Page 205 - Encyclopedia Of World History Vol IV

1506 berkshire encyclopedia of world history

narratives that legitimate certain ideals and gloss over addressed the topic. Nor is it clear that postmodernism
conflicting views and discontinuities. Traditionally that has been the major stimulus for the reduced scope of
has meant the adoption of a Eurocentric position: That new world histories and the currently lively discussion on
is, events and spaces are named, organized, and judged Eurocentrism.The rise of gender history and postcolonial
in line with European ideas and ideals. Framed thus, and world systems studies, as well as concerns about the
world histories convey the message that European civili- practicalities of world history education may also be
zation is the epitome of a modern civilization, that Euro- credited for these developments.
pean culture offers a model that other cultures should Writings on postmodernism and world history focus
and will aspire to emulate. In questioning the privileging in the main on metanarratives and the dissolution of
of a single view of the past—whether Eurocentric or any nations and historical agents. Attending to the latter, for
other “centric” view—postmodernists argue that all we instance, the psychologist Lewis Wurgaft has described
are left with are multiple and often contradictory per- the activity of writing national and world histories as a
spectives. That endpoint appears to be incompatible form of psychological projection intended to ensure
with the project of researching and writing world history, “narcissistic equilibrium” (Pomper, Elphick, and Vann
as that project demands the selection, arrangement, and 1998, 195).The historian Stephen Greenblatt has called
synthesis of historical experiences. for the creation of world histories in which cultural dif-
Adding to the challenge of postmodernism, poststruc- ference and homogenization oscillate and deny one
turalism questions whether world histories may be linked another mastery. Kerwin Lee Klein, also a historian, has
back to authors or even to a real historical world.As writ- taken a more critical stance, suggesting that Lyotard’s dis-
ers are shaped by the system of language they are born tinction between “master” and “small” narratives pre-
into, world histories should not be studied for their cre- serves the very antinomy of people with and without
ators’ intentions but for traces of that system through the history that postmodernism tries to escape. Jerry Bentley,
examination of other texts (intertextuality). Opinion is who edits the Journal of World History, has also been crit-
divided about what texts will be considered relevant in ical of postmodernism, arguing that the reduction of his-
studies of intertextuality: some writers focus on contem- tory to discrete micronarratives has led to a neglect of
porary works from the same genre, whereas others cast cross-cultural interaction. In response, he has posited a
their studies much wider, crossing spatial, temporal and large-scale empirical narrative from which themes like
genre boundaries. In the wake of the death of the author, population growth are inducted, not imposed. But Arif
as the literary critic Roland Barthes calls it, comes the Dirlik, a historian whose research focuses on China,
birth of the reader, who writes and rewrites meaning.This argues that Bentley’s inducted empirical themes are fash-
deconstruction is extended even further in the writings of ioned out of Western concepts of space and time, as seen
the philosopher Jacques Derrida, who denies that even for instance in the naming and division of the continents.
readers can be a source of meaning and who characterizes This is true of even the most inclusive new world histo-
the search for meaning as movement in a closed maze of ries. To Dirlik’s view, world histories are rhetorical con-
mirrors. In Derrida’s view, signifiers do not refer to phe- structions, and world historians have yet to grasp that
nomena outside of a system of language: They only refer due recognition of differences “may mean the end of his-
to other signifiers in an endless chain of signification. tory as we know it” (Stuchtey and Fuchs 2003, 133).
Extending Dirlik’s thinking, we should also note that
Responses to this encyclopedia is fashioned out of Western concepts
Postmodernism and conceptual arrangements. Recognizing this may
Given the radical implications of postmodernism for the mean the end of encyclopedias of world history, as well
field of world history, it is surprising that few writers have as world history itself. The opinion of postmodernist