HARTOG,KOSELLECK, AND RICOEUR: HISTORICAL ANTHROPOLOGY AND THE CRISIS OF THE PRESENT

I enquire here into whether historical anthropology may serve to orient the critique of modes of temporalization under the conditions specific to what François Hartog designates as the contemporary regime of historicity. To this end, I bring Hartog into conversation with Paul Ricoeur: both arrive at a diagnosis of the crisis of the present on the basis of a parallel interiorization of the metahistorical categories of Reinhart Koselleck. Sharing a common interlocutor, the diagnoses at which they arrive are nevertheless quite different in nature, a result of the way in which these categories are inflected alternatively toward the anthropological perspective of fundamental temporalization and the semantic perspective of articulation at the level of “orders of time.” I suggest that the crisis of the present eludes the grasp of both and, with a view to gaining a more secure critical purchase over this crisis, propose a framework for bringing them into conversation.     

OPACITY AND TRANSPARENCY IN HISTORICAL REPRESENTATIONS

In his latest book Frank Ankersmit develops a comprehensive philosophical perspective on the problem of the truth and reference of historical representations. The approach and the wider perspective of the book largely belong to what could be called the postmodernist paradigm, in spite of some recent attempts to interpret Ankersmit's recent work differently. Since his 1983 Narrative Logic Ankersmit has propounded the view that individual statements that constitute historical representations may have reference, but that representations themselves do not. His most recent book remains faithful to this position and elaborates it further. This essay examines Ankersmit's arguments as well as the assumptions and implications of this view.     

HISTORY AND THE MANIFEST IMAGE: HAYDEN WHITE AS A PHILOSOPHER OF HISTORY1

To claim that Hayden White has yet to be read seriously as a philosopher of history might seem false on the face of it. But do tropes and the rest provide any epistemic rationale for differing representations of historical events found in histories? As an explanation of White's influence on philosophy of history, such a proffered emphasis only generates a puzzle with regard to taking White seriously, and not an answer to the question of why his efforts should be worthy of any philosophical attention at all. For what makes his emphasis on narrative structure and its associated tropes of philosophical relevance? What, it may well be asked, did (or could) any theory that draws its categories from a stock provided by literary criticism contribute to explicating problems with regard to the warranting of claims about knowledge, explanation, or causation that represent those concerns that philosophy typically brings to this field? Robert Doran's anthologizing of previously uncollected pieces, ranging as they do over a literal half‐century of White's published work, offers an opportunity to identify explicitly those philosophical themes and arguments that regularly and prominently feature there. Moreover, White's essays in this volume demonstrate a credible knowledge of and interest in mainstream analytic philosophers of his era and also reveal White as deeply influenced by or well acquainted with other important philosophers of history. White thus invites a reading of his work as philosophy, and this volume presents the opportunity for accepting it as such.     

PHOTOGRAPHS, SYMBOLIC IMAGES, AND THE HOLOCAUST: ON THE (IM)POSSIBILITY OF DEPICTING HISTORICAL TRUTH

Photography has often been scrutinized regarding its relationship to reality or historical truth. This includes not only the indexicality of photography, but also the question of how structures and processes that comprise history and historical events can be depicted. In this context, the Holocaust provides a particular challenge to photography. As has been discussed in numerous publications, this historic event marks the "limits of representation." Nevertheless there are many photographs "showing" the Holocaust that have been produced in different contexts that bespeak the photographers' gaze and the circumstances of the photographs' production. Some of the pictures have become very well known due to their frequent reproduction, even though they often do not show the annihilation itself, but situations different from that; their interpretation as Holocaust pictures results rather from a metonymic deferral. When these pictures are frequently reproduced they are transformed into symbolic images, that is, images that can be removed from their specific context, and in this way they come to signify abstract concepts such as "evil." Despite being removed from their specific context these images can, as this essay argues, refer to historical truth. First, I explore the arguments of some key theorists of photography (Benjamin, Kracauer, Sontag, Barthes) to investigate the relationship between photography and reality in general, looking at their different concepts of reality, history, and historical truth, as well as the question of the meaning of images. Second, I describe the individual circumstances in which some famous Holocaust pictures were taken in order to analyze, by means of three examples, the question what makes these specific pictures so particularly suitable to becoming symbolic images and why they may—despite their abstract meaning—be able to depict historical truth.     

