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HISTORY between REFLEXIVITYand CRITIQUEChallenging Concepts and Themes

is now online:

2010NEFELI PUBLISHERS

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M A N A G I N G E D I T O R :Antonis Liakos

V O L U M E E D I T O R :Effi Gazi

E D I T O R I A L B O A R D :Athena Athanasiou | Panteion UniversityRika Benveniste | University of ThessalyAda Dialla | School of Fine Arts, AthensHaris Exertzoglou | University of the AegeanCostas Gaganakis | University of AthensEffi Gazi | University of PeloponnesePothiti Hantzaroula | University of the AegeanAngeliki Koufou | University of AthensVangelis Karamanolakis | University of AthensKostis Kornetis | Brown UniversityIoanna Laliotou | University of ThessalyDimitra Lambropoulou | EducationKaterina Papakonstantinou | Ionian UniversityYiannis Papatheodorou | University of IoanninaIoulia Pentazou | University of ThessalyDespoina Valatsou | University of AthensPolymeris Voglis | University of ThessalyYannis Yannitsiotis | University of the AegeanKostas Yannakopoulos | University of the Aegean

Book Review Editor AT H E N A SY R I A T O U

Language editor DA M I A N MA C CO N UL A D H (E N G L I S H) SE R V A N N E JO L L I V E T (F R E N C H)Cover Design DI M I T R I S ST E V I S

DTP NE F E L I P U B L I S H E R S

Publisher NEFELI PublishersAsklipiou 6, 106 80 Athens, Greeceinfo@nnet.gr

I S S N : 1 1 0 8 - 3 4 4 1

AN ANNUAL PUBLICATION OF THECultural and Intellectual History Society www.historein.grhistorein@historein.gr

2010

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C O R R E S P O N D E N C E , C O N T R I B U T I O N S ,S U B S C R I P T I O N S , A D V E R T I S I N G :HistoreinNEFELI PublishersAsklipiou 6, 106 80 Athens, Greecetel.: +30 210 3639962historein@historein.gr

P R I C E :€15 (Greece), €23 (Europe and the rest of the world)

C O P Y R I G H T :All rights reserved. Permission to reprint must be obtained from the publisher.

N O T E S F O R C O N T R I B U T O R S A N D G E N E R A L G U I D E L I N E S :Articles and reviews submitted to Historein should be original contribu-tions and should not be under consideration for any other publication at the same time. Contributions should not exceed 7,500 words, including notes and references. Details of all authors’ institutional affiliations and full address, including email, for correspondence should be included on a separate cover sheet. Any acknowledgements should be included on the cover sheet, as well as a note of the exact length of the article. Historein welcomes contributions in English or French.

Historein strives to offer an efficient reviewing process. To facilitate this, electronic (email) submissions are preferred, in MS Word format. Arti-cles submitted for publication should be sent as an attachment to the editor at: historein@historein.gr

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T H E V O L U M E H A S B E E N P U B L I S H E D W I T H T H E F I N A N C I A L S U P P O R T O F T H E NA T I O N A L BA N K O F GR E E C E

ιστορεινhistoreina review of the pastand other stories

AN ANNUAL PUBLICATION OF THE CULTURAL AND INTELLECTUAL HISTORY SOCIETY

C o n t e n t sn t e n t s

Effi Gazi Introduction: 5History between Reflexivity and Critique

Hayden White The Practical Past 10Costas Gaganakis Thinking About History in the European Sixteenth 20

Century: La Popelinière and his Quest for “Perfect History”

J. D. Braw Original Knowledge and True Enlightenment: 28Ranke’s Kritik in Contextk

Servanne Jollivet The Uses and Misuses of Historical Reflexivity 38 in Philosophy: From “Historical Critique” to “Deconstruction”

Pothiti Hantzaroula Gender History and the Transformation 48 of the Poetics of Historical Knowledge

Sanjay Seth Historiography and Nonwestern Pasts 71Q. Edward Wang The Power of Paradox: The Double-Edged 82

