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Historical thinking has a politics that shapes its ends. While at least two generations of scholars have been guided into their working lives with this axiom as central to their profession, it is somewhat of a paradox that historiography is so often nowadays seen as a matter of intellectual choices operating outside the imperatives of quotidian politics, even if the higher realms of ideological inclinations or historiographical traditions can be seen to have played a role. The politics of historical thinking, if acknowledged at all, is seen to belong to the realms of nonprofessional ways of the instrumentalisation of the past.
This series seeks to centre the politics inherent in historical thinking, professional and non-professional, promoted by states, political organisations, 'nationalities' or interest groups, and to explore the links between political (re-)education, historiography and mobilisation or (sectarian?) identity formation. We hope to bring into focus the politics inherent in historical thinking, professional, public or amateur, across the world today.
Advisory Board:
Amar Baadj, American University Cairo
Berber Bevernage, University of Ghent
Federico Finchelstein, New School for Social Research, New York
Kavita Philip, University of British Columbia
Dhruv Raina, Jawaharlal Nehru University
Indra Sengupta, German Historical Institute, London
Jakob Tanner, University of Zurich
About the author
Jeffrey Andrew Barash, Université de Picardie Jules Verne, Amiens, France.
Summary
This book focuses on political presuppositions animating modern historical reflection in Germany that underwent sharp radicalization in the post-World War I context of the Weimar Republic. It is in this context that a novel polemical use of political concepts, nourished by radical forms of reflection on the historical character of human existence, brought to the fore interpretations of collective mentalities or group perspectives that crystallized in specific conceptions of “ideology” and of “political myth”. By centering analysis on the insight of a variety of twentieth-century thinkers whose works are of central importance for the elucidation of this topic, the author examines different interpretations of the role of reflection on human historicity in the elaboration of this novel polemical use of political concepts. Beyond an historical inquiry into this topic, this work aims to provide a theoretical investigation to elucidate the complex range of significations of the concepts of “ideology” and of “political myth”, the province of each of these concepts in the delineation of group perspectives, and the problematic legacy that the polemical use of these concepts has bequeathed to the contemporary world.