19世纪中国学者关于历史演进的理论

进入19世纪以后,由于时代剧变和中西文化交流的推动,一批中国学者对历史演进阐发了深刻而新鲜的理论。龚自珍、魏源预见到"乱将不远",对公羊"三世说"进行革命性改造,提出新的命题;其后,以康有为为代表的维新派构建了宣传变法维新的历史观;至19世纪末年,以严复为代表,结合中国面临被列强瓜分的危局,传播了西方近代进化论,中国民气为之一变。     

汉儒理念与价值观研究的方法论问题之理论篇

臧知非《两汉之际儒生价值取向探微》(《史学集刊》2003年2期)的立论,和我近年考析汉儒的文字针锋相对,感觉有必要对考论汉儒所牵涉的一些史学理论和方法提出来讨论。本文“(一)理论篇”讨论法国“年鉴学派·心态史回转到人类文化历史学”的新趋向;这是转向到美国人类学大师罗拔·列德夫(Robert Redfield,1897—1958)所重视的文化“大传统”——对整体文化发展变化的多元和全面意义的理解,综合为文明史的研究——“人文·精神文明”。以中国传统观念来说,聚焦于文化“大传统”,是以“君子”的“价值”理念,来理解和批判两汉儒生;聚焦于文化“小传统”,是以“小人”的“行径”来体认两汉儒生。顾炎武以“大义”、“节义”等理想理念来评论《两汉风俗》;吕思勉、蒙文通(以及臧文未指名的钱穆师和我)则以汉儒“要改正当世社会组织”(传统谓之“济世淑世”)的“志士仁人之公意”、“洪流”来解释新莽政权之兴起;这都是从儒学的“人文精神”“淑世理想”和“学术理念”(文明“大传统”的价值理念)着眼;因而成为聚焦于文化“小传统”价值取向的臧文批评的标的。本文续“考论篇”将进一步讨论在历史考证和分析上研究汉儒的实际问题。     

The Millennial of Castile (1943): the historical culture of Spanish Fascism

The creation of new symbols and historical myths were common practices of nationalist politics, especially in Fascist regimes. In 1943 the Franco regime organized the most impressive historical commemoration celebrated in post-war Spain: the Milenario of Castile. With its heterogeneous mixture of history and spectacle, the Milenario of Castile was by far the greatest historical commemoration promoted by the State during the 1940s. Taking the commemoration of the Milenario as a case study, this article examines the historical culture of Spanish Fascism, as well as the attempts of the Falangist intellectual elite to impose a concrete national narrative in post-war Spain. At the same time, the article analyses the historical discourses and aesthetics displayed throughout the commemoration, underlining its Fascist character, and consequently the transnational dimension of the Fascist politics of the past. Finally, the article reflects on the scope and limits of the process of Fascistisation in Franco's dictatorship, especially in its commemorative culture.     

A graph-based analysis for generating geographical context from a historical cadastre in Spain (17th and 18th centuries)

Abstract

The cabreves are notarial documents prepared between the 13th and 19th centuries in the Catalan and Valencian regions of Spain. These historical records were published before the first cadastral maps and contain geographical information that could help spatially reconstruct historical landscapes. However, these documents have not been used to their full potential mainly because of their semi-structured and complex nature. In this article, we propose a new graph-based interactive methodology for partially reconstructing historical landscapes. We have successfully applied this methodology for reconstructing the historical landscape of the Barony of Sella in the 18th century and the methodology has also helped us locate “El Poblet,” a previously unknown archeological site abandoned after the expulsion of the Moriscos in 1609.     