Effect of the Postcolonial Challenge to Modern Historiography

Diana Mishkova Scale and Cognition in Historical 94 Constructions of Space

Kalle Pihlainen Critical Historiography in the Entertainment Age 106Ewa Domanska Beyond Anthropocentrism in Historical Studies 118Alexandra Lianeri Historiographical Estrangement as Critique: 131 The Divided History of Dēmokratia

Antonis Liakos What is Historical Critique About? 144

I N T E R V E N T I O N S

Daho Djerbal De la difficile écriture de l’histoire d’une 153 société (dé)colonisée: Interférence des niveaux d’historicité et d’individualité historique

Athena Athanasiou Subjectivity, Liberation and Revolution 161and Elena Tzelepis in Simone de Beauvoir’s The Second Sex: An Interview with Julia Kristeva

B O O K R E V I E W S

J. D. Braw Margaret MacMillan, Dangerous Games: 170 The Uses and Abuses of History

Anna Maria Droumpouki Jerome de Groot, Consuming History: 172 Historians and Heritage in Contemporary Popular Culture

Alexander Kitroeff Roderick Beaton and David Ricks (eds), 176The Making of Modern Greece:

Nationalism, Romanticism and the Uses of the Past, 1797–1896

Vicky Doulaveras Peter Mackridge, Language and National 179 Identity in Greece, 1766–1976

Jack L. Davis Dimitris Damaskos and Dimitris Plantzos (eds), 184 A Singular Antiquity: Archaeology and Hellenic Identity in Twentieth-Century Greece

Vera Sýkora Dimitrios A. Stamatopoulos, Το Βυζάντιο 189 μετά το έθνος: Το πρόβλημα της συνέχειας στις βαλκανικές ιστοριογραφίες [Byzantium after the nation: The problem of continuity in Balkan historiographies]

Christina Koulouri Andreas Lyberatos, Οικονομία, πολιτική 193 και εθνική ιδεολογία: η διαμόρφωση των εθνικών κομμάτων στη Φιλιππούπολη του 19ου αιώνα [Economy, politics and national ideology: the formation of the national parties in Philippoupolis in the nineteenth century]

Silvia Rosa Maurizio Isabella, Risorgimento in Exile: 197 Italian Émigrés and the Liberal International in the Post-Napoleonic Era

Stefano Petrungaro Augusta Dimou, Entangled Paths 201 Towards Modernity: Contextualizing Socialism and Nationalism in the Balkans

Alexandros Lamprou Lorans Tanatar Baruh 204and Vangelis Kechriotis (eds),

Economy and Society on Both Shores of the Aegean

Dimitris Kousouris Giorgos Antoniou and Nikos Marantzidis (eds), 207 Η εποχή της σύγχυσης: Η δεκαετία του ’40 και η ιστοριογραφία [The age of confusion: The forties and historiography]

Gabriella Etmektsoglou K. E. Fleming, Greece: A Jewish History 212Flora Tsilaga Mark Mazower, Hitler’s Empire: 216 Nazi Rule in Occupied Europe

Pothiti Hantzaroula Iordanis Psimmenos and Christoforos Skamnakis, 219 Οικιακή εργασία των μεταναστριών και κοινωνική προστασία: η περίπτωση των γυναικών από την Αλβανία και την Ουκρανία [Female migrants’ domestic labour and social welfare: The case of Albanian and Ukrainian women]

Katerina Vassilikou, Γυναικεία μετανάστευση και ανθρώπινα δικαιώματα: μια βιογραφική έρευνα για τις οικιακές βοηθούς από τα Βαλκάνια και την Ανατολική Ευρώπη [Immigrant women and human rights: A biographical study on domestic workers from the Balkans and Eastern Europe]

Evthymios Papataxiarchis, Penelope Topali, Angeliki Athanasopoulou, Κόσμοι της οικιακής εργασίας: φύλο, μετανάστευση και πολιτισμικοί μετασχηματισμοί στην Αθήνα του πρώιμου 21ου αιώνα [Worlds of domestic labour: Gender, migration and cultural transformations in early twenty-first century Athens]

Spyros Tzokas and Faidra Papanelopoulou, Agustí Nieto-Galan 227Eirini Mergoupi Savaidou and Enrique Perdiguero (eds), Popularizing Science and Technology in the European Periphery, 1800–2000

