on history, i like your notion of a chain that we try to understand, and break.
i think historians have a weakness, which is to read the past teleologically, as if there were a clear cause effect. so for years, and still i suppose, the rwandan genocide was presented as a consequence of the history of hutu-tutsi relations, as though they inevitably let to the conflicts, and ultimately, the genocide. (and thus, the hutus and tutsis couldn't help hating each other and massacring each other.)
the journalists, whose knowledge of history usually was very thin, maybe a few decades max, tended to read the events in terms of the immediate circumstances. (and their explanations wound up stating, "and thus the hutus and tutsis couldn't help hating each other and massacring each other).
this is the same story that was told about the bosnians--"eternal conflict," more or less portraying the antagonists in the conflict as not being able to help hating each other.... in which case, it would be pointless to intervene.
finally, the political scientists pushed to explain the genocide due to the convergence of contemporary pressures.
very few like mamdani dared to claim that the hutus actually had a political agenda, rather than blind passion, that drove their decisions. and very few, like pottier in Re-imagining Rwanda, were able to make meaningful distinctions between tutsis who had left the country in the 19th c, the early 20th c, the middle 20th c, etc, all of which bore on the actual motives and actions of the people.
i agree we need to understand the historical complex in order to understand the current events; i also agree we need to understand current pressures, etc. But because the past and present pressures are multiple, and the further back one goes, the more pluralistic are the pressures, the more i resist determinism in historical explanations. we can understand some of the factors, today and yesterday, that account for a given situation, but can we say, THIS is why it happened, and if we do THAT it won't happen again? Never again?
the narratives we construct, in order to understand why something happened, change. just look at how africa was excluded from historical narratives written by europeans in the past. and the ones to be written tomorrow will also be different.
i agree with you that we have to view ourselves as having agency, not to be condemned to processes we don't understand, and thus we have to try to understand them; that's what i like about the chain metaphor.
i would go one step further, however; which is to imagine the chain as a simulacrum, not an actual causal set of links. we attempt to understand it not because we would then be able to control our fate, but because the narratives we construct about the past will determine the kind of future we create.
i think that is derrida's point about the archive; that in the construction of the archive what is at stake is not the past, but the future.
ken
On 4/5/11 7:26 AM, Jaye Gaskia wrote:
--Dear Ken,I am thinking that social processes will always develop their own dynamics, and that if it is possible after the event, to determine to some degree, the causal relationships embedded in a process; it should be possible to prevent similar situations happening in the future, if certain steps and not others are taken. It would never be perfect, but it is possible to move towards such a goal.I think that a rigorous consideration of the history of every situation is important, but if we view history as a chain, it ought to be possible to break the chain at some point. Otherwise we would be condemned to destruction.On violenve, i think that when those who control state power deploy violence against those who oppose them, and when those who oppose them represent the majority of the people in actual fact, then it is only a matter of time before state violence is met with the violence of those resisting the state. It will occur as a result of two primary impulses and reasons; as a response to defend the uprising against brutal repression; and as a response to promote the offensive thrust of the uprising.It would be good indeed if all oppressors can simply step aside from history when they are challenged by those whom they exploit and surpress. However, this is not what happens in reality.How do we proceed from here?Warm Regards,Jaye
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-- kenneth w. harrow distinguished professor of english michigan state university department of english east lansing, mi 48824-1036 ph. 517 803 8839 harrow@msu.edu
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