Robin George Collingwood un Tarih Tasarımı Tarih Felsefesi ve Tarihyazımı Süreçleri Üzerine Bir Tartışma

OpenAlex Türkçe

Objectivity in history-writing and the role of historician in reaching the knowledge of past/ reconstruction of history have been among the most disputable subjects of philosophy of history. The basic purpose of this paper is to analyze the idea of Collingwood – who was among one of the most influencial philosophers of history of British Idealism School – about those two controversial subjects of history. Collingwood’s answers to the following questions are discussed?: “Is objectivity possible in history-writing? Is it possible to reach the knowledge of past? If yes, then how? What is the role of historician at this point?” Collingwood’s historical imagination, question-answer and re-enactment theories are interpreted in this context and his stress on history-natural sciences difference and his views on historical progress/freedom are studied. Collingwood defended unique character of the object of history – fact. He affirmed it as worth reviewing, and emphasized that historician has to deal with unique and particular facts instead of pursuing to reach historical laws and generalizations. He concluded that history is transferrred to today merely by historician with re-enactment in the mind of the historician. Consequently, Collingwood stated that objectivity and reaching the knowledge of past are possible. He emphasized the difficulties that the historian has to deal with in this process and proposed some methods that the historian can use in order to overcome those difficulties. According to Collingwood, every historician is the child of his/her own age, in other words a carrier of value judgements of his/her era. However, if he/she could be purified from the value judgements of his/her age and identify his/her idea with the historical actor’s mind, it is possible to reach the knowledge of past.