Alexandros Manolatos Quentin Skinner, Θεωρήσεις της πολιτικής: 232 Σχετικά με τη μέθοδο [Visions of Politics: Regarding Method]

G. Plakotos Peter Burke, Popular Culture 235 in Early Modern Europe

“Critique is uncomfortable,” the historian Joan W. Scott claims in a recent essay, before she goes on to unravel the disturbances ofscrutinising the taken-for-granted as well as the “shock of the new” that critique causes. “Critique uses the language of desire,” she also points out, before turning her attention to the motivation and passionwhich underlie and define critique.1 Feeling “uncomfortable” and hav-ing “desires” both played a role in choosing to host an internationalconference on the topic of “History between Reflexivity and Critique”, jointly organised by Historein, the Historical Archive of the University of Athens, the International Commission for Theory and History ofHistoriography and the European Doctorate in Social History, which took place in Athens from 30 October–1 November 2008. Our scope was exploratory: we brought together scholars from different areas of specialisation and from different perspectives in order to discuss a variety of themes,including: “Reflex-ive Historiographyin East and West”,“A History of Criti-cal History”, “History, Philosophy and Science”, “Critique and Moder-nity”, “Transcultural History”, “Postcolonialism as Critique”, “CriticalConcepts”, and “History and the Politics of Recognition”. We aimedat raising anew and at reassessing the themes that have been dis-cussed in the last few decades within the various “post” agendas.We also meant to move backwards and forwards; we wanted to ex-plore the concepts of critique and reflexivity in the long term, to ex-amine their functioning in different settings, to investigate the waysthey have been shaped and reshaped, as well as to try to anticipate future orientations in history. By placing history between reflexivity and critique, we turned our attention to the question of what history will become, bearing in mind that historical knowledge is being re-positioned within the contemporary configurations of the so called

Introduction

History between Reflexivity and Critique

6

History between Reflexivity and Critique

“knowledge economy”. It was from this perspective that we proceeded to the publication of se-lected papers in the present volume.

This has been a difficult task, indeed. Drawing on Michael Oakshott’s concept of the “practical past”, Hayden White argues, in the first chapter of the volume, that “coming to terms with the past” today means to reflect on the kind of knowledge produced about the past. In this vein, heexplores how the “practical past” was thrown out of the window of the proper historical discipline.The more “scientific” history became, according to White, the more it was removed from “prac-tical reason”. By defining the past as “a space of experience”, White emphasises the importanceof relating it to the present through innovative ways that might converge, such as, for instance, historiographical metafiction or the postmodernist “neohistorical novel”. The kind of knowledge produced about the past that White explores has also been at the centre of historians’ interest in other historical moments. In fact, it stands at the centre of historiographical criticism. A detach-ment from religion, a reconsideration of religious-historical narratives and a turn to the secular have played a crucial part in this respect. Costas Gaganakis discusses how Lancelot Voisin dela Popelinière’s interest in the critical interpretation of evidence and in an all-inclusive historyaimed at emancipating the study of the past from theology. Gaganakis places the “historical rev-olution” of the sixteenth century in the context of the cataclysmic events unleashed by the wars of religion between Catholics and Protestants. In this context, history rose as a hermeneutic en-deavour while it became related to earlier processes of nationalisation in the European sixteenthcentury. The study of history as an answer to a set of existential questions stands at the centre of J. D. Braw’s contribution on Ranke’s work. Braw relates Rankean criticism to an attempt to transfer religious concerns and beliefs into the secular context and to unravel conceptualisa-tions of vocation so that the past unfolds into the present and the future. Servanne Jollivet, on the other hand, discusses how philosophy and history came together against theology. By fo-cusing on Dilthey, Troeltsch and Heidegger, Jollivet turns her attention to a critical philosophy of history which implements both philosophical perspectives and historicist paradigms in order to formulate its critical arguments. In this vein, she revisits major issues of historical reflexivityclaimed by philosophers from the late nineteenth century onwards vis à vis historical writing, relativism and metaphysics.

