Berichte zur Wissenschaftsgeschichte, EarlyView.

Departing from Charles Taylors’s statement that philosophy is inescapably historical, the paper tries to examine several attempts to write the history of African philosophy. It notes that contrary to the experience of many other regional philosophies there is yet no comprehensive history of African philosophy which takes full account of its the different spectrums and periods. A good number of authors who have tried to recount the history of African philosophy have dwelt only on aspects or periods of that philosophy (...) thus precluding the advantage of presenting African philosophy as a coherent whole. An examination of the weakness and the strong points of some of these works leads to the assertion of the necessity of comprehensive history of African philosophy, as well as a weighing of the possible reasons why no serious attempt have been made in that direction. Writing such a work will be the last complement of the History of Africa. (shrink)

A participant in the Three Chapters controversy, the deacon Liberatus wants to revive resistance against the unacceptable movement of counciliar revisionism. In view of such an aim, his tale may seem to be confusing on the following points: geographical displacement, to the extent that Alexandria becomes the main place of his story; chronological distance, in order to stop his statement just before the explosion of the actual controversy. But this narratological approach allows him to take advantage of Tertullian’s praescriptio haereticorum (...) principle. Indeed, from Liberatus’ point of view, all that he writes about Nestorianism and Eutychianism is enough to demonstrate to the faithful that his opponents have no legitimacy in appealing to holy scriptures and tradition. (shrink)

The paper aims to disclosure of key points in the development of the German tradition of historiography of philosophy after the 90s of the 18th century. The starting point was the so-called «dispute about the method» of historiography, which erupted in the last decade of the 18th century not without the influence of Kant’s «critical philosophy». Its participants (Reinhold, Fülleborn, Goess, Grohmann, Tennemann, and others) put forward different theses, but they agreed that it is Kant’s philosophy that makes it possible (...) to create a «philosophical history of philosophy». A type of historiography was formed, which was based on the criterion of «progress of philosophy» and Kant’s position was considered as a standard for any historiography. Subsequently, other types of historiography were formed, which followed either the opposite criterion of «regress» or «decadence», or tried to combine both of these criteria (Hegel). In the second half of the 19th century «history of problems» becomes widespread as a principle of research and presentation of the history of philosophy, its main representatives were W. Windelband, N. Hartmann, H. Heimsoeth. Instead, in the second half of the 20th century the dominant type of historiography is the «history of concepts», which finds linguistic and philosophical justification in Gadamer’s philosophical hermeneutics. In recent decades, the German tradition of historiography has been enriched by K. Flasсh’s project «historical philosophy» and by D. Henrich program «constellation research». In both of these projects, there is a noticeable attraction to microhistory, going beyond the «classic» texts, discovering hitherto unknown figures and sources that significantly expand the established practice of the historiography of philosophy. (shrink)

Marxist Historiographies is the first book to examine the ebb and flow of Marxist historiography from a global and cross-cultural perspective. Since the eighteenth century, few schools of historical thought have exerted a more lasting impact than Marxism, and this impact extends far beyond the Western world within which it is most commonly analysed. Edited by two highly respected authors in the field and taking a truly global perspective on this topic, Marxist Historiographies demonstrates clearly the breadth and depth of (...) Marxism's influence in historical writing throughout the world and is essential reading for all students of historiography. (shrink)

Zagorin presents a critique of F. R. Ankersmit's postmodernist philosophy of history as fallacious and opposed to some of the fundamental convictions and intuitions historians feel about their discipline. It questions Ankersmit's conclusion that the overproduction of historical writings and continuing generation of new interpretations has obliterated the past as an object of knowledge. It argues that Ankersmit's attempt, in accord with Hayden White, to aestheticize historiography and regard it as a linguistic construction indistinguishable from literature, must sever it from (...) its necessary grounding in reality and truth. It also rejects as groundless Ankersmit's claim to have deconstructed causality, and concludes that the postmodernist conception trivializes historiography and deprives it of its essential function in education and culture. (shrink)

