Oktober 2, 2014, 11:39 a.m.,
ELÍAS JOSÉ PALTI,
Allgemein.
ABSTRACT
This article intends to clarify what distinguishes the so-called new “politico-intellectual history” from the old “history of political ideas.” What differentiates the two has not been fully perceived even by some of the authors who initiated this transformation. One fundamental reason for this is that the transformation has not been a consistent process deriving from one single source, but is rather the result of converging developments emanating from three different sources (the Cambridge School, the German school of conceptual history or Begriffsgeschichte, and French politico-conceptual history). This article proposes that the development of a new theoretical horizon that effectively leads us beyond the frameworks of the old history of political ideas demands that we overcome the insularity of these traditions and combine their respective contributions. The result of this combination is an approach to politico-intellectual history that is not completely coincident with any of the three schools. What I will call a history of political languages entails a specific perspective on the temporality of discourses; this involves a view of why the meaning of concepts changes over time, and is the source of the contingency that stains political languages.
Quelle: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/resolve/doi?DOI=10.1111%2Fhith.10719
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Oktober 2, 2014, 11:39 a.m.,
Alexandra Garbarini,
Allgemein.
ABSTRACT
Alon Confino has issued a desideratum to other historians that they should bring questions and insights from cultural history to bear on the study of the Holocaust. Taking the work of Saul Friedländer as his point of departure, Confino nonetheless sets out on a path different from Friedländer's. He turns away from the goal of “integrated history” and instead seeks to investigate the realm of German culture, understood as encompassing much more than just Nazi ideology. By analyzing how the Holocaust has come to be perceived as unprecedented, as a rupture in human history, and furthermore by treating Jewish victims' sense of disbelief as an artifact of the past, one that has continued to inform unduly the historical understanding of the Holocaust up to the present day, historians will be able to account anew for what made the persecution and extermination of Jews imaginable and thus possible. With Confino's approach, a major historiographical question resurfaces, however: namely, what place an analysis of non-Germans should occupy in the history of the Holocaust, and in particular what place should be accorded to Jewish voices? This essay argues that we cannot make sense of why Germans supported and carried out the Holocaust without also considering Jewish contemporaneous perspectives and imaginings.
Quelle: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/resolve/doi?DOI=10.1111%2Fhith.10720
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Oktober 2, 2014, 11:38 a.m.,
HERMAN PAUL,
Allgemein.
ABSTRACT
What is the problem that “epistemic virtues” seek to solve? This article argues that virtues, epistemic and otherwise, are the key characteristics of “scholarly personae,” that is, of ideal-typical models of what it takes to be a scholar. Different scholarly personae are characterized by different constellations of virtues and skills or, more precisely, by different constellations of commitments to goods (epistemic, moral, political, and so forth), the pursuit of which requires the exercise of certain virtues and skills. Expanding Hayden White's notion of “historiographical styles” so as to encompass not only historians' writings, but also their nontextual “doings,” the article argues that different styles of “being a historian”—a meticulous archival researcher, an inspired feminist scholar, or an outstanding undergraduate teacher—can be analyzed productively in terms of virtues and skills. Finally, the article claims that virtues and skills, in turn, are rooted in desires, which are shaped by the examples of others as well as by promises of reward. This makes the scholarly persona not merely a useful concept for distinguishing among different types of historians, but also a critical tool for analyzing why certain models of “being a historian” gain in popularity, whereas others become “old-fashioned.”
Quelle: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/resolve/doi?DOI=10.1111%2Fhith.10717
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Oktober 2, 2014, 11:38 a.m.,
SERGE GRIGORIEV,
Allgemein.
ABSTRACT
The intention of this essay is to offer a reading of John Dewey's recently found manuscript (considered lost for decades), Unmodern Philosophy and Modern Philosophy, as a kind of philosophical history leading up to the formulation of the key problems to be addressed by the general framework of Dewey's cultural naturalism. I argue, first, that cultural naturalism has direct implications for the way that we think about history, and that Dewey's recently recovered manuscript reflects this in its conception of the purpose and mode of historical reconstruction. Second, the essay presents a synoptic overview of the historically emergent thought-conditions structuring, according to Dewey's narrative, the possibilities of the philosophical discourse of modernity. In conclusion, I argue that cultural naturalism allows us to move beyond these problems by a radical revision of the terms in which we construe the idea of “persons.” Specifically, instead of thinking about persons in terms of embodied minds, we should start thinking about them as participants in histories, carving their individual paths through the world of events, with their existence being essentially both temporal and social. I also suggest that this view of persons allows us to outline a promising account of the notion of human freedom, couched in terms of historical social agency.
Quelle: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/resolve/doi?DOI=10.1111%2Fhith.10718
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Oktober 2, 2014, 11:38 a.m.,
JONAS GRETHLEIN,
Allgemein.
