WITH OR AGAINST HAYDEN WHITE? REFLECTIONS ON THEORY OF HISTORY AND SUBJECT FORMATION

This article reflects on Hayden White's understanding of the subject and explores how best to move forward discussions in theory of history after his arguments about narrativity. To do so, I reconsider his arguments in light of more recent feminist and queer theorizations. Through a reconstruction of the current international new wave of feminism and LGBTQ+ activism as a rich and complex social movement that involves a narration of its own (practical) past, I will recontextualize and revaluate White's insight from the perspective of Judith Butler's theory of subject formation. The argument will unfold in four parts. First, I will recall White's ironic and existential stance on language and narrativity in the representation of reality and in relation to social beliefs. Second, I will again raise the question of the value of narrativity, as framed by White, in the context of the publication of a recent feminist manifesto. It is here that another issue will emerge as crucial: the relationship between the limits of linguistic self-consciousness and the question of the subject. In the third part, my argument will take a partial turn “against White” and toward Butler's subject formation theory. My claim will be that there is a residue of the belief in the sovereign individual in White's insistence on self-consciousness. However, I will also show that his suspicion regarding the psychological impulse toward narrative closure can be re-elaborated as the challenge Butler is facing with their theory of subject formation: that of critically resisting the belief in our being coherent and self-sufficient individuals. In the fourth part, I will present Butler's refiguration of the thesis of the subject's opacity in terms of the primary relationality that binds human beings to one another, and I will offer a new understanding of the individual, norms, agency, infancy, and ethics. Finally, I will conclude that we are bodies in history and that theory of history can find a promising line of research through this conception of the subject, a conception that reframes how we understand the intimate links between political consciousness, historicity, and embodiment. I also claim that this line of research constitutes an ethics for our historical undoing.     

北京万泉寺遗址金代白瓷胎釉配方的锶同位素特征研究

北京丰台万泉寺遗址位于金中都遗址内,遗址出土金代白瓷样品在形制上符合金代定窑白瓷特征。白瓷胎体成分和锶同位素比值综合研究确定了三种制胎原料,其中:高铝黏土原料的锶同位素比值在0.73左右;白云岩化石灰岩原料的锶同位素比值在0.72左右且钙含量较高;草木灰原料的锶同位素比值在0.71左右,且锶含量在1 000 μg/g左右。通过釉层的成分分析及胎釉成分的对比研究,发现釉层主要使用高硅原料与白云岩化石灰岩配制而成,并受到了部分熔融胎体的强烈影响,根据与草木灰关联性较强的P₂O₅含量推断,釉层中可能也含有一定量草木灰。万泉寺遗址白瓷的研究丰富了有关金代定窑白瓷胎釉配方的认识,确认了白云岩化石灰岩为胎釉的主要钙质助熔剂,揭示了草木灰类助熔剂在胎和釉中可能存在各自独立的来源。     

The Australian 2016 Defence White Paper,great-power rivalry and a ‘rules-based order’: an imagined correspondence between Carr,Bull and Bell

This piece is an imagined email correspondence between three renowned international relations scholars, E. H. Carr, Hedley Bull and Coral Bell, who are discussing the Australian 2016 Defence White Paper. The purpose of such an exercise is to reflect on the ‘big-picture’ international relations questions posed by what might otherwise be thought of as a relatively technical defence policy document. In particular, the correspondence between the three focuses on the central importance of the White Paper’s assumptions of a ‘rules-based global order’ and the relationship between this order and US power. In their time, all three authors spoke directly to questions of power, law and order in their scholarly work, which had been deeply influenced, in all three cases, by periods spent working at the ‘coalface’ of these issues in government in Britain and Australia. As such, Carr, Bull and Bell have much to say about how Australia is positioning itself for a post-unipolar world.     

The Archaeological Site of Persepolis (Iran): Study of the Finishing Technique of the Bas‐Reliefs and Architectural Surfaces

One of the aims of the 5‐year Iranian/Italian project for Persepolis, called ‘From Palace to Town’ was to contribute to the conservation of the stone monuments of the imperial site. As part of the activities dedicated to this purpose, a diagnostic study was carried out. Various aspects were considered: petrographic characterization of the stone, forms and factors of decay, and in situ testing of suitable conservation treatments. The present paper reports on the unexpected results of the study on the finishing of architectural surfaces. The results obtained on a limited, but nevertheless significant, number of samples collected from the monuments of the imperial Terrace, allow us to state that the dark grey limestone used for several (or many?) monuments was covered on purpose with a thin, fine whitish layer containing fluorapatite, as major component, and calcite. It is highly probable that the fluorapatite was obtained from calcined animal bones and that slaked lime was used as a binder. Further evidence for this is the discovery of a kiln with the remains of calcined bones and, nearby, a waste pit with animal bones containing fluorapatite. A second white layer, obtained with barium sulphate, was detected in one of the samples beneath the external, earthy encrustation. It could be perhaps interpreted as the remnants of a polychrome finishing.     