Gaganakis, Braw and Jollivet remind us, in the most illustrious manner, that historiography as a field has been constituted on the very processes of reflexivity and critique. Both concepts are familiar to relevant scholarship. Yet, familiarity does not presuppose homogeneity or linearity in processes. Neither has it contributed to the rise of a uniform agenda on the politics of reflexiv-ity and critique. On the contrary, the hot and tense debates that have marked history in the lastdecades vis à vis, for instance, the concepts of “science” or of “society” or “the past”, either in its “real”, “practical” or “imaginary” configurations, point towards desirable, yet rather uncomfort-able and at times painful, processes of reflexivity and critique.

This is even more so because of the inherent tensions in reflexive and critical history. Let usmake a special reference to these inherent tensions. Firstly, by being object dependent, both reflexivity and critique are shaped and formed by their emphasis on particular themes, for in-stance on gender or on the colonial. Reflexivity and critique are relational in the sense they ex-

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ist in relation to something other than themselves in an attempt to question “given truths”.2 Inrecent historical scholarship, critical perspectives on imperialist and colonial narratives not only enriched our knowledge of the practices that surround history-writing but also led to a new un-derstanding of power.3 Pothiti Hantzaroula shows how gender has called into critical examina-tion the foundations of the historical discipline and how historical knowledge has been grasped by feminist historical writing. Gendering the historical narrative has opened, as Hantzaroula ar-gues, a variety of new conceptualisations and themes in history. Sanjay Seth examines, in his contribution, how the rise of the history of the “collective singular”, that is, of Man, in premodern Europe as well as the formation of the “sciences of Man” imposed a code of conceptualising the past even for those who did not live by that code such as the non-West. By pointing at the crucial question of the foundations of western historical thinking, Seth raises the important issue of its reassessment. Yet, this condition of object dependency does not exclude either the process ofgenerating new objects or the process of invoking alterations in the wider historical field, irre-spective of their own particularity. Edward Wang enriches our knowledge of the intellectual and political formation of postcolonial historians, especially the core group of the Subaltern Stud-ies project, by turning his attention to the Maoist underpinnings of their Marxism, to their initial interest in the Cultural Revolution and to their study of the Chinese historiography on peasants. Wang defines postcolonial scholarship as paradoxical in nature since it is an offshoot of cultural developments in the West and a persistent attempt to engage in a criticism of them. Through his critique of the subalternists’ approach to nationalism, Wang turns our attention to the important theme of colonialism and nationalism as well as to the issue of the impact of contemporary na-tionalism. Secondly, amorphous as it may be, critique acts as a transformative power. Reflex-ive and critical interventions impose their transformative power on history, even if they are not complete or even when they are controversial. It is necessary, however, to elaborate and clarify the concepts of reflexivity and critique within particular and distinct historical agendas and top-ics. Diana Mishkova turns her attention to the transformative power of critique by pointing to the ways “scale shifts”, that is, shifts in the scale of observation of historical reality, offer a view into differentiated “spaces of experience”. In this context, she elaborately examines the critical his-torical scholarship on the Balkans in the 1930s which opened up new perspectives on the his-tory of the region. For Mishkova, that historical perspective which implemented regional “chal-lenges” formed an important critique of nation-centred history. Finally, reflexivity and critique in their philosophical, epistemological and ethical underpinnings have definitely contributed to the ramifications of historical thought; yet, historical critique is also placed within history. It is formedand determined by particular historical contexts while it functions within its own historicity. It is historically bound. This becomes evident in the interactive dialogue between history and con-temporary critical theory which has opened up space for new experimental narratives.4 In this vein, Kalle Pihlainen investigates the role and function of history in the “entertainment age”. By focusing on contemporary evolutions especially in the field of new media, Pihlainen looks for new critical attitudes beyond traditional professional practices in history, urging for a conceptu-alisation of history as communication rather than interpretation. Ewa Domanska, on the other hand, relates the necessity for reflexivity and critique to current concerns about the kind of hu-manities we need today. She discusses the rise of a new interest in the “nonhuman” as well as the critique of traditional anthropocentrism and defines nonanthropocentric humanities as post-humanities. By turning her attention to an emerging paradigm inspired by biology and technosci-

8

History between Reflexivity and Critique

ence, she argues for a nonanthropocentric history as well as for a posthumanist displacement of our interpretive frameworks in history.