ABSTRACT
The historian's account of the past is strongly shaped by the future of the events narrated. The telos, that is, the vantage point from which the past is envisaged, influences the selection of the material as well as its arrangement. Although the telos is past for historians and readers, it is future for historical agents. The term “future past,” coined by Reinhart Koselleck to highlight the fact that the future was seen differently before the Sattelzeit, also lends itself to capturing this asymmetry and elucidating its ramifications for the writing of history. The first part of the essay elaborates on the notion of “future past”: besides considering its significance and pitfalls, I offset it against the perspectivity of historical knowledge and the concept of narrative “closure” (I). Then the works of two ancient historians, Polybius and Sallust, serve as test cases that illustrate the intricacies of “future past.” Neither has received much credit for intellectual sophistication in scholarship, and yet the different narrative strategies Polybius and Sallust deploy reveal profound reflections on the temporal dynamics of writing history (II). Although the issue of “future past” is particularly pertinent to the strongly narrative historiography of antiquity, the controversy about the end of the Roman Republic demonstrates that it also applies to the works of modern historians (III). Finally, I will argue that “future past” alerts us to an aspect of how we relate to the past that is in danger of being obliterated in the current debate on “presence” and history. The past is present in customs, relics, and rituals, but the historiographical construction of the past is predicated on a complex hermeneutical operation that involves the choice of a telos. The concept of “future past” also differs from post-structuralist theories through its emphasis on time. Retrospect calms the flow of time, but is unable to arrest it fully, as the openness of the past survives in the form of “future past” (IV).
Quelle: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/resolve/doi?DOI=10.1111%2Fhith.10715
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Oktober 2, 2014, 11:38 a.m.,
Gavriel D. Rosenfeld,
Allgemein.
ABSTRACT
Richard Evans's new book, Altered Pasts, offers a perceptive but flawed critique of the field of counterfactual history. The author provides a useful historical survey of the field's recent rise to prominence and intelligently analyzes its respective strengths and weaknesses. His overall assessment of the field is quite skeptical, however. Evans cites many reasons for his skepticism, but his overall critique can be summarized in three words: plausibility, politicization, and popularity. Evans faults works of counterfactual history for their frequently implausible narratives, their promotion of political agendas, and their distressing degree of popularity. In advancing his critique, Evans makes many valid observations that call attention to important deficiencies in the field. But his view is a partial one that neglects countervailing evidence and never penetrates to the heart of why the field has left the margins for the mainstream. Evans's study provides a useful introduction to an understudied topic, but further research—ideally of a less partisan nature—is required for us to better understand counterfactual history's increasing appeal.
Quelle: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/resolve/doi?DOI=10.1111%2Fhith.10724
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Oktober 2, 2014, 11:38 a.m.,
Todd May,
Allgemein.
ABSTRACT
Colin Koopman's excellent Genealogy as Critique argues that Michel Foucault's genealogies—and, in fact, his archaeologies—should be read as historical accounts of the emergence of particular “problematizations.” The idea of a problematization, which Foucault introduces late in his career, has two sides. First, there is the idea that the situation whose emergence a genealogy traces is problematic in the sense of being fraught or dangerous. Second, by tracing the genealogy, Foucault problematizes the situation itself, showing how it calls for attention. Koopman argues that Foucault's genealogies are not themselves normative, but they instead outline situations or practices in a way that allows for normative investigation and political intervention. What is required, then, are normative approaches that complement Foucault's genealogies. Koopman argues that Foucault's own late discussions of self-transformation are inadequate to fully accomplish the task; they need to be complemented by recourse to Deweyan reconstruction or Habermasian normative reflection. However, and in turn, such reflection cannot be had on an absolutist ground but rather must be seen as historically contingent, universalizing rather than universalist in Koopman's vocabulary. I argue that there are several reasons to think that the strong separation between genealogy and normative posited by Koopman may be too strict. Foucault's rhetoric, his choice of certain problematizations, and Koopman's own commitments to problematizations as requiring attention all seem to point toward a more intimate, although admittedly implicit, relation between genealogy and normative positions in Foucault's work.
Quelle: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/resolve/doi?DOI=10.1111%2Fhith.10721
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Oktober 2, 2014, 11:38 a.m.,
JOUNI-MATTI KUUKKANEN,
Allgemein.
ABSTRACT
Roger Cooter is concerned about the survival of historiography under the pressures of neoliberal economics and the entertainment industry. His and Claudia Stein's book is a welcome call for “critical history,” which is aware of own fundamental intellectual categories. Cooter emphasizes the importance of self-reflection and political contextualization of all knowledge-production. However, although reflection is undoubtedly a virtue, it is not clear whether historiography is under such a severe threat. It is also necessary to ask where the limits of contextualization lie. It is doubtful whether a fully localized and contextualized study removed of all “presentist” categories and language is possible. In addition, one should avoid combining antirealism about natural sciences in the name of anti-Whiggism with realism about historical knowledge in attempts to provide contextualized accounts of the past. What is needed above all is the hermeneutical dialogue between the language of past agents and the language of present actors.
Quelle: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/resolve/doi?DOI=10.1111%2Fhith.10722
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Oktober 2, 2014, 11:38 a.m.,
History and Theory,
Allgemein.
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Oktober 2, 2014, 11:38 a.m.,
History and Theory,
Allgemein.
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