历史思考的新途径：海登·怀特历史哲学研究

【作者】 韩炯；

【导师】 姜芃；

【作者基本信息】 中国社会科学院研究生院 ， 史学理论与史学史， 2010， 博士

【摘要】 本文主旨在于通过揭示海登·怀特叙事主义历史哲学思想的理论来源、理论内涵,以及其价值立场的多样性,阐明怀特开创的历史思考新方式——叙事主义历史哲学。论文以唯物史观“历史是关于现实的人与其历史发展的科学”为指导,结合怀特文本语境以及历史语境评析其理论得失。怀特重建历史知识价值标准的努力并不成功,它无法回避关于现实的人的历史发展规律这一根本问题。叙事主义历史哲学是怀特历史研究的理论表现形态。面对“亨普尔争论”带来的当代西方历史哲学中主张因果解释和主张历史理解的两派的对垒,深入反思究竟什么是“历史地思考”,解决“科学主义”与“人本主义”本体论的对立,成为怀特时代面临的理论难题。怀特运用语言哲学的最新成果,尤其是后结构主义的形式主义理论,在综合以柯林伍德为代表的分析主义历史哲学和以斯宾格勒为代表的思辨的历史哲学的基础上,提出从历史书写的角度来考察历史学家工作和历史学科的科学特性,由此建构了文本主义本体论为核心的叙事主义历史哲学。在怀特理论发展的不同阶段,怀特开创的历史思考方式呈现的面貌不同:即转义诠释模式、文本解读模式和叙事策略分析模式。这三类思考路径意义相近,本质上都是语言学(确切地说是语用学)的分析方式,但切入角度不尽相同。理论早期,怀特是从历史修辞(转义)的角度进行理论反思的。他基于19世纪思想史的实证研究认为,转义结构贯穿在一切历史作品和历史哲学作品之中。转义诠释取代因果解释和历史理解,实现了历史解释模式的转换。此间怀特将历史审美作为独立的维度纳入到历史思考当中,认为历史思考不可避免地体现出美学特征。历史学在怀特的理论视野中带有诗学的特征。随着研究的深入,怀特将转义模式应用于一切文化领域。历史被视为文化,他对历史学科特性的反思变成对于一切文化形式的批评,而其切入点或者说批评的理论工具就是文本。怀特对启蒙运动的批判充分显示出其理论的文本主义史学本体论。不过,怀特的文本主义也有别于极端的文本主义。怀特认为,一切历史都内在地包含某些叙事形式,对历史叙事策略的分析成为其历史思考方式的最高理论概括。历史叙事策略既表现为转义结构,又是对历史的文本再现。历史学的学科特性与历史的思维方式就表现为叙事性。文化批评理论被升华为叙事主义历史哲学。怀特开创的叙事主义历史哲学试图重建历史知识的价值标准。但其文本主义本体论决定了它在价值立场上的相对主义。而在特定事件的阐释上,怀特坚持一元论,二者构成了怀特理论的内在张力。这种张力推动怀特被迫回归到对于“现实的人及其历史发展”的思考。怀特理论研究实践存在着理论的连续性与断裂性,二者共同表明,历史本体论无法回避,历史真理不容回避。更多还原

【Abstract】 The theme of this dissertation is to illuminate the new way of historical thinking which is reflected in Hayden White. Based on the Marxism historical materialism, the dissertation elaborates the origins of Hayden White’s narrative philosophy of history, the implied meaning in his different theoretical phases and the varieties of his moral attitudes. The author tries to analyse and comment them according to the scholarship background as well as the context of text .In the end, the dissertation shows such a point that Hayden White’s attempt to reconstruct the criterion of historical knowledge is not successful, because he avoids the historical ontology, especially the law of the real human and the historical development.The narrative philosophy of history is the new theoretical pattern of history operated by White. Facing the dilemma of the philosophy of history since the Hemple’s argument, Hayden White tried to rethink the problem“what does the historical thinking mean”, and tried to solve the dichotomy between the scientific ontology and the humanism ontology. Using the creation of the linguistic philosophy, especially the theories of the formal structuralism, and melting the analytical philosophy of history and the speculation philosophy of history , Hayden White gives a point that the speciality of history should be thought according to the writing of historiography, and constructs the narrative philosophy of history, which focuses on the textual ontology.The new way of historical thinking appears as different forms in White’s academic developing course, that is the pattern of trope interpretation,the pattern of textual reading and the pattern of analyzing narrative strategy, the meaning of which is similar to one another but belongs to different categories.At the early period, Hayden White rethought the speciallity of history according to the rhetorics(tropes).He drew the conclusion that the structure of tropes is lying in the historical works as well as the works of the philosophy of history on the base of his positivist study. He changed the pattern of explaining history into the pattern of trope interpretation. During this period, White treated the historical aesthetics as the independent division of historical thinking. So the history becomes the poetics of history in the vision of Hayden White. With the studying further, White spread the pattern of tropes to the field of culture. History is thought as being cultural, and his rethinking became into criticizing all the cultural phenomena, and the weapon of theory criticizing is the textualist. The criticizing to the Enlightment movement shows the ontology of White’s theory belongs to the textualist. However, White’s textual position is different from that of the radical textualist. After engaged in studying the narrative, White discovered the narrative form inserted in historian’s thinking explicitly or implicitly. The strategy of historical narrative appears as the structure of tropes, and historical narrative is the representation of the past in the form of text. The speciality of history, that is the way of historical thinking, is the narrativity. At last, the theory of cultural criticizing is sublimated into the narrative philosophy of history.In the narrative philosophy of history, Hayden White attempts to reconstruct the criterion of historical knowledge. But the textualist ontology determinates its moral relativism. White also maintains the moral monism in elucidating the modernist event such as Slaughter, so that there are tensions between White’s two kinds of positions. The tensions force White to rethink the historical development of the real human, which he tries to avoid in his narrative philosophy of history.The practice of White’s researching on the new way of historical thinking shows that the ontology of the philosophy of history could not be avoided, and nor could the truth of history.更多还原