Epistemology of History
It would probably be remiss of me to not mention my views about the
epistemology of historical truth, and my views about history in general. So,
I state my views in brief here.
- I do not believe that history can always be fully
reconstructed. What happened in the past often left different
impressions on different people, both contemporaneous and of
succeeding generations. On factual issues, this implies that
the traditions, myths, memories, and records may be
insufficient to get at the truth today. In addition, I believe
that the motivations behind actions are often multifarious, and
people are often conscious about social and political
implications when they speak about such things; such
pronouncements, even in the first person, therefore, teaches us
more about the views of the various sections of the
contemporary society than about the ‘true’ basis of
actions.
- I do not think that history can teach us to assign blame or
otherwise choose between various parties in current conflict:
this fits in with my general lack of belief in overarching good
and evil. People are driven by individual psychological needs,
and societies are, in addition, governed by mythic and
political factors; and it is of utmost necessity to realize
that these change over time, and to understand this complex
stratum that underlies societal change.
- I do not believe in the overarching force of tradition, race,
and religion on history. The little that I have understood
informs me that in many of the major conflicts, the armies of
the conquerors were not always composed of adherents of a
single religion, and at times even had a majority believing in
the religion of the conquered Political alliances have often
brought together disparate parties. Similarly, economic
motivations have often brought people of similar persuasion
into deadly conflict; and explanations purely in terms of group
identities often reflect only the situation when the
explanation was devised.
- Neither do I believe that economic factors explain all of
history. Every population has seen a vast majority of
disadvantaged section: and, often, their condition arises from
all of economic, educational, and political factors. But, it
is simplistic to portray all evolution as a monolithic class
struggle with unchanging characteristics in every age and
place. Religion, group identities, charismatic personalities,
education, mechanisms of information dissemination, and other
societal factors inform and channel the basic conflicts and
give them the structure observed as historical reality.
- Finally, I do not believe in strict determinism in history.
Though general universal trends are definable and have
broad-stroke explanatory power; the details, and, often
thereby, the choice between major streams occurs due to
contingencies.
Up to history of Bengal
