History is constructed reality; yet, as historians we often select material and shape our interpretations without self-analysis. We assume that because we were educated to be objective, we undertake our research, analysis, and interpretation in an objective manner. We rarely question why we have chosen a particular issue to investigate or how far our understanding of the body politic existing in our own day colors our interpretation of institutions and events in the past. Once we have established ourselves in our field, how often do we change our perspectives, or even our focus? How often do we incorporate new ideas, or new perspectives, into our interpretations of the past? Only occasionally, I believe. Sometimes, though, when we read ideas that differ radically from our own, we may begin to interpret our own research data using a different lens or a different focus. Sometimes, we may begin to search for new material in order to investigate an issue, using perhaps a telephoto lens to probe into it more deeply than we had originally intended. And sometimes, we may even change our topic of investigation, swinging our camera to capture a fresh aspect of reality.