HETEROTEMPORALITY,THE ISLAMIC TRADITION,AND THE POLITICAL: LAROUI'S CONCEPT OF THE ANTINOMY OF HISTORY1

If tradition has often figured as modernity's other, the Islamic tradition has long played the role of the modern constitutive other par excellence. Modern secularizing practices of timing and spacing feed this grounding of the political beyond the conceptual grip of tradition. The works by the Moroccan historian and philosopher Abdallah Laroui (b. 1933) put forward a concept of heterotemporality that distances itself from secularizing practices of timing and spacing, and, importantly, also from theological ones. His critique enables us to understand each of these practices as viewing heterotemporality through one master temporality, a view that represents temporality as, in Laroui's words, “absolute” time. First, this privileged temporality is the homogeneous time of secular progress, and second, it is the homogeneous time of theological truth. Laroui unsettles both practices of timing and spacing by discussing heterotemporality as governed by what he calls the antinomy of the concept of history. For Laroui, this antinomy refers to a specific temporal dynamic that results from the tension between the fundamental discontinuity and incoherence of history, on the one hand, and the production of continuity and coherence through human observers, on the other. Laroui thus reveals that the claims about continuity and coherence that sustain groundings of the political within homogeneous time—either secular or theological—must always be understood in relation to their position within the temporal dynamic of the antinomy of the concept of history. In revealing the temporal dynamic of this antinomy within the Islamic tradition, Laroui reworks the architecture of difference that keeps the secular modern and the Islamic theological conceptually separated from each other.     

时间地理学的企划概念及其研究案例

企划是为完成任何意愿和目标而进行的一系列必要的简单或复杂的任务,即为达到某个个人或组织的长期或短期目标而实施的活动。企划研究旨在建立意图和实现之间的桥梁,从个体或组织主体意图的视角构建活动之间的关系,它不仅关注时空间行为的客观发生,还关注时空间行为的计划和时空间行为结果的影响反馈等主观方面。企划视角下的时间被看作将"未来"不断转换为"过去"的连续过程,一个完整的企划包括孕育计划、活动实现、影响反馈三个主要阶段,基于企划可以分析个体行为的闭环决策过程。个体企划与组织企划交织的情景分析有助于解释个体时空间行为以及个体企划与组织企划的关系。沃尔沃乌德瓦拉工厂"结构性变革"的案例为如何从组织企划与个体企划交织的视角探索组织管理变革及其综合效益评价提供了很好的启示。企划视角下的日常活动研究将极有可能推动时间地理学从主客观结合、能动被动结合的微观视角透视日常活动决策的黑箱,进而对时空间行为进行解释和预测,最终实现物质世界时空制约与人的时空意图的统一。     

ISLAMIC GLASS WEIGHTS AND STAMPS: ANALYSIS USING NUCLEAR TECHNIQUES

A non-destructive bulk analytical method based on instrumental neutron activation techniques was developed to study Islamic glass weights and stamps. Three different successive irradiations are necessary. A calibration method and a calculation program have been developed in order to correct both the different observed interferences and geometrical factors. A good relationship was formed between the chronological classification of the objects and the compositional groups.     

遗产认同:概念、内涵与研究路径

本文从遗产产生、发展及其遗产本质属性特征的视角提出了遗产认同的概念,并从“遗产身份”和“遗产认同”两个角度解释了遗产认同的内涵,即前者强调遗产的客观属性,后者强调主体对遗产的认知。在此基础上,根据遗产与认同的四种交叉关系,作者提出了遗产认同相应的研究路径,即从时间视角的遗产化过程分析每个阶段的遗产认同;以尺度的视角从表征层面的空间身份和文化身份特征理解遗产认同;从非表征层面的遗产实践分析相关者如何通过具体行动表征和重构自己的身份认同。遗产认同概念的提出与研究不仅可能丰富新文化地理学的景观研究理论,也为遗产旅游地治理提供理论借鉴,未来还需对遗产认同与遗产保护利用关系做进一步探讨。     

RESEARCH,NARRATIVE, AND REPRESENTATION: A POSTNARRATIVE APPROACH

Narrativism or representationalism is founded on the idea that historical narratives and representations are 1) true and indivisible wholes, whereof 2) the truth needs to be maintained, although a narrativist or representationalist whole cannot be confirmed or disconfirmed, and wherein 3) the past is represented in a figurative sense. These fundamental aspects of narrativism have had a positive impact on historiography, but they are also the three reasons why narrativism has neglected historical research and argumentation. To remedy these problems postnarrativism has been evoked. It opts for presentation instead of representation, cutting through all the links between the past and the historiographical product. The product is not a narrative or a representation but a thesis, a proposal to see the past in a special way. The only element postnarrativism wants to retain of narrativism is colligation because it has an argumentative structure based on epistemic values. Postnarrativism leads to knowledge, built on the practice of warranted assertions instead of truth. My postnarrativism chooses a middle course between a strong narrativism and what I would like to call a “weak,” presentational postnarrativism. I agree with postnarrativists that more attention must be paid to argumentation and research. Moreover, I consider time a neglected issue in narrativism. Nevertheless, I don't want to give up the three above‐mentioned fundamental aspects of it. In my view the assumption of truth with regard to (figurative) representation needs to be maintained, but in a pragmatic, provisional form: a historical narrative or representation can be considered as true as long as it has not been replaced by a better one. Retaining truth and holism, but wanting more room for investigation and argumentation, requires that narrativism's role in historical research and history‐writing be revised. This implies the replacement of the usual research phase by a preparation phase, wherein, next to research, space must be reserved for so‐called writing activities. Preparation means the conversion of a germinal narrative or representation into an accomplished whole. Holism occurs in two representational forms: a narrative and a representation. In both forms, research concepts and the associated temporalities become visible under the surface of the narrativist or representational superstructure.     

TRUTH AND MEANING IN HISTORICAL INTERPRETATION: A DAVIDSONIAN APPROACH

This essay argues that Donald Davidson's work in philosophy sheds light on debates about truth, meaning, and context in historical interpretation. Drawing on distinctions between Davidson's project and that of his mentor, W. V. O. Quine, I aim to show that certain ambiguities that have arisen in the methodological reflections of Quentin Skinner and Frank Ankersmit, to take representatives of contrastive approaches to intellectual history, are clarified once we reckon with Davidson's ideas. This discussion leads to a case for the broader pertinence of Davidson's work to historical writing, which insists that his focus on the centrality of truth to disagreement bears salutary consequences for thinking about what constitutes compelling historical scholarship.