Organized thematically, this important five-volume set brings together key essays from the field of historical studies. Including an extensive general introduction by the editor in the first volume, as well as shorter individual introductions in each of the following volumes, this set is essential reading for scholars and students alike. Coverage includes: 1. Foundations - The Classic Tradition - The Old Cultural History - Economic History 2: Society - Social History - Marxism - Annales - History of Mentalities 3: Ideas (...) - History of Ideas/ Intellectual History - History of Science - History of the Arts - History of Religion - History of Sexuality. 4: Culture - History and Anthropology - Microhistory - New Cultural History - History and Memory - The Poetics of History - Narrativity. Postmodernist Historiography and its Critics 5: Politics - Political History - Imperialism and Postcolonial History - World History - World-Systems Analysis. (shrink)

The essays in this collection explore both how the employment of nation-state dominated discourses have caused a re-imagination of the past, and how the past has been re-constructed to accord with nationalist agendas. Although other works have considered in general terms how nations are imagined, this collection takes a different stance and specifically focuses on how 'the past' is used in such imaginations. This collection was conceived in an interdisciplinary spirit, drawing insights from art history, intellectual history, literature, archaeology, heritage (...) studies, political science, and film studies. The authors combine a sophisticated theoretical approach with illuminative case studies from all across the globe, including the Balkans, South Africa, Rwanda, the Yemen, Italy, Turkey, Greece, and Uzbekistan. (shrink)

In the article, the author substantiates the thesis that the study of the historiography of early Neo-Thomism is extremely important for research on the history of its Ukrainian branch and, accordingly, the creation of its Ukrainian historiography. Early Neotomism is a significant stage in the development of Neotomism. Under its influence, Ukrainian neo-Thomists Andrei Sheptytsky, J. Slipyj, and M. Konrad formed their views. Its study is an important part of the historiography of Ukrainian Neo-Thomism. The study of early Neo-Thomism helps (...) not only to objectively assess the views of Ukrainian Neo-Thomists, but also to distinguish the views of thinkers who do not belong to it, as in the case of H. Kostelnyk. The historiography of the issue includes not only the works of Ukrainian thinkers and studies devoted to their views, but also the sources of Neotomism, the works of foreign Neotomists, and studies that help to reconstruct the inherent context of the ideas of the representatives of the movement in Ukraine. The most important of these types of works are the encyclicals of the Popes and documents of the Church, the works of Neo-Thomist philosophers, and the achievements of researchers of this period. They help to recreate the context and clarify the features of early Neo-Thomism. The main one is objective idealism, which is used to criticise subjectivism in philosophy. The next feature is the reference not directly to the works of Thomas Aquinas, but to the encyclicals of the Popes, Church documents, and the works of famous Neo-Thomists. Thus, the absence of direct references to St Thomas is not a reason to think that a thinker cannot be a Neotomist. The study of early Neo-Thomism is an important part of the historiography of Ukrainian Neo-Thomism. His research will make it possible not only to objectively assess the views of Ukrainian neo-Thomists, but also to distinguish the views of thinkers who do not belong to it. As a result, it can be argued that the study of the historiography of early neo-Thomism is extremely important for research on the history of its Ukrainian branch and, accordingly, for the creation of the historiography of the issue. (shrink)

This book presents a series of case studies and reflections on the historiographical assumptions, methods, and approaches that shape the way in which philosophers construct their own past. The chapters in the volume advance discussion of the methods of historians of philosophy, while at the same time illustrating the various ways in which philosophical canons come into existence, debunking the myth of analytical philosophy's ahistoricism, and providing a deeper understanding of the roles historiographical devices play in philosophical thought. More importantly, (...) the contributors attempt to understand history of philosophy in connection with other historical and historiographical approaches: contributors engage classical history of science, sociology of knowledge, history of psychology and historiography, in dialogue with historiographical practices in philosophy more narrowly construed. Additionally, select chapters adopt a more diverse perspective, by making place for non-Western approaches and for efforts to construe new philosophical narratives that do justice to the voice of women across the centuries. Historiography and the Formation of Philosophical Canons will be of interest to researchers and advanced students working in history of philosophy, meta-philosophy, philosophy of history, historiography, intellectual history, and sociology of knowledge. (shrink)

