Historians as Engaged Intellectuals: historical
writing and social criticism
The first open conference of the ICTCH
(International Commission on the History and Theory of Historiography) will be
held at the Institute for the History of Social Movements, Ruhr-University
Bochum, 19 – 21 September 2013.
In the twentieth century Marxist historiography
went furthest in demanding from scholars partisanship for the poor and the
oppressed in society. Historians were neither to be antiquarians nor chase the
illusions of objectivity postulated by European historism. Whilst in Communist
countries, the ruling Communist Parties disallowed any deviations from the
historical interpretations it prescribed, in non-Communist countries Marxist
scholars belonged to the most engaged intellectuals writing history as an
intervention into social and political debates. The influence of 1968 and the
anti-colonial struggle on historiography ensured that the idea of the historian
as an engaged intellectual became widespread across the globe. However, by the 1980s,
this idea had run into difficulties, as the Marxist project seemed to run out
of steam. Nevertheless, social protest has not gone away. After all, the 1980s
witnessed massive peace and ecological movements as well as the social protest
against Communist dictatorships, which all found considerable interest among
historians, and more recently we have seen, with movements such as Attac or
Occupy, that some scholars are involved in transmitting
concepts and categories from the realm of their studies to the movements
themselves, whilst, at the same time, making the movements case studies in
their disciplines. Today,
with Communism gone and Western liberalism far from triumphant, it may be time
to revisit the relationship between historical scholarship and societal
engagement. Should historians intervene in the social and political debates of
contemporary societies? How have they done so in the past? For what causes did
historians write and with which effects? Did they participate in social
movements and, at the same time, make social movements the objects of their
studies? Feminism, poststructuralism and postcolonialism all deeply influenced
historical writing after the 1970s – to what extent did they promote the
emergence of engaged intellectuals among historians?
Latin American
historians dealing with traumatic memories by the dictatorships and tortures,
the experience and the thinking of historians on the Commissions of Truth and
Reconciliation in South Africa and other countries, the experience of engaged
historians in the Muslim countries under the threat of Islamic Law and of
course the anti- and post-colonial experience
We invite submissions of papers which reflect
on past and present attempts to write history from the perspective of societal
interventions, including papers which do so with reference to
the
theory of history
the
history of historical studies
popular
history
history
and memory
Please send an abstract of no more than 150
words to Stefan Berger by 30 December 2012. All those who have proposed papers
will be notified by email as to whether their paper has been accepted by 27
February 2013.
The Berendel Foundation has kindly provided limited
financial assistance to junior scholars without institutional affiliation, and
scholars from poorer countries. If your participation is contingent upon
receipt of financial support, please include details of why such support is
needed along with your abstract.
http://www.historiographyinternational.org/
ICHTH is going to organize an open conference on “Historians as Engaged Intellectuals: Historical Writing and Social Criticism” at Ruhr University-Bochum, Sept. 19-21, 2013. Any ICHTH members interested in presenting their papers at the conference could submit a 150 words abstract to Professor Stefan Berger [stefan.berger@rub.de] by Dec. 30, 2012.
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