Info thread about each leader/civ in civ6

[Zaarin]

You're free to do as you like. I'm simply advising anyone who might care that they have been dishonest on other topics, which puts all their topics under suspicion of dishonesty. Of course, I'd hope that most people would regard any YouTube history channel or pop history source with some healthy skepticism.

 

[Andrew Johnson [FXS]]

History is dicey. I think people overestimate how much of a single narrative exists, and underestimate how much is a good guess based on fragmentary sources. (There are, of course, very bad guesses based on fragmentary sources). They overestimate the continuity of peoples and cultures (forgetting that in most places people juggle multiple languages, cultures and even religions). Sukhothai, for instance, certainly existed, but was one of many city-states in the area; its designation as "the origin of the Thai nation" is a nationalist one. Same with its leader (and my profile pic). Srivijaya might not have existed at all outside of a city-state, and accounts of its splendor might be conflating other powers in the region. But were you to go onto a Wikipedia page or pop-history bit, you'll have someone saying authoritatively what places like that were, what life was like, etc. Archaeology tells us where people were and what tools and food they had (but politics and culture have to be inferred), travelers' accounts tell us what visitors thought was important (full of incomplete or biased information), and inscriptions tell us what rulers or those who could write (in durable materials) wanted to record. A frustrating thing about a lot of Southeast Asian ancient history is that people love writing religious texts about the lives of the Buddha, but not a lot about what peasants were eating.

So, for Khmer, for instance, the discovery of the sheer size of Angkor was surprising, because we were relying a lot on inscriptions (the empire from the vantage point of the ruler) and travelers' accounts (the empire from the vantage point of a foreigner). And then when LIDAR came along the scale of Angkor's urban cityscape was shocking - neither Jayavarman nor Zhou Daguan (ruler and visitor, respectively) had thought it important to mention.

That said, what's your objection to these videos? I haven't really watched them (traveling right now).

 

[nzcamel]

Just as an FYI, while I haven't watched their history content, based on their literature content Extra Credit is pretty sketchy as a channel. I would expect their videos to be equal parts shallow and skewed.

So much of their literature content is just outright blatant lies I'd hope they have separate writers/editors for history then.

That said, what's your objection to these videos? I haven't really watched them (traveling right now).

I'm not enough of an expert on history to judge EC well, but compared to everything I watch they seem pretty good. They are often nuanced rather than one sided; will, in episode, note things that are more guessed at than known for a fact; and as someone else mentioned, have those excellent post series episodes, where they go over mistakes they made in their own videos. That level of honesty and willingness to admit error is rare, even among the many good history channels on YouTube. I suspect their later stuff might not be as good as their earlier stuff, but that's just my 5 cents.

Certainly I have watched almost none of their literature series, so don't have the context Zaarin does; yet as he hasn't watched many of their history ones, it seems we're in a similar boat.

 

[Kupe Navigator]

I'm not enough of an expert on history to judge EC well, but compared to everything I watch they seem pretty good. They are often nuanced rather than one sided, will in episode note things that are more guessed at than known for a fact; and as someone else mentioned, have those excellent post series episodes, where they go over mistakes they made in their own videos. That level of honesty and willingness to admit error is rare, even among the many good history channels on YouTube. I suspect their later stuff might not be as good as their earlier stuff, but that's just my 5 cents.

Certainly I have watched almost none of their literature series, so don't have the context Zaarin does; yet as he hasn't watched many of their history ones, it seems we're in a similar boat.

If one watches lies episodes... they CLEARLY do their research... and their episodes on Admiral Yi is VERY well done.
I can confirm as Korean-New Zealander.

 

[Zaarin]

That said, what's your objection to these videos? I haven't really watched them (traveling right now).

Like I said, I haven't watched any of their history videos. I did watch a couple of their literature videos that someone sent me. In their Othello video, for example, they made a number of dubious claims that cannot be supported by the text. When they did actually reference the text, it was invariably out of context and distorted. As they point out at the beginning of their video, there are many possible readings of a text...but theirs was not one of them. As my literature criticism professor used to say, "There are many possible interpretations of a text, but they have to be supported by the text. You cannot make Emily Dickinson be about igloos." They tried to make Othello about igloos. I forget off the top of my head what the other video was, but it committed the same sins against the text. It's possible their history videos are written and edited by someone else who is more objective and does their research better, and if so, great. I was just providing a caution that they have been dishonest in other subject areas so proceed with critical reading and skepticism at full alert.

 

[Kupe Navigator]

Like I said, I haven't watched any of their history videos. I did watch a couple of their literature videos that someone sent me. In their Othello video, for example, they made a number of dubious claims that cannot be supported by the text. When they did actually reference the text, it was invariably out of context and distorted. As they point out at the beginning of their video, there are many possible readings of a text...but theirs was not one of them. As my literature criticism professor used to say, "There are many possible interpretations of a text, but they have to be supported by the text. You cannot make Emily Dickinson be about igloos." They tried to make Othello about igloos. I forget off the top of my head what the other video was, but it committed the same sins against the text. It's possible their history videos are written and edited by someone else who is more objective and does their research better, and if so, great. I was just providing a caution that they have been dishonest in other subject areas so proceed with critical reading and skepticism at full alert.

At his extra history is very well done and all these videos I linked are some of their best works. Give them a watch.

 

[Kupe Navigator]

now Chinese leaders are here... here is video/podcast on Yongle

and
Wu Zetain