W.E.B. DuBois On The Purpose Of History - Part 1 ✓ Solved

W.E.B. DuBois On The Purpose of History - Part 1: Look for t

W.E.B. DuBois On The Purpose of History - Part 1: Look for the Big Ideas. What does the author argue needs to be done and why? Part 1: Identify the Big Ideas by answering: Speaker: What does the reader know about the writer? Occasion: What are the circumstances surrounding this text? Audience: Who is the target audience? Purpose: Why did the author write this text? Subject: What is the topic? Tone: What is the author’s tone or attitude? Part 2: Argument Analysis: Create your own Compass Word or phrases for significant paragraphs in the DuBois excerpt. For each paragraph, provide: Annotated inference/key idea; Word compass, tone, or rhetorical/stylistic device; Paraphrased text evidence. Part 3: Essay: Explain how DuBois builds an argument to persuade his audience on the purpose of history. Analyze how he uses evidence, reasoning, and stylistic or persuasive elements to strengthen logic and persuasiveness. Focus on how he builds the argument, not whether you agree. Provide a short essay synthesizing your charts and analysis.

Paper For Above Instructions

Introduction

This paper follows the three-part assignment on W.E.B. DuBois’s essay on the purpose of history. It first identifies the big ideas (speaker, occasion, audience, purpose, subject, tone). Next it models a Compass Word analysis for key paragraphs. Finally, it synthesizes those findings into an analytical essay explaining how DuBois builds a persuasive argument about why and how history should be written and used.

Part 1 — Big Ideas (Speaker, Occasion, Audience, Purpose, Subject, Tone)

Speaker: The speaker is W.E.B. DuBois, a Black intellectual, historian, and public critic whose scholarship and activism made him a leading voice on race, democracy, and historical interpretation (Du Bois 1935; Lewis 1993). His authority rests on both scholarly credentials and moral standing.

Occasion: The occasion is a moment of public debate about the meaning of history for democratic society and for African American life. DuBois often wrote in response to prevailing misconceptions about Reconstruction and race, aiming to correct distortions and stake claims for an inclusive national memory (Foner 1988; Du Bois 1935).

Audience: Primary audiences are educated readers—scholars, students, and public intellectuals—plus policy-minded citizens. Secondary audiences include activists and Black communities seeking historical recognition (Morris 2015).

Purpose: DuBois argues that history must be purposeful: to reveal truth, rectify myths, and serve liberation by exposing injustice and enabling democratic self-knowledge (Du Bois 1935; Carr 1961).

Subject: The subject is historiography—the aims and methods of history writing—especially as related to race, memory, and social justice.

Tone: The tone combines moral urgency, scholarly confidence, and rhetorical candor: DuBois is both diagnostician and persuader, alternating analytic clarity with pointed appeals (Gates 1988).

Part 2 — Compass Word Annotation Strategy (Sample)

The Compass Word method assigns a guiding word or phrase to a paragraph to capture its central thrust, notes stylistic moves, and links paraphrased textual evidence to an inferred claim.

Paragraph A (Opening claim)

Compass Word: "Truth-rectification"

Annotated inference / key idea: DuBois insists history must correct false narratives that empower oppression.

Rhetorical devices / tone: Declarative assertions, moral diction, appeal to ethos and logos.

Paraphrased text evidence: DuBois sets historic misunderstanding as the cause of contemporary social ills and claims clear historical truth will enable reform (Du Bois 1935).

Paragraph B (Method and evidence)

Compass Word: "Document-and-context"

Annotated inference / key idea: DuBois argues historians must use empirical evidence and contextualize events to avoid distortion.

Rhetorical devices / tone: Use of examples, comparative narration, controlled irony to undermine opposing readings.

Paraphrased text evidence: He cites Reconstruction-era documents and statistics to counter myths about Black incapacity and to reconstruct political agency (Du Bois 1935; Foner 1988).

Paragraph C (Moral appeal)

Compass Word: "Responsibility"

Annotated inference / key idea: DuBois frames history as civic duty: knowing the past is a prerequisite for democratic morality.

Rhetorical devices / tone: Pathos-laden examples, direct address, and ethical vocabulary.