The interest in the historicity of reflexivity and critique has further implications. As mentionedabove, while we opted for this particular topic both for the conference and for the present vol-ume, we had an eye on the future of the past. We also aimed at turning our attention to that his-tory which is not necessarily or exclusively about the past. For decades now, historians haveworked against a backdrop of questions around the nature of their discipline. At times, this back-drop has produced such tensions that seemed to be in conflict with their work. Indeed, very few topics remained uncontested in the course of embattled processes of critique and reflexivity.What’s next? We thought that by posing history “in between” reflexivity and critique, we couldperhaps come up with a different suggestion. We aimed at moving beyond binary oppositions.After all, critique is not just about “fault finding”. It is a practice that suspends judgment and ac-tivates modes of questioning.5 It is also a form of resistance to what is taken for granted. Yet, one question remains puzzling. There is a form of historical critique or of “history-writing as critique” or of critical history that demands further attention. It is that form which has allies and adversaries, friends and opponents, that one which carries the power of political energy. Whatis the future of critical history now that earlier forms of it are either institutionalised or domesti-cated or even routinised while politics itself is changing dramatically? Some decades ago, Rein-hart Koselleck explored how the split between the absolutist state and society contributed to the emergence of new forms of critique and produced new models for political society within the confines of the Enlightenment.6 Moments of tension and turbulence invite processes of critique around new agendas. Could this apply to contemporary history? Alexandra Lianeri recasts the burning issue of an emancipatory political critique through the intellectual history of democracy.Drawing on Foucauldian notions of critique and governmentability, Lianeri explores an intellec-tual and political tradition which focuses on the Athenian democracy and the Roman republic in an attempt to illustrate how the Roman (republican) appropriations of the Greek concept of de-mocracy offered the founding moment of humanism and the politics of the modern democraticstate. A radical vision of democracy arises from underneath the layers of age-old appropriations and reconceptualisations. Lianeri discusses this vision vis à vis the contemporary crisis of de-mocracy. In his concluding essay, Antonis Liakos reflects on the ways of doing critical historytoday. By juxtaposing conceptualisations of “critical history” in the 1960s and 1970s with current perceptions, he explores the concept of critique, drawing on the Foucauldian analysis of systems of thought and forms of governmentability. In this line of argumentation, he argues for a criticalhistory that avoids self-referentiality and efficiently establishes itself within contemporary forms and communications media.

Two different but paradoxically complementary contributions are included in the “Interventions”section. Daho Djerbal proposes a research project which aims at bringing together the history of a colonial and postcolonial society and of a colonial power. By focusing on Algeria (and, as a consequence, on France), he reflects on the study of elites and of political conceptualisations in an attempt to explore the ways the colonial system produced new social agents and to revisitthe history of colonialism in general. Finally, Athena Athanasiou and Elena Tzelepis discuss with Julia Kristeva. By turning into Simon de Beauvoir’s leftist feminist vision, Kristeva combines po-

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litical philosophy, psychoanalysis and literature in a critical investigation of the theme of free-dom. By defining it as “the power to constantly transcend”, Kristeva argues for the intellectualand political importance of “continually moving beyond”.

The present volume aims especially at “moving beyond” through the processes of reflexivity and critique. Let us view it as an open invitation to the pleasures and anxieties, to the threats and desires that reflexivity and critique can generate in their disturbing, annoying, painstaking, yetexciting call on history and, especially, on historians.

Effi Gazi

NOTES

1 Joan W. Scott, “History-writing as Critique”, in Keith Jenkins, Sue Morgan and Alun Munslow (eds),

Manifestos for History, London: Routledge, 2007, 19–38.

2 Michel Foucault, The Politics of Truth, ed. Sylvère Lotringer and Lysa Hochroth, New York: Semiotext(e),

1997, 25, 32.

