Hayden White

Hayden V. White ( born July 12, 1928 in Martin ( Tennessee) ) is an American historian and literary scholar. He was professor of the "History of Consciousness" at the University of California, Santa Cruz and of comparative literature at Stanford University. In Germany White was familiar with the book Metahistory, which caused quite a stir in the science of history. In addition, he cooperated with the German historian Reinhart Koselleck.

• 2.1 Papers

Theory

By White has the history for the first time analyzed by categories of literary theory, it comes to the merit of having initiated the debate about post-modern or post-structuralist approaches in the discipline of history. Critically it was therefore " the most then went undertaking ever Performed by a historian of his profession" accused.

His theory of poetics of history, he has worked in Metahistory, stating that any depiction of historical contexts poetological subject categories. Historiography, White says, is necessary narrative, even where she pretends to not be. This knowledge is condensed in its central thesis "Even Klio seals ".

Order in his presentation " a semblance of explanation " ( White ) to produce, the historian of three different strategies may avail himself, of which there are again four forms:

Narrative modeling ( Emplotment )

Use the narrative modeling equips the historian the story with a statement. According to Northrop Frye Hayden White distinguishes four narratives: romance, tragedy, comedy and satire.

Formal conclusions

Formativismus

The forma -tivist theory of truth (The formist theory of truth ) aims at identifying the unique properties of the objects in a historical field, explaining the historical field as such. The focus of the study is therefore the uniqueness of the actors, the plot and action that make the events and not the context in which they arise. The explanation of a historical field is completed when the existing items are fully identified ( in terms of their class, genus, the specific characteristics ascribed to them and them adhering labels). The articles are to White individuals as well as collectives, One like Universal, concrete things, as well as abstractions. Examples of the format tivist kind of explanation can be found in Herder, Carlyle, Michelet, in the romantic historians, including the great historical novelists such as Niebuhr, Mommsen and Trevelyan. The forma -tivist declaration form is, according to White rather a " scattering " ( dispersive ) as an integrating. They tend to lack precision in their concepts and tend to draw generalizations about the entire historical field, which are so broad that they could hardly be confirmed or refuted by empirical data.

Organicism

According to White, organicist world hypotheses are integrated, which means that their procedures aimed at the simplification of the facts. The Organizist sees individual events of the past as moments of a synthetic scene. He understands individual phenomena as components of larger processes, which in turn broken down into units. These units are to White each different nature than the sum of its parts. Historians who use a organicist narrative structure, condense a series of scattered elements to a large structure whose importance surpasses the individual items described. To White, the organicist presentation of history, especially the historians of the 19th century and recognizes this narrative structure, particularly with Leopold von Ranke, Theodor Mommsen, Heinrich von Treitschke, Heinrich von Sybel, Frederic William Maitland and William Stubbs. According to White, organicist historians are not so much interested in a description of individual elements, but at the characterization of the integration process as a whole. This historicist historiography tends to a teleology of history as a whole. She writes the course of history to a goal point to which all movements in the historical field. At the same time White identified under the organicist historians tend to avoid the search for historical laws. The Organizist prefer to talk about "principles" and " ideas " that characterize the historical individual case on the one hand and the development in its entirety on the other. These principles and ideas is to White at the Organicists the goal towards which moves towards the whole historical process of their opinion, mapped out.

Mechanism

Mechanistic assumptions about the world are integrative. You are reductive rather than for a for a synthetic way of looking. White mentioned extra-historical drivers of Kenneth Burke. This speaks of " actors " and " acts" in the historical field. The origin of this lies in the " scene " where is going on the said plot. The mechanistic explanation theory puts her attention to the " causal laws," which determines the results of the field discovered in the historical events. Historical objects are viewed as objects. The historical objects are in a part - part relationship and their specific configurations are directed by laws that regulate their exchange. Trailers for the mechanistic conceptions are Buckle, Taine or Marx, Tocqueville himself one of them. To the movement of history to get to the track they also write to explain in narrative form to their effects. Looking for regularities mechanistic tendency is threatened by the abstraction: Individual structures are less important to him as a phenomenon classes. And phenomenon classes in turn are less important than laws. In the mechanistic conception of history only laws are considered important if they are similar to the laws of physics and nature. These historical laws then you turn on data so that the configuration of the laws are understood as a function. Also, typing, which is used by Tocqueville, less important than historically significant laws. The advantage of the mechanistic conceptions is the conceptual precision. The major disadvantage, however, is too narrow viewing angle and the inclination to abstraction.

Contextualism

The presupposition of the contextualist declaration form is that events can be explained by situating them in context. Why are they so occurred and not otherwise, is explained by revealing the specific relationships to other events in their historical context at a given time within the examined historical field. The method, which is applied have called modern philosophers such as Walsh and Berlin " colligation " (link ). Here, the " threads" ( threads ) located, " which connect the tested individual or institution with the external socio-cultural, present '. " Detected in the historical field phenomena are integrated into sections ("relative integration "). The historic field is divided into districts of important events. They serve as the basis for the distinction of periods and epochs. Examples of this can be found at most historians, but especially in the 19th century, Burckhardt.

Ideological implications

Hayden White distinguishes four ideological concepts that influence the interpretation of history. These are:

This ideological positions have in common is that they refer to " reason, science and realism ", which they undertake to critical discourse with the other basic positions. All agree on the inevitability of social change, but differ on the desirability and the pace of the selfsame.