One of the traditional subjects of discussion among historians of philosophy is the question of the status of the history of philosophy as well as a discipline, as well as the tasks, possibilities, and limitations of some approaches and genres of the historiography of philosophy. The article focuses on the analysis of the contribution to these discussions of studies in the historiography of philosophy, which began in Francophone philosophy in the 1970s with the publication of the studies of L. Braun (...) and M. Gueroult, in particular, the answers to the mentioned questions, proposed within the framework of these studies. The starting point of the article is the historical scheme of the attitude of philosophers to the past of philosophy, proposed by Y. Lafrance, which makes it possible to determine the place of the history of philosophy as a discipline in philosophical activity and to study the historiography of philosophy as an element of such activity. In this article, three research projects of the historiography of philosophy were analyzed – the «history of the history of philosophy» by L. Braun, the studies in the doxography by A. Laks and M. Frede, the social history of the historiography of philosophy by C. König-Pralong. Based on the analysis of the mentioned projects, the article support the conclusion that the history of philosophy cannot be considered either only as a historical or only as a philosophical discipline, and also that a historian of philosophy cannot investigate a subject without simultaneously constructing it on the basis of historical data, which always remain outside the historiographic construction. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: Some Basic Definitions Historiography and Myth in Ancient Greece Mythical Historiography in Antiquity Myth vs. Historiography References.

As historians of science increasingly turn to work on recent (post 1945) science, the historiographical and methodological problems associated with the history of contemporary science are debated with growing frequency and urgency. This book brings together authorities on the history, historiography and methodology of recent and contemporary science to review the problems facing historians of contemporary science, technology and medicine and to explore new ways forward. The chapters explore topics which will be of ever increasing interest to historians of postwar (...) science, including the difficulties of accessing and using secret archival material, the interactions between archivists, historians and scientists and the politics of evidence and historical accounts. (shrink)

Drawing on recent publications on studies in historiography of philosophy in French-, English-, and German-speaking philosophy, the author clarifies the subject matter and tasks of studies in historiography of philosophy as a historico-philosophical approach, in particular, counting among such subjects the images of philosophy's past constructed by histories of philosophy, as well as the historiographical attitudes of historians of philosophy and the contexts and factors that determine these historiographical attitudes. The article analyses the conceptions and implementations of three projects of (...) studies in historiography of philosophy that have taken place in Ukraine in recent decades: the project of “History of Historico-philosophical Science”, led by Yu. Kushakov in the 1980s and 2000s and dedicated to the study of historico-philosophical conceptions of German and Russian philosophers of the 19th and early 20th; S. Rudenko's study of post-Soviet methodological approaches to the history of Ukrainian philosophy (2012); and the Ukrainian part of the bilateral project “Philosophy in the system of national culture: comparative analysis of historico-philosophical studies in Belarus and Ukraine” (2011-2012), led by V. Yevarousky and S. Yosypenko. Based on the results of the latter project and on his more recent research, the author outlines the socio-political, general philosophical and institutional context in which the historiography of Ukrainian philosophy was formed and functioned during the 20th century; analyses the images of the history of Ukrainian philosophy created by D. Tschižewskij and V. Horskyi, which embody two extreme points in the development of the historiography of Ukrainian philosophy in the 20th century; and points out the changes in the general philosophical and institutional context of historico-philosophical research in independent Ukraine and the consequences of these changes for the further development of the historiography of Ukrainian philosophy. (shrink)

A broad perspective on historical thought and writing, with a new epilogue.