MAKING CHAINS THAT (UN)MAKE THINGS: WASTE–VALUE RELATIONS AND THE BANGLADESHI RUBBISH ELECTRONICS INDUSTRY

There is growing empirical and theoretical interest in post‐consumption activity that results in the capture and creation of value from waste in the global economy. This article engages with two dominant approaches to tracing the capture and creation of value, global value chains (GVCs) and global production networks (GPNs), and their shared call to examine waste disposal and recycling. Using non‐participant observation, semi‐structured interviews, and a survey we examine what happens to the products of one of GVCs ‘and GPNs’ paradigmatic industries, electronics, when they are labelled e‐waste and are imported into Dhaka, Bangladesh, as rubbish electronics. Rather than wasting and final disposal predominating, our research documents a substantial rubbish recovery economy that captures and creates value anew. Consequently, we argue that both GVC and GPN approaches must rethink how they theorize the capture and creation of value.     

PEIRCE AND FOUCAULT ON TIME AND HISTORY: THE TASKS OF (DIS)CONTINUITY

Some have recognized an affinity between Pragmatist thought and that of Foucault, though this affinity is typically cashed out in terms of William James and John Dewey and not Charles Sanders Peirce. This article argues that bringing Foucault and Peirce into collaboration not only shows the relevance of Peirce for Foucault, and vice versa, but also enriches the thought of both thinkers—indeed, it also reveals important implications for the theory of history more generally. Specifically, the article crosses the Peircean concept of habit and the Foucauldian concept of practice (as it operates in the arenas of discourse, power, and self), ultimately decoding them in terms of an account of time that derives from Peirce and that gives a fundamental role to discontinuity. In this way the article shows how Peirce can provide Foucault with an account of time that buttresses and grounds his genealogical approach to history, while at the same time revealing how Foucault can provide Peirce with an account of history. The synergy between the two thinkers offers a way to think about the nature of history that goes beyond what each thinker individually provided.     

EARTHQUAKE DAMAGE SCENARIOS AND SEISMIC HAZARD OF MESSINA,NORTH-EASTERN SICILY (ITALY) AS INFERRED FROM HISTORICAL DATA

A study aimed at evaluating earthquake damage scenarios and seismic hazard of Messina using historical data, is presented. The analysis of coeval reports allowed us to reconstruct the seismic history of the city and to obtain a homogeneous earthquake site catalogue based on intensity assessed by the European Macroseismic Scale 1998. In the last 1200 years Messina was destroyed once (1908, intensity X-XI EMS) and suffered effects estimated between intensities VII and IX EMS many times (e.g. 853, 1169, 1494, 1509, 1599, 1693, 1783, 1894, 1909). Destruction or severe damage which affected the city are mainly related to earthquakes occurring in the Messina Straits and Southern Calabria, while slighter, moderate effects are usually due to shocks taking place in the seismogenic sources of SE Sicily, Gulf of Patti and Northern Calabria. The damage scenarios of the most relevant events, delineated using coeval urban plans of the city, showed that damage distribution is strongly conditioned by the different soil response. A probabilistic seismic hazard assessment was obtained by using site observed intensities: The expected intensity in a time span of 50 years (i.e. maximum intensity characterised by at least 10% exceedance probability in 50 years) is DC EMS; the expected intensity in a time span of 300 years (10% exceedance probability in 300 years) is X EMS.     

THE PAST IS EVIL/EVIL IS PAST: ON RETROSPECTIVE POLITICS,PHILOSOPHY OF HISTORY,AND TEMPORAL MANICHAEISM

One of the most remarkable phenomena in current international politics is the increasing attention paid to “historical injustice.” Opinions on this phenomenon strongly differ. For some it stands for a new and noble type of politics based on raised moral standards and helping the cause of peace and democracy. Others are more critical and claim that retrospective politics comes at the cost of present‐ or future‐oriented politics and tends to be anti‐utopian. The warnings about the perils of a retrospective politics outweighing politics directed at contemporary injustices, or strivings for a more just future, should be taken seriously. Yet the alternative of a politics disregarding all historical injustice is not desirable either. We should refuse to choose between restitution for historical injustices and struggle for justice in the present or the future. Rather, we should look for types of retrospective politics that do not oppose but complement or reinforce the emancipatory and utopian elements in present‐ and future‐directed politics. I argue that retrospective politics can indeed have negative effects. Most notably it can lead to a “temporal Manichaeism” that not only posits that the past is evil, but also tends to treat evil as anachronistic or as belonging to the past. Yet I claim that ethical Manichaeism and anti‐utopianism and are not inherent features of all retrospective politics but rather result from an underlying philosophy of history that treats the relation between past, present, and future in antinomic terms and prevents us from understanding “transtemporal” injustices and responsibilities. In order to pinpoint the problem of certain types of retrospective politics and point toward some alternatives, I start out from a criticism formulated by the German philosopher Odo Marquard and originally directed primarily at progressivist philosophies of history.     