In order to work out the differences of ideologies and their influence on the writing of history Hayden White uses five different categories:

Even more fundamentally than this Erklärungsmodi the rhetorical figures (tropical ) that a presentation of history are ( as indeed any text ) underlie always:

Metaphor

The metaphor (literally transmission ) is used for much of history to represent objects representative. Phenomena are characterized by the production of an analogy or a comparison. As an example, White calls the phrase " my love, a rose ." The term love is here for the individual whose characteristics such as beauty, delicacy, tenderness are represented by the image or the symbol of the rose. Is a comparison of similar properties, and is not a perfect equivalence of two phenomena or reduction of the one to the other. The mistress is not set identical to the rose and not reduced to them.

Metonymy

The metonymy literally means change of name. In the metonymy is a part for the whole. An example would be the term " fifty sail" which stands for " fifty vessels". This makes it clear that metonymy is reductionist. The whole is reduced to its parts. The part - to-part relationships are perceived in metonymy. This makes it possible to transmit the status of an aspect or function to another. A distinction is made in the metonymy between the first parts, which are representative of the whole and 2 such that merely represent aspects. Another example would be " the rumble of thunder ." Here is divided into two phenomena: first, in the cause of "thunder" and secondly in the action " rumble ". It is a separation that sets the " thunder " in relation cause-effect reduction to the " rumble ". Also you can in metonymy an actor - action ratio distinction to make, for example, the "thunder" rumbles. Thus, in the metonymy of a division into actors and driving forces takes place. Thus, two systems are possible: doer and cause on the one hand and on the other acts and effect. It is characteristic of metonymy that the reduction between two orders is extrinsic.

Synecdoche

In contrast to metonymy synecdoche is intrinsic, where relationships between common qualities are interpreted. In the trope of synecdoche, the two parts are interpreted by integration as a whole. The quality is distinguished from the sum, " which are merely microcosmic reproduction of him." To explain the synecdoche, Hayden White uses the example "He's all heart ." The term "heart " must be (figuratively ) read figurative. This is not a body part is called, but a character trait symbolizes. It is a symbol of a property that is for the whole individual. This is a " microcosm - macrocosm relationship ". This is not a change in name is displayed as the metonymy, but certain characteristics such as generosity, compassion, etc.

Irony

Irony is referred to by White as a form of metaphor and is his opinion essentially negatorisches element. Metaphor, metonymy and synecdoche called White " naive tropics ", while the trope of irony is the " sentimental counterpart ". The basic mode of irony is the catachresis (literally " misuse "), an obviously absurd metaphor. This stylistic device is used to stimulate a reflection on the subject matter described metaphorically and to expose the inadequacy of the description itself. With the rhetorical figure of doubt the author of a ( historical ) text signaled according to White distrust of the truth of his own statements. The aim of the statement is ironic in his opinion in the negation of what was actually communicated literally.

By means of irony working authors of historical texts behave critically to White against " naive " formulations of the forma -tivist, mechanistic and organicist explanation strategies. Their textual form, the satire is contrary to the other types ( romance, comedy, tragedy).

Irony as a worldview tends to refute the belief in the chance positive political action.

These stylistic devices have different effects on the content of the presentations. " Irony, metonymy and synecdoche are forms of metaphor, but differ from each other in the way of reduction or integration, they produce at the level of literal meaning, and by what they want to highlight on a visual level, respectively. The metaphor is much more illustrative, metonymy reductionist, synecdoche integrative, the irony negatiorisch. "

Although White has worked out these categories on the basis of the relevant historians and philosophers of history of the 19th century, but he emphasizes their importance over time. The subspecies of these categories may be linked differently ( although some are mutually exclusive ); " Natural allies " are grouped as follows ( with the respective historians and philosophers, have the story as shown):

This rigid scheme has refined in later work white. " How White acknowledges in his later works, are precisely those texts most interesting - the classic -. , Which distinguishes an exciting interplay between different Tropics" ( Irmgard Wagner)

Works

• The Fiction of Narrative: Essays on History, Literature, and Theory, 1957-2007, hrg. by Robert Doran, Baltimore, Md. [ ua]: Johns Hopkins Univ. Press, 2010
• Figural Realism: Studies in the Mimesis Effect, Baltimore, Md. [ ua]: Johns Hopkins Univ. Press, 1999
• The Content of the Form: Narrative Discourse and Historical Representation, Baltimore [ ua]: Johns Hopkins Univ. Pr, 1987 German The meaning of the form, Frankfurt am Main: Fischer, 1990
• Tropics of Discourse: Essays in Cultural Criticism, Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1978. ger also Klio seals or the fiction of facts: Studies on tropology of histor. Discourse, Stuttgart: Klett Cotta 1991
• Metahistory: The Historical Imagination in Nineteenth Century Europe, Baltimore [ etc.]: Johns Hopkins UP, 1973, dt Metahistory: the historical imagination in nineteenth -century Europe, Frankfurt am Main: Fischer, 1991
• The Greco - Roman tradition
• The Ordeal of Liberal Humanism, Vol 2 of An Intellectual History of Europe ( with Willson H. Coates )
• The Emergence of Liberal Humanism, Vol 1 of An Intellectual History of Europe ( with Willson H. Coates ), New York: McGrew -Hill, 1966

Papers

• Hayden White: The Question of Narrative in Contemporary Historical Theory. In: Pietro Rossi ( ed.): Theory of modern historiography. Frankfurt am Main in 1987.