific pseudo-detached academic type) to accurately and adequately communicate the story of the past. They also believe that narrative is just a vehicle, and not something that you can manipulate to tell different stories, or that can influence how you tell stories - to them, it’s simply the only appropriate way to tell the story of the past. (And it's usually just the story, rarely a multiplicity of stories.)
• Aim to remain objective and dispassionate (despite the fact that most of them know that total objectivity is an unattainable ideal). They don’t want the history they write to be influenced by their own personalities, contexts, experiences, etc. They seem to think they can somehow rise above their own circumstances to cast an unbiased eye over the past, in order to get at it 'as it really was'.
• Some of them acknowledge that you can’t really get at ‘the truth’ but they tend to blame their sources, rather than looking at themselves and how they understand things and how they build interpretations.
• Won’t engage with how narratives work, never mind experimentation with narrative forms and methods of communicating those narratives. They also won’t engage with the distinction between a single statement and a broader interpretation, never mind how these compare against what they believe to be reality.
• Strongly dislike theory (whether from history or any other discipline) as they believe it’s an imposition onto the past and won’t get you accurate results.

Constructionist historians:

• Also believe in the correspondence theory of representation and accept that yes, it’s imperfect, but they still believe that they can accurately convey the results of their empirical study of traces of the past in a standard historical narrative.
• Use narrative as an analytical mechanism, but they still think that they can find the story in the past. (Why is it always the? Not a possible story or a bunch of possible stories? Or even this is openly fictive but let's imagine this for a minute, eh why not)
• Sometimes like to borrow theory from elsewhere, such as sociology or psychology or economics or something, but they like to make sure it’s appropriate to whatever they’re researching. (How they decide something is appropriate, I do not know. Also, notice how orthodox these other disciplines are - I've yet to hear of any constructionists borrowing something from a more obviously creative discipline, but if you know otherwise, hit me up)
• Usually aim to be objective, and also acknowledge that that’s very idealised and that it’s impossible to remain impartial.
• Acknowledge that they’re actively seeking meaning in the past, sometimes by intervening with concepts and theories, but they claim that these are meant to serve the evidence rather than interfere with it.

Both reconstructionists and constructionists:

• Believe in practical realism: here, this means that stuff that we can’t see right now (such as past events) exists in the absence of anyone perceiving it, and that its existence has nothing to do with its being perceived. This is linked to the correspondence theory we met earlier in this post - where people believe that the representations they make correspond truthfully to reality. (However, the existence of stuff we can’t perceive right now - such as past events - doesn’t necessarily mean that we can represent those things accurately here in the present. And there's loads of lost stuff, too!)
• Believe in empiricism: they think true knowledge is grounded in what they can experience with their senses. (What the hell is 'true knowledge' and who gets to decide that? Ok let's not start on that one) They want solid evidence rather than stuff that’s a bit wobbly round the edges. They prefer explicit knowledge to tacit knowledge. They’re definitely not going to approve of vibes.
• Believe that they can represent the past accurately as written history, and that what they write is a very special form of literature that isn’t really literature because it’s actually real. If you call their work ‘literature’, they’ll get a bit twitchy and tell you that their work is based on The Evidence and that ‘literature’ is uncomfortably close to silly things like fiction. Oh, the horror!
• Believe that their work must be done in writing as they think other forms of investigation and communication - things like drawings, re-enactment, performance, film, sculpture, dance, and all sorts of other exciting things - can’t do the required citations and footnotes and all that, and definitely can’t be as nuanced as words on a page.