3 Dipesh Chakrabarty, “History as Critique and Critique(s) of History”, Economic and Political Weekly, 14

September 1991, 2162–66.

4 See in particular Dominick La Capra, History in Transit: Experience, Identity, Critical Theory, Ithaca and

London: Cornell UP, 2004.

5 Judith Butler, “What is Critique? An Essay on Foucault’s Virtue”, in Sara Salih with Judith Butler (eds),

The Judith Butler Reader, Oxford: Blackwell, 2003, 302–22.

6 Reinhart Koselleck, Critique and Crisis: Enlightenment and the Pathogenesis of Modern Society, Cam-

bridge, MIT Press, 1988.

M A N A G I N G E D I T O R :Antonis Liakos

V O L U M E E D I T O R :Effi Gazi

E D I T O R I A L B O A R D :Athena Athanasiou | Panteion UniversityRika Benveniste | University of ThessalyAda Dialla | School of Fine Arts, AthensHaris Exertzoglou | University of the AegeanCostas Gaganakis | University of AthensEffi Gazi | University of PeloponnesePothiti Hantzaroula | University of the AegeanAngeliki Koufou | University of AthensVangelis Karamanolakis | University of AthensKostis Kornetis | Brown UniversityIoanna Laliotou | University of ThessalyDimitra Lambropoulou | EducationKaterina Papakonstantinou | Ionian UniversityYiannis Papatheodorou | University of IoanninaIoulia Pentazou | University of ThessalyDespoina Valatsou | University of AthensPolymeris Voglis | University of ThessalyYannis Yannitsiotis | University of the AegeanKostas Yannakopoulos | University of the Aegean

Book Review Editor AT H E N A SY R I A T O U

Language editor DA M I A N MA C CO N UL A D H (E N G L I S H) SE R V A N N E JO L L I V E T (F R E N C H)Cover Design DI M I T R I S ST E V I S

DTP NE F E L I P U B L I S H E R S

Publisher NEFELI PublishersAsklipiou 6, 106 80 Athens, Greeceinfo@nnet.gr

I S S N : 1 1 0 8 - 3 4 4 1

AN ANNUAL PUBLICATION OF THECultural and Intellectual History Society www.historein.grhistorein@historein.gr

2010

10

C O R R E S P O N D E N C E , C O N T R I B U T I O N S ,S U B S C R I P T I O N S , A D V E R T I S I N G :HistoreinNEFELI PublishersAsklipiou 6, 106 80 Athens, Greecetel.: +30 210 3639962historein@historein.gr

P R I C E :€15 (Greece), €23 (Europe and the rest of the world)

C O P Y R I G H T :All rights reserved. Permission to reprint must be obtained from the publisher.

N O T E S F O R C O N T R I B U T O R S A N D G E N E R A L G U I D E L I N E S :Articles and reviews submitted to Historein should be original contribu-tions and should not be under consideration for any other publication at the same time. Contributions should not exceed 7,500 words, including notes and references. Details of all authors’ institutional affiliations and full address, including email, for correspondence should be included on a separate cover sheet. Any acknowledgements should be included on the cover sheet, as well as a note of the exact length of the article. Historein welcomes contributions in English or French.

Historein strives to offer an efficient reviewing process. To facilitate this, electronic (email) submissions are preferred, in MS Word format. Arti-cles submitted for publication should be sent as an attachment to the editor at: historein@historein.gr

A detailed style sheet is available at:www.historein.gr/Info_en.htm

read historein online:www.nnet.gr/historein.htm

HISTOREIN IS A MEMBER OF THE EUROZINE NETWORK

www.euroz ine . com

T H E V O L U M E H A S B E E N P U B L I S H E D W I T H T H E F I N A N C I A L S U P P O R T O F T H E NA T I O N A L BA N K O F GR E E C E

2010

10

ιστορε

ινhistor

ein

www.nnet.gr

9 7 7 1 1 0 8 3 4 4 0 0 6

ISSN: 1108-3441

HISTORY between REFLEXIVITYand CRITIQUEChallenging Concepts and Themes

is now online:

2010NEFELI PUBLISHERS

10