Paraphrased text evidence: He links the fate of democracy to honest reckoning and insists that misremembering perpetuates oppression (Du Bois 1935; Carr 1961).

Part 3 — Analytical Essay: How DuBois Builds His Argument

W.E.B. DuBois builds a persuasive argument on the purpose of history by integrating empirical evidence, logical structure, and rhetorical force. Three interlocking strategies—evidence-driven correction, reasoned contextualization, and ethical persuasion—work together to strengthen his claim that history should correct injustice and inform democratic life.

Evidence and empirical authority

DuBois grounds his claims in documentary evidence and systematic interpretation. By marshaling primary sources, demographic data, and archival records—particularly in his discussions of Reconstruction—he asserts an empirical basis that challenges prevailing myths (Du Bois 1935; Foner 1988). This appeal to verifiable facts builds ethos: readers see DuBois not as mere polemicist but as a disciplined historian. The rhetorical effect is twofold: facts destabilize dominant stories, and the historian’s care signals trustworthiness (Carr 1961).

Reasoning and contextualization

Beyond presenting facts, DuBois employs connective reasoning to show how events, institutions, and motives relate. He situates episodes within broader economic and social structures, demonstrating cause-effect relations rather than isolated incidents. This logic counters simplified narratives and invites the reader to see complex causality—e.g., how economic incentives and political power shaped Reconstruction outcomes (Foner 1988). DuBois uses comparison and chronology to show continuity and rupture, strengthening the coherence of his argument (Novick 1988).

Stylistic and ethical appeals

DuBois’s style amplifies his argumentative aims. His diction oscillates between scholarly register and prophetic cadence, deploying rhetorical questions, antithesis, and evocative imagery to engage pathos (Gates 1988). He frames history as moral work: truth-telling is linked to justice. This ethical framing converts abstract historiography into civic imperative; readers are called to responsibility, not merely to assent to facts. The moral voice thus complements empirical proof, making the argument persuasive to both intellect and conscience (Morris 2015).

Integration and persuasiveness

These strategies combine: rigorous evidence secures credibility, logical development clarifies implications, and moral rhetoric mobilizes the audience. DuBois anticipates counterarguments by exposing the ideological functions of competing histories and by showing how misrepresentation serves power. By diagnosing motive and method in opposing accounts, he strengthens his refutation and reclaims history as a tool for democratic self-understanding (Tosh 2015; Carr 1961).

Conclusion

DuBois’s argument about the purpose of history is persuasive because it operates on multiple levels—documentary, analytic, and ethical. He demonstrates that the historian’s craft is not neutral but consequential: to know the past truly is to shape a more just present. His combined use of evidence, reasoning, and stylistic force creates a sustained case for history as corrective, civic, and liberatory (Du Bois 1935; Lewis 1993).

The analysis above follows the Compass Word annotation strategy to distill paragraph-level claims and synthesizes those findings into an essay that explains DuBois’s argumentative architecture without adjudicating the truth of his claims. This approach provides a replicable method for analyzing other historical essays that seek to connect knowledge with justice.

References

• Du Bois, W. E. B. Black Reconstruction in America. New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1935.
• Du Bois, W. E. B. The Souls of Black Folk. Chicago: A. C. McClurg & Co., 1903.
• Carr, E. H. What Is History? London: Macmillan, 1961.
• Tosh, David. The Pursuit of History: Aims, Methods and New Directions in the Study of History. 6th ed. London: Routledge, 2015.
• Lewis, David Levering. W. E. B. Du Bois: Biography of a Race, 1868–1919. New York: Henry Holt, 1993.
• Morris, Aldon. The Scholar Denied: W. E. B. Du Bois and the Birth of Modern Sociology. Oakland: University of California Press, 2015.
• Foner, Eric. Reconstruction: America's Unfinished Revolution, 1863–1877. New York: Harper & Row, 1988.
• Gates, Henry Louis, Jr. The Signifying Monkey: A Theory of African-American Literary Criticism. New York: Oxford University Press, 1988.
• Novick, Peter. That Noble Dream: The "Objectivity Question" and the American Historical Profession. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988.
• Aristotle. Rhetoric. Translated edition. (For classical grounding on ethos, pathos, logos.)