Justification for a new historicism

In olden days, the historian specialized in knowledge and access. He knew languages through years of study, carried multi-stamped passports with him as so many badges of honor, thumbed through moldy manuscripts untouched for hundreds of years...and, at last, he constructed an account of what happened.

The internet takes such a figure and transmutes him into a fool. Language is easy. Sources are available. What happened is a matter of public debate, not of private authority. What is left to the historian is an interpretive patchwork. No longer does access to rare stones draw readers to a work; rather, the method of arranging common materials is what the art must be redefined to be.

Forced to artistry, the historian is left looking backwards for guidance as to how history should be written. What was often an idle question to predecessors becomes the foundation stone of future study, and the old question of historicism takes on a new meaning.

Regardless of whether or not the study of history allows for accurate projections about the future, the manner in which history is interpreted and understood surely is used to influence thought and policy. But historians are no longer the gatekeepers to historical sources and the histories they tell, and it is unclear if the writers of histories should still be considered historians. Historians are not only authors of histories, but experts in the interpretation of historical sources. History as an academic subject must change accordingly: from the study of what has happened to the study of what has been interpreted to have occurred.

Of the aims which are at the same time duties

In an effort to improve my output, I've embraced a radical philosophy: naps are vital to our survival. "You adjust your life's schedule because the internet told you to?" Yes.

Emphatically.

Technological or chemical, the future is built for experimentation. But society continues to enforce chemical stasis with banal conversation. Imagine dinner parties enhanced with tactical readouts of mother-in-law number four's capacity to deal deadly destruction, with discretion. Delightful? Doubtful.

Besides, being an American, I take comfort in the knowledge that somewhere, at this very moment, the next generation is training to protect me from whatever perils my archaic mind will be unable to face.

Eight year olds with machine guns, blowing shit up.

Who loves ya?

Edited 6/27/2008 8:17 A.M. CST

Wherein I vastly oversimplify complex economic debates, much to your consternation

Here's a quite useful paper explaining a lot of current thought on international capital. Joy! Groan and click away if you can, but I've got a hook for you: this post is about rich people.

Intrigued? You bet your ass you are! Apparently arguments for free trade are dying because "the poor have not been borrowing from the rich to finance their investment and industrialization, instead the rich have on net been borrowing from the poor to finance their own consumption".

Wow. Who could've seen that one coming?

Fact: Rich people are scared of poor people.

Because the U.S. "offers a form of protection for capital against unanticipated political disturbances", even as American companies move abroad for cheaper labor, the people who actually make money prefer to invest in America. So, even though companies are moving abroad, America still wins! Woo! Just...not all of America...in my cynical phantasma, pretty much everyone who is not an investment banker will likely be reduced to the same Malthusian equilibrium currently enjoyed by the oh-so-cheap labor forces our companies so prize.

Now, breaking the equilibrium is relatively easy to do, but I'm not sure anyone else is up for televised fire-circle death match rituals for all twenty-year olds. An equally implausible solution has been proposed by the authors of the said paper: "governments should lower taxes and spend more". How deficit spending fixes global inequity is beyond me. I have enough trouble counting up to the $50 needed to fill my gas tank without further inflation. Better solutions: global unions (all the fun of riots, now with more capitalism!) and government investment in technical education.

Tricky Tricky Wording

Attention Everyone:

Read THIS article on CNN and notice the exorbitant amount of "quotation-marks," if you imagine them as "air-quotes" I "believe" it completely changes the intended "meaning" of the article, or "perhaps" it is the "intended" meaning.
"Who" knows?

Absconding With Dignity

The Anglican Church seems to have hit a queer fork in the road; two priests in the Anglican church were married -in a same sex marriage, mind you- using the traditional liturgy, which, in turn, has created a rift with the more conservative mind-set within the church. Apparently, the Archbishop had stated, no more than three years ago, that the sexual teaching provided by the church would maintain the more traditional values of the bygone eras, and that those who act in opposition to these teachings would be "disciplined." (Sounds sexy.) And, since these sexual trespassers were not roundly spanked, quite a few of these vicars have their knickers stuffed far up their cracks with rage.
What bothers me (just one of the many things, I suppose) is this statement:
Anglicans in Africa and Asia are infuriated enough with the liberal North American churches, where openly homosexual clergy and church blessings for same-sex couples are now common. But the news two male priests used a traditional wedding liturgy, involving exchange of rings and vows, in a Church of England church could push them to the edge.
I'm not sure that those in Africa and Asia (two large geographical areas that are having a significant amount of civil unrest) should be overly concerned with two priests getting hitched. Seems to this uneducated jackass that they would have bigger fish to fry. (Wait, is it just the Catholics that like fish?) Eh, let these priests engage in furious dry-humping with all the ceremony they want and worry about something that actually matters.
Now, why is this bad for Archbishop Rowan Williams? Seems to the public that this little non-secular sexual indiscretion could split the Anglican Church like two ass cheeks, letting the world see the blown-out rectum that is the tricky grey-area of religious sexual teachings.
Wait a minute, who doesn't want to see that?

Links

Like pillaging Vikings, we rejoice at the latest Mars landing. "We did this, this is what we can do".

It is time to upload off Earth, to dispense with current fashions and look through the latest spatial contraptions, whence come motorcycle banditas with jetpacks and hovercrafts, dead set on the destruction of their insect lovers.

Inside My Own Head

I try to abstain from writing entirely self-reflective and naval-gazing posts, but this time it cannot be helped. Those of you who have read my posts in the past, which is no more than five people, should be aware that I mostly try to tie my ranting to some bizarre or funny piece of news; unfortunately, a fierce introspection has taken hold. Recently, I have noticed an unwillingness to leave my house. It's not out of fear, or at least I don't believe it is, though I do feel uneasy every time I leave. Not terribly long ago I was quite happy to go out to bars, drink and talk with friends amongst throngs of other drunks. Now it is not so, and best as I can tell it's not because I no longer enjoy a drink or talks with friends, but they no longer hold the pull that they once did. I sit at home now, reading, watching nonsense on the internet, playing video games, and looking at porn. I have lost contact with many of my friends; choosing to let relationships slide quietly into the ether. I have no rational reason, just an odd subconscious dread of the outside world. I truly believe I am beginning my descent into madness. This is all the more reason that I should be reaching out to others, but the desire is just not there. Well, perhaps it's nothing.