Pb and Sr Isotopes and the Provenance of the Painting Materials of Cornelius Krieghoff in 19th‐Century Canada

Radiogenic lead and strontium isotope data are presented for lead‐ and calcium carbonate/barium sulphate‐containing paint and ground samples from 15 paintings, executed between 1844 and 1871, by 19th‐century Canadian artist Cornelius Krieghoff. Like many artists of this era, Krieghoff used lead‐based pigments such as lead white, chrome yellow and Naples yellow, and extenders such as calcium carbonate and barium sulphate. The lead isotope analyses of the majority of these pigments are consistent with the isotopic compositions of lead mined from European lead deposits in England and/or Germany. However, three samples from Krieghoff's early career yield lead isotope compositions that are much more radiogenic than European sources. The lead isotope compositions of these three samples are consistent with the addition of a more radiogenic lead component that is similar to the lead derived from North American lead deposits in Missouri and Illinois (Mississippi Valley Pb–Zn type deposits). The strontium isotope compositions of the extenders suggest that the raw materials for calcium carbonate or barium sulphate extenders were largely derived from Palaeozoic to modern‐day marine environments. This study shows that pigments manufactured from North American lead were being incorporated into Canadian paintings as early as 1844.     

中国西北地区古代壁画彩塑中的含铅白色颜料

本文叙述了我国西北地区探测发现的铅白（类）、角铅矿、碱式硫碳酸铅、硫酸铅、氯化铅、羟基氯化铅、磷氯铅矿砷铅矿（类）等九种含铅白色颜料。它们在我国有丰富而悠久的历史。它们可能来源自矿物,也有可能是人造的。天梯山石窟有丰富的含铅颜料品种;麦积山石窟大量使用磷氯铅矿砷铅矿类颜料,是上述石窟使用颜料特征之一     

Chemical analysis of white porcelains from the Ding Kiln site, Hebei Province, China

The Ding kilns were some of the most famous early kilns of medieval China, producing huge quantities of white and cream-white porcelains of outstanding technical and aesthetic quality. Since 1949 they have been excavated three times, in 1965, in 1987, and in 2009 respectively. In this latest study 69 white porcelain sherds from assured contexts and from the 2009 excavations were analyzed using laser ablation techniques (ICP-AES). The samples date from Five Dynasties, Northern Song and Jin Dynasties respectively (early 10^th to early 13^th C CE). The results show that Ding wares of different times show different characteristics that can be demonstrated through chemical composition. During the early phase of production the Ding ware bodies consisted largely of high firing kaolinitic clays with predominantly calcareous materials as fluxes. After the early Northern Song Dynasty, some calcareous material was replaced by a more potassic material. The compositions of the glazes show a parallel evolution to the bodies. However, because the glazes are very low in titania it seems unlikely that the main clay ingredients of the bodies could have been used in the glaze recipes. For much of the kiln site’s history the glazes appear to have been made mainly from the same siliceous flux-rich materials that had been blended with the main body-clays used to make the Ding ware porcelains, plus some extra calcareous material. The P₂O₅ contents of the glazes suggest that wood ash may have been one source of CaO in the glaze recipes.     

The Sector Theory and the Canadian Arctic, 1897–1970

ABSTRACT

Although European discovery in the Arctic began during the Middle Ages, sovereignty issues did not become a major concern until the early twentieth century. At that time, the controversial sector theory was taken up by Canada, the United Kingdom and the Soviet Union, but opposed by the United States and Norway. This article examines the sector theory in Canadian state practice, clarifying the version of the theory to which Canadian officials subscribed and the aims they hoped to achieve through its use. The international response to Canadian claims is also described.

The article demonstrates that Canadian use of the sector principle during the 1920s was pragmatic and successful, but in later decades, confusion arose both inside and outside the government. Inconsistent public statements were made by government representatives in the 1950s and 1960s; these have puzzled and misled scholars ever since. Differences between the Canadian and Soviet versions of the sector theory, lack of adequate institutional memory in Ottawa, and partisan political rivalries all played a part in creating the confusion, but perhaps the key factor was the inherent difficulty of state control over this remote yet geopolitically crucial region.     

THE REFLEXIVE TEST OF HAYDEN WHITE'S METAHISTORY

This paper assesses Hayden White's Metahistory through the test of reflexivity; that is, it asks whether the book's “general theory of the structure of that mode of thought which is called ‘historical”’ applies, as it should, to its own history of nineteenth‐century “historical consciousness.” Most components of the theoretical apparatus—the various concepts invoked in the “theory of the historical work” and in the “theory of tropes”—fail the reflexivity test; further, it emerges that those same components are also seriously flawed on other grounds. The sole and partial exception is the concept of emplotment, which passes the reflexivity test, albeit with qualifications, but more particularly has the virtue of illuminating the traditional history of history against which Metahistory's own story was pitched; and this result provides an ironic and unexpected vindication of Metahistory's underlying vision. Thus the book's fundamental insight—that the form of historical writing is epistemologically consequential—can be retained, even though its two theories should now be set aside.     

内蒙古赤峰缸瓦窑与河北定窑白瓷的对比分析

缸瓦窑为内蒙古地区辽代规模较大的窑场,为辽代官窑,与宋代五大名窑中的定窑同处一个历史时期。为科学揭示缸瓦窑与定窑之间胎、釉制作工艺关系,运用能量色散X射线荧光光谱法(EDXRF),分析了缸瓦窑与定窑白瓷的胎、釉化学组成,同时结合显微结构和烧成温度分析,并辅助以往的研究资料,将宋辽时期河北定窑与赤峰缸瓦窑白瓷胎、釉化学组成及制作工艺等进行系统的对比分析,发现缸瓦窑受定窑影响较大,缸瓦窑白瓷的生产体现了宋辽两地制瓷工艺的交流传播。