Stuttgart‐Bad Cannstatt: frommann‐holzboog 2012. VIII, 458 S., 63 Abb., geb., € 148,00. ISBN 978‐3‐7728‐2568‐2.

Marxist historiography has always claimed to be "conceptually" rooted in the natural sciences and has therefore been concerned with the function of laws, the structure of theories, and the logical relations between hypotheses and empirical data. Minimal criteria for the identification of a scientific research program as developed by Lakatos and Laudan include: a negative heuristic; explanatory or predictable scientific theories; a central model or paradigm; identification and solution of internal problems; self-conscious awareness by researchers of a common tradition; and (...) the internal dynamics of conflict and convergence. Less than a generation ago, Marxist scholarship seemed to offer the most innovative methodologies in history. More recently, however, Marxist scholarship seems to be reliving old glories while other approaches have advanced more innovative research programs. (shrink)

This chapter addresses major tendencies in the history of academic French historiographies of philosophy, from the establishment of history of philosophy as a university discipline in the early nineteenth century to feminist critiques of the philosophical canon in the twentieth century. Focusing on the ways in which the philosophical character of the history of philosophy has been conceptualised, it argues that the history of the historiography of philosophy in France is marked in two ways by the intellectual legacy of Victor (...) Cousin. At the level of canon-formation, this history has involved continuity and reproduction of those authors and texts which Cousin regarded as central to the history of philosophy. At the level of theoretical accounts of the relation between the practice and the past of philosophy, this history has involved discontinuity and the contestation of the spiritualist eclectic framework within which Cousin himself accounted for this relation. With feminist historiographies of philosophy, the theory-constitutive function of the canon itself comes into question, thus opening a new field of inquiry as to what should be counted as properly ‘philosophical’. (shrink)

This paper examines the historiography of the Front de Liberation Quebecois within the context of three frameworks, each used to devaluate the FLQ, the idea of separation, its potential support and most importantly, the perspectives of historians who oppose these frameworks. Through an examination of the literature, the FLQ are framed as an attack on British liberalism, an attack on Canadian Unity, or violent in a political climate where such actions were unjustifiable. These understandings work cooperatively together to de-legitimize alternative (...) views on FLQ history, and Quebec independence. I will examine also the benefits in studying the FLQ outside of the tensions of separation and the potential for future study in the history of the FLQ. (shrink)

Historiography in a metaphysical mode Content Type Journal Article Pages 1-17 DOI 10.1007/s11016-011-9524-6 Authors Bernadette Bensaude-Vincent, CETCOPRA/Université Paris 1-Panthéon-Sorbonne, 17 Rue de la Sorbonne, 75231 Paris Cedex05, France Jan Golinski, Department of History, University of New Hampshire, 20 Academic Way, Durham, NH 03824, USA Lissa L. Roberts, Department of Science, Technology and Policy Studies (STePS), University of Twente, Postbox 217, 7500 AE Enschede, The Netherlands John McEvoy, Department of Philosophy, University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, OH 45221, USA Journal Metascience Online ISSN (...) 1467-9981 Print ISSN 0815-0796. (shrink)

Modern Historiography is the essential introduction to the history of historical writing. It explains the broad philosophical background to the different historians and historical schools of the modern era, from James Boswell and Thomas Carlyle through to Lucien Febure and Eric Hobsbawm and surveys: the Enlightenment and Counter Enlightenment Romanticism the voice of Science and the process of secularization within Western intellectual thought the influence of, and broadening contact with, the New World the Annales school in France Postmodernism. Modern Historiography (...) provides a clear and concise account of this modern period of historical writing. (shrink)

