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The study of history began to change drastically in the 19th century, as history became a sophisticated academic discipline. Popkin writes about “historicism”, or the way of understanding the world through examining each society and era’s “unique individuality”(Popkin 69). This method of studying history is the one that I truly have learned to appreciate. Historicism really allows people to understand more about themselves and their own histories as a part of a specific people group. The post-revolution French were expected to identify themselves as a nation, but would they be able to understand what it truly means to be French without understanding how their nation’s history and how they came to proudly be called “French”? For example, how would Americans be able to take pride in our “free country” without understanding how exactly our founding fathers had fought for that freedom that we so proudly boast of today? Popkin quotes Edmund Burke’s definition of the nation as “a partnership not only between those who are living, but between those who are dead, and those who are to be born”(Popkin 73). A nation and its’ people’s identity does not start from the present, it starts with roots that have been sown in from decades, even centuries, past. Armando35 points out that history had excluded certain groups of people, such as women, and that this exclusion gives a “slanted perspective” of what actually occurred in history, taking away from its accuracy and authenticity. This point is very accurate, considering that all peoples deserve to know their unique, individual history. If their part history is blotted out, that will only lead to a very apparent gap in understanding the way these people have served to form the unique history of the society or era that they have partaken in.