Deconstructionist historians (like me):

• Understand the distinction between ‘history’ (what historians make and do to say things about the past) and ‘the past’ (which is gone and we can’t access it; we can access traces of it, but not the past itself).
• Understand that traces of the past exist, but our work will never correspond to the past itself. I can draw a few lines, and it’s only a representation of my interpretation of whichever historical character I say it is - it’s not the person themself. Traces of that person’s activities might still exist, such as if they made something, but their act of making it is over. Look at that pencil. The tip is worn where you drew or wrote with it, which is evidence for you having done some action with it (in addition to whatever you drew or wrote). However, you might’ve put it down two seconds ago or used it last week - the actual event of your using it is over and gone. You might pick it up again, but that'd be a different event. The traces of your past activity with the pencil are here, but that activity itself is in the past.
• Challenge the assumption that language is adequate for representing reality - language is part of reality. It’s not separate. Like how us historians are part of reality, we can’t detach ourselves from it and float mysteriously above it all in order to say things about the past. (I'd include non-written language here, too - using the word 'language' to describe however you want to explore and share your ideas about the past, such as drawing or acting or making puppets or anything else fun. These things are all part of reality, as are the events and people in the past.) 
• The most likely group to venture into experimental history. We’re more likely to engage with multiple narratives and voices (which the other two groups sometimes like to do) but we also use different methods of exploration and communication.
• Recognise the presence of the researcher. The history we create is what we make based on our own subjective interpretations of traces of the past (also known as sources or evidence). Our interpretations are not inherent in those traces. Our interpretations are influenced by our personal circumstances, contexts, biases, unconscious stuff, and plenty of other things. It's important to acknowledge this as it influences what we choose to research and how we do that.
• Recognise the role of the historian as a creator. We don’t ‘discover what happened’ - we encounter traces of the past, then we make interpretations of what we think might’ve (or might not have) happened. We like to be reflexive and self-aware. We understand that the researcher/ creator decides the form(s) that our histories take; the content doesn’t tell us what to do.
• Believe that the truth is not back there, waiting to be discovered. There are multiple truths, and we can never know or access everything, and this is a good thing.
• Understand that history is a creative act. History and literature (and illustration!) aren't that different. We're all storytellers. We (usually) use evidence of some kind to make and tell our stories: historians use traces of the past, some fiction writers might use something they overheard, some illustrators might use pose reference or whatever, any of us can find inspiration in our own experiences. We're (usually) invested in our stories in some way, and we want our audience to be invested in them, too. We need to use our imaginations to create and share our stories, and we need to use our creative skills to make our stories memorable and effective. (I've got another spicy bit in my thesis about this sort of thing but I won't post that here today.)

I'm an illustrator (surprise!) and I feel like deconstructionism fits well with my existing illustration practice. I'm very present in my work, I won't pretend to be some detached objective observer - the marks I make as I draw are evidence for my presence. I also use my own experiences as material. As a historian, my stuff is experimental (the majority of historians prefer to write, and would find drawing a bit weird) and then I take it further by encouraging audience participation (you interpret my stuff!). 

I won't pretend that my stuff is accurate, or that it adequately reflects past realities - yeah, accuracy is useful, but I'm not getting bogged down in ok how many buttons on that coat, can I get the exact colour that they'd have painted the wall - my work is more about evoking a multiplicity of possible experiences than accurately describing anything pretending to be reality. 

A deconstructionist approach can be empowering. It encourages a broader range of explorations of (sometimes lost) past experiences, and also encourages more varied ways of interrogating and sharing ideas about the past - not everyone is comfortable with writing, so other methods are needed so everyone can create their histories that help them to build their own identities or commemorate events as a group or whatever other useful things you'd like to do with your histories. We're not stuck with traditional/ established research and communication methods, so we can involve more people with different skills, and generate more insights and ideas.

I have got more on this, so if you want to chat, send me a message (best way is IG: @Ed.smike) - alternatively, fly over to BookFinder and see if you can get your hands on something reasonably priced from the selection below. Have fun!

Further information:
The Nature of History Reader edited by Keith Jenkins and Alun Munslow, 2004
The Routledge Companion to Historical Studies by Alun Munslow, 2000
Deconstructing History by Alun Munslow, 1997
‘Genre and history/ historying’ by Alun Munslow in Rethinking History journal, vol.19 no.2, 2015
‘Modifying Alun Munslow’s classification of approaches to history’ by Eugen Zeleňák in Rethinking History journal, vol.15 no.4, 2011