By way of essays and a selection of primary sources in parallel text, Biography, Historiography, and Modes of Philosophizing provides an introduction to a vast, significant, but neglected corpus of early modern literature: collective biography. It focuses especially on the various related strands of political, philosophical, and intellectual and cultural biography as well as on the intersection between biography, historiography, and philosophy. Individual texts from the fifteenth to the eighteenth century are presented as examples of how the ancient collective biographical (...) tradition--as represented above all by Plutarch, Suetonius, Diogenes Laertius, and Jerome--was received and transformed in the Renaissance and beyond in accordance with the needs of humanism, religious controversy, politics, and the development of modern philosophy and science"--Provided by publisehr. (shrink)

Contacts between Polish historians, French historians and French centers of historiography – espcially with the prestigious milieu of Fernand Braudel's Annales – were unusual and extraordinary in comparison with other forms of scientific cooperation with foreign countries: both with the West and the “friendly countries.” Because of the undeniable uniqueness of these relations many scholars from various countries claim that the annalistic methodology “influnced” Polish historiography. What is characteristic, however, is that these statements are most often completely a priori. This (...) paper is a reflection on the nature of the methodological influence of one historical school on the other and discusses such a possibility, taking into consideration models of circulation of ideas proposed by Pierre Bourdieu and Jerzy Maternicki. It is also an attempt at answering whether historical sciences are able to freely interfere on a supra-national level or whether they are by nature characterized by provincialism, understood here as a limitation to national frameworks outside of which they cannot be understood. (shrink)

The narrativist insight -- From analytic philosophy of history to narrativism -- Three tenets of narrativist philosophy of historiography -- Representationalism and non-representationalism -- Reasoning in historiography -- Colligation -- Underdetermination and epistemic values -- From truth to warranted assertion -- The tri-partite theory of justification in historiography -- Historiography between objectivism and subjectivism -- Postnarrativist philosophy of historiography.

RÉSUMÉ: La pragmatique et la sémantique de l’historiographie révèlent une fragmentation croissante qui s’étend par-delà les écoles jusqu’aux historiens individuels. Alors que les scientifiques normalisent les données pour qu’elles s’ajustent aux théories, les historiens interprètent leurs théories, de manières incompatibles entre elles, pour qu’elles s’ajustent aux différents cas historiques. Les difficultés qui en découlent dans la communication historiographique remettent en cause les philosophies herméneutiques de l’historiographie et redonnent un nouvel intérêt à la question d’une historiographie scientifique. Mais (...) les réponses existantes sont philosophiquement obsolètes. Une façon de reformuler le problème est de partir de la complexité du chaos et de l’unicité de l’histoire. Seule la science peut évaluer si les propriétés d’un domaine donné en interdisent une approche scientifique. Or la science s’étend par réductions méthodologiques explicatives, en ramenant des propriétés d’événements complexes, chaotiques et uniques, qui sont familières, mais d’un niveau plus élevé, à des propriétés ou interrelations non familières et d’un niveau moins élevé. La culture disciplinaire de l’historiographie, cependant, empêche le développement par essais et erreurs de telles tentatives de réductions scientifiques, qui seules permettraient d’évaluer les possibilités d’une historiographie scientifique, laquelle, dans la situation présente, relève de la science-fiction. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: Theory and Method in Historiography: Some Preliminary Distinctions A Short History of the Historiographic Method Critical Method and Its Discontents The Comparative Method as the “Royal Road” to Scientific Historiography? Bibliography.

_ Source: _Page Count 24 This article has three main interconnected aims. First, I illustrate the historiographical conceptions of three early analytic philosophers: Frege, Russell and Wittgenstein. Second, I consider some of the historiographical debates that have been generated by the recent historical turn in analytic philosophy, looking at the work of Scott Soames and Hans-Johann Glock, in particular. Third, I discuss Arthur Danto’s _Analytic Philosophy of History_, published 50 years ago, and argue for a reinvigorated analytic philosophy of history.

