Titel
Reconciling history with the nation? Historicity, national particularity, and the question of universals
Autor*in
Axel Schneider
Leiden University
Abstract
This article interprets the historiography of two modern Chinese historians, Fu Sinian and Chen Yinke, who both have been labeled the Chinese Ranke. Both historians have in recent years attracted a lot of attention in China, due to their prominent and very different concepts of national history.
In this article Axel Schneider brings out the characteristics of their ap- proaches to history by, first, situating modern historiography within the context of the philosophical crisis of modernity. By “modernity” he refers to the process of historicization and, hence, relativization of norms and values once con- ceived as timeless and universal. In Europe, this process has been characterized by a decline of metaphysical and theological assumptions on the structure of the world and a concomitant decline of traditional assertions of ontological and epistemological coherence. In China, this process challenged the inherited, very prominent status of traditional historiography as a core field for political and philosophical debates.
This article interprets the historiography of two modern Chinese historians, Fu Sinian and Chen Yinke, who both have been labeled the Chinese Ranke. Both historians have in recent years attracted a lot of attention in China, due to their prominent and very different concepts of national history.
In this article Axel Schneider brings out the characteristics of their ap- proaches to history by, first, situating modern historiography within the context of the philosophical crisis of modernity. By “modernity” he refers to the process of historicization and, hence, relativization of norms and values once con- ceived as timeless and universal. In Europe, this process has been characterized by a decline of metaphysical and theological assumptions on the structure of the world and a concomitant decline of traditional assertions of ontological and epistemological coherence. In China, this process challenged the inherited, very prominent status of traditional historiography as a core field for political and philosophical debates.
historicist, hermeneutic methodology. His research should aim at the “empathetic understanding” of the historical manifestations of the national spirit.
Although Chen never referred to Ranke, later historians claimed to know of such an influence. Chen’s position surely was closer to the hermeneutic Ranke who struggled with the problem of the relationship between the indi- vidual and the universal and who opposed any notion of teleological progress. However, while Ranke had lived in a Christian world still comparatively at peace with its theological assumption of a divine providence, Chen could not fall back on a Christian God for solace. He was – far more than Ranke – confronted with far-reaching changes, bringing about the rapid decline of his Confucian world.
Stichwort
Chinacrisis of modernityChinese historiographyhistoricityparticularityuniversalityRankeChen YinkeFu Sinian
Objekt-Typ
Sprache
Englisch [eng]
Persistent identifier
Erschienen in
Titel
Historiography East and West
Band
1
Ausgabe
1
Seitenanfang
117
Seitenende
136
Publication
Brill Academic Publishers
Erscheinungsdatum
2003
Zugänglichkeit
Rechte
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