Herman Paul

Herman Paul offers a thematic introduction to the theory and philosophy of history. In his own words, he addresses undergraduates: “It does not aim to cover everything historical theorists find worth discussing. It merely hopes to arouse readers' interest, to stimulate them to reflect on the ways in which human beings relate to their pasts and to provide them with some intellectual tools for doing so.”
But to be honest, this nevertheless is a tough piece of work. Paul does his best to make the material palatable, but the final effect is that this is a very encyclopaedic overview of very different views on history itself, and on historical research.
This is the translation of an originally Dutch-language book (Als het Past Trekt), albeit slightly edited. Paul has condensed the text and adapted some examples to an English-speaking audience.
More in my History account on Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2614854947… (plus d'informations)

So much has been written about Hayden White and his linguistic turn, what else is there to add?, you can think. The great merit of this intellectual biography is that it shows very well the evolution in White's thinking, and therefore also that he stands for a lot more than just the "linguistic turn" or the tropology of his magnum opus "Metahistory" (1973 ). Herman Paul is trying to rehabilitate White against the already several decades of attacks on his narrativism and relativism. He shows that White did not make any statement about the narrativistic structure of reality (like followers like Mink or Ankersmit did), he did not intend to make any metaphysical or even epistemological statements at all. According to Paul, White only wanted to expose that each story gives an incomplete construction of reality and depends upon certain formal requirements, which he summarized in his famous 'tetralogy of the tropics'. At the same time, Paul admits that there is a fair amount of inconsistency in White's thinking, that he sometimes went too far in his fierce polemics, and occasionally gave in to adventures (his flirtation with structuralism, for example), which he had to review afterwards. In short this book certainly is a kind of apology, with inherent sympathy for the research topic, but also some critical distance.… (plus d'informations)

Dit werk is een goede aanvulling op oudere overzichten van de geschiedfilosofie (van Van der Dussen en Von der Dunk). Die boden vooral een overzicht van de diverse stromingen in de 19de en 20ste eeuw, en draaiden meestal om klassieke vraagstukken als dat van de causaliteit, de vraag of de geschiedenis gedetermineerd was of niet, of de geschiedkunde een wetenschap was of niet, of er sprake was van geschiedkundige wetten enz. Herman Paul zoemt vooral in op de “narrative turn”, de postmodernistische wending in de geschiedwetenschap die vooral door de Amerikaan Hayden White gestalte werd gegeven, en die de waarheids- en objectiviteitsvraag ontwijkt door te stellen dat elke geschiedschrijving een constructie is. Gelukkig denkt Paul die aanpak consequent door, zodat hij de postmodernistische valkuil van het relativisme weet te vermijden en toch uitkomt bij (relatieve) grondvesten die een historisch metier mogelijk en zinvol maken.… (plus d'informations)