What problems does Source K suggest historians encounter...?

Question

A question I have to do for homework is, "what problems does Source K [below] suggest historians encounter when trying to explain attitudes held by men during the first world war from the perspective of the late twentieth century?"

Source K is: 'Our plastic throw away, take-away society is completely alien to the spartan values for which the men of 1914 to 1918 fought and died. What place does 'courage', 'comradeship', 'loyalty' and above all, 'sacrifice' have in the 'me' world?... The bewilderment on te faces of the aged survivors of the war when I asked them what they thought of the modern world, was painful to behold.'
Extract from 'The war walk', written in 1983 by Nigel Jones.

I'm not asking anyone to do my homework because I'm capable of that when I get the gist of the question but:
1. I don't understand what the question's asking me to do
and
2. I don't really understand what the source is saying..

Can anyone enlighten me on these please?!

Lorna

Answer 1

It's asking you to explain why historians have a problem understanding this stupid question.

Answer 2

Lorna you ask a pair of very fair questions, questions which really are asking the same question in two different ways. The point here is that the First World War transformed the Western World culturally. Our attitudes and values today are closer to the attitudes and values of 1919 than the attitudes and values of 1919 are to those of 1913. The war had that much of an impact. Thus, the author is saying, it is very difficult for us to understand why those who participated in WW1 did the things they did since they thought very differently from us. It is difficult for us to get inside of their heads and see the world the way they did. Similarly, though this is the lesser point, those whose attitudes and values were formed before the war have had trouble understanding the post-war world. For historians it is always a problem to try not to project our own way of thinking and understanding (our "modes of cognition") onto historical actors. But it is especially acute and poignant a problem in this case since WW1 is not all that remote in time. A great additional source for this is the book by Paul Fussell, "The Great War and Modern Memory".
Hope this helps.

Answer 3

When historians attempt to explain historical events to the current generation, even one under a century ago like WW1, it's almost as if they were talking about alien races, so much have viewpoints, experiences and assumptions changed since then.

A tiny example: When a BBC TV series was done, "The Trench", trying to recreate the experiences of WW1, the volunteers on the whole found WW1 army food "revolting".
What they didn't realise was, that for many if not most of the real WW1 recruits, this would have been food better than they'd ever had in their lives. We're used, in the modern West at least, to having food in plenty. It wasn't necessarily so then, for industrial or agricultural workers.

Respect for authority and class was different. The view of discipline, duty, was largely different.
So motivation and thinking cannot be easily translated into modern terms.
The risk is of unconsciously assuming modern modes of thinking apply to individuals (and hence events) who lived in a different mental and social world.

As I've heard myself: those who lived through the Blitz and the Buzzbombs in WW2 Britain are not that impressed with the modern generation's reaction to the current level of bombs and threat of bombs.