MATTER(S) OF INTEREST: ARTEFACTS, SPACING AND TIMING

This paper argues that time‐geography can make a contribution to contemporary ‘rematerialized’ geographies, because the interconnections among social processes, human corporeality and inanimate material artefacts within the landscape were among Hägerstrand's central concerns. Time‐geography needs none the less to be extended in several ways to make it more reconcilable with current thinking about materiality in geography. The possibility of combining Hägerstrand's framework with notions from (post) actor‐network approaches is therefore explored. It is suggested that concepts and notions from the latter may contribute to the advancement of the conceptualization of action at a distance and agency in general in time‐geography, as well as the incorporation of the immaterial realm into space—time diagrams. The resulting materially heterogeneous time‐geography is a framework for studying the spacing and timing of different material entities that is sensitive to the role of artefacts and their local connectedness with other material forms. Some of its elements are illustrated briefly through an empirical study of the roles played by a few mundane artefacts in working parents ‘coping with child‐care responsibilities on working days. The case study suggest that these artefacts not only enable goal fulfilment and routinization but also result in further spacing and timing practices, and can introduce uncertainty and novelty to existing orders.     

区域知识管理的目标、原则与方式研究

为了能动响应信息化、全球化带来的机遇与挑战,在动态市场中持续发展,以及解决区域内部知识生产、知识交换和知识分配等方面的问题,区域必须进行有效的知识管理。作为知识系统,区域知识管理目标应该是如何设计出一个适应系统,强化私人主体和公共机构的知识生产能力和知识价值实现能力,管理的核心在于激励私人创造知识的积极性和公共管理的核心在于激励私人的创造知识的积极性和公共知识流通与分配方面。区域知识管理必须遵循人本主义原则、遵循市场规律原则、区域性原则和制度学习原则,并相应采用多级管理模式。     

BYZANTINE AND UMAYYAD PERIOD POTTERY AT BARSINIA (2006 SEASON OF EXCAVATION)

Abstract

Until recent pottery studies of the ancient Classical and Early Islamic rural sites in northern Jordan were of less interest to archaeologists. This article focuses on the Byzantine and Umayyad period pottery that has been discovered during the first season of excavation at Barsinia in the north-western part of Jordan. Fifty-two indicative pottery sherds were sorted according to their date and function into two main groups: the early Byzantine pottery (fourth–sixth centuries) and the Late Byzantine–Umayyad pottery (sixth–eighth centuries). Since Barsinia is one of the small rural archaeological sites, and such sites were rarely mentioned in ancient literary sources, the study of material remains at such locations is essential for elucidating regional development and trade. It also sheds more light on the relation between the site and the surroundings through the comparative study of the pottery objects.     

“FUTURE PAST”: TIME AND TELEOLOGY IN (ANCIENT) HISTORIOGRAPHY

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).     

清至民国西宁至拉萨道路(青海段)分布格局的变迁——基于古旧地图及数字化的分析

西宁至拉萨道路是青海地区交通网中的主线,近代西宁至拉萨道路(青海段)分布格局的变迁代表了青海地区历史时期道路分布格局变迁的一般规律。基于中国国家图书馆所藏1935年《青海省三十万分一图》的数字化成果,结合其他时期的资料可复原出清初至1954年近三百年青海地区西宁至拉萨道路分布格局的变迁过程。驿站制度裁撤导致的清代官道系统崩溃,新式交通工具带来的新交通体系和民国时期青海地区的开发活动是近代青海地区道路分布格局变迁的三大驱动力。清至民国西宁至拉萨道路(青海段)分布格局的变迁,表现出历史时期复杂地形条件下道路分布格局易受多变的人文要素影响的特点。基于丰富实测地图资料的近代道路复原是准确复原古代道路的基础。