Paradigms of historiography of philosophy in India have being changed since late 19th c. till present, depending on the social and cultural context of the history of Indian philosophy as a part of contemporary Indian culture. This change manifests itself in the conceptions of Indian historians concerning the teaching of Buddhist Mahāyāna school of Yogācāra (4th c. and later). Historians of colonial times, basing themselves on the philosophy of Neovedаntism (S. Radhakrishnan, S. Dasgupta), regarded Buddhism as a derivate of late (...) Vedic culture and Yogācāra as a teaching that reflected - though in an essentially transmuted form - the ideology of Upaniṣads. The latter, according to Neovedantists, was based on the postulate of the existence of the single cosmic soul - Brahman, the true human Self (Ātman) being identical to it. Historians of the late colonial and early postcolonial times (P.T. Raju, D.P. Chattopadhyaya, A.K. Chatterjee, partly also S. Dasgupta) brought Yogācāra closer to the teachings of European idealism, mainly to conceptions of G. Berkeley, G.W.F. Hegel, F. Bradley, J.E. McTaggart, trying to demonstrate a principal identity of fundamental problems in Indian and Western philosophy. At the same time, they brought Yogācāra together with the teaching of Brāhmaṇic school, Advaita Vedānta, regarded as another form of Indian idealism. In later times, following the evolution of contemporary Indian culture and changings in its social and political context, historians like D.J. Kalupahana became to analyze Yogācāra as a kind of philosophy of mind. All these facts show the dependence of strategies of historico-philosophical studies in India on its social, political and cultural context: in the Yogācāra teaching mainly those aspects call attention that a historian sees as the closest to the problematic field of contemporary philosophy. (shrink)

The quest by Spaniards for the meaning of the history of Spain and Spanish history itself has been influenced, oversimplified, and distorted by the power of certain myths. The central myth of Spanish historiography, that of "one, eternal Spain," grew out of an earlier idea that Spanish history is the history of a crusade in which the favored Catholic religion struggled with and triumphed over its rivals. Historiographers subscribing to this notion have reacted violently and even hysterically to the thought (...) that the interaction of Christians, Muslims, and Jews is a main key to Spanish history. They have been influenced by the apparent success of Franco, who represented the centralizing tradition of Castile. Now Spain's greatest problem is the linguistic and regional separatist movements, and the failure to deal with them in time is at least in part owing to the refusal to recognize this too total concentration on Castile and its saving, "unifying" mission. (shrink)

This reply aims both to respond to Gregory and to move forward the debate about God’s place in historiography. The first section is devoted to the nature of science and God. Whereas Gregory thinks science is based on metaphysical naturalism with a methodological corollary of critical-realist empiricism, I see critical, empiricist methodology as basic, and naturalism as a consequence. Gregory’s exposition of his apophatic theology, in which univocity is eschewed, illustrates the fissure between religious and scientific worldviews—no matter which basic (...) scientific theory one subscribes to. The second section is allotted to miracles. As I do, Gregory thinks no miracle occurred on Fox Lakes in 1652, but he restricts himself to understanding the actors and explaining change over time, and refuses to explain past or contemporary actions and events. Marc Bloch, in his book The Royal Touch: Sacred Monarchy and Scrofula in England and France, is willing to go much further than Gregory. Using his superior medical knowledge to substitute his own explanation of the phenomenon for that of the actors, Bloch dismisses the actors’ beliefs that they or others had been miraculously cured, and explains that they believed they saw miraculous healing because they were expecting to see it. In the third section, on historical explanation, I rephrase the question whether historians can accommodate both believers in God and naturalist scientists, asking whether God, acting miraculously or not, can be part of the ideal explanatory text. I reply in the negative, and explicate how the concept of a plural subject suggests how scientists can also be believers. This approach may be compatible with two options presented by Peter Lipton for resolving the tension between religion and science. The first is to see the truth claims of religious texts as untranslatable into scientific language ; the other is to immerse oneself in religious texts by accepting them as a guide but not believing in their truth claims when these contradict science. (shrink)