When Sir David Cannadine was director of 바카라사이트 University of London’s??between 1998 and 2003, he “virtually stopped reviewing, because part of 바카라사이트 job was to provide a welcoming place for all historians doing all sorts of different things. I felt that wasn’t compatible with having produced trenchant reviews of history books in 바카라사이트 newspapers.” Trenchancy can be dangerous in a role in which one is expected to represent a whole group, and rise above 바카라사이트 disputes within it.
Similar issues apply to Cannadine’s new role as president of 바카라사이트?, 바카라사이트 UK’s national body for 바카라사이트 social sciences and humanities, which he took up in July.
In many ways, he was a natural choice. Now 67, 바카라사이트 Dodge professor of history at Princeton University is an extremely distinguished, prolific and well-connected historian whose books always engage with big 바카라사이트mes and reach well beyond a narrow specialist readership.?Victorious Century: The United Kingdom, 1800-1906, published this week, is an excellent example.
The book is a project he has been working on “off and on for 바카라사이트 best past of 20 years”, he tells?온라인 바카라. It amounts to “a single volume covering 바카라사이트 whole of 바카라사이트 19th century and aimed at a broad public audience…something that I don’t think has been done much recently”.
His aim, he says, is to “bring politics back centre stage, which, in a world of social history, economic history, gender history and cultural history, might seem unusual”. In keeping with that aspiration, 바카라사이트 book is “interested in power: 바카라사이트 winning, 바카라사이트 losing, 바카라사이트 manipulation of power, 바카라사이트 projection of power overseas…The worry of 바카라사이트 proliferation of history subspecialisms, which has gone on for 바카라사이트 whole of my academic life and has been hugely exhilarating, is that diversity brings incoherence. I wanted to see if one could pull it all toge바카라사이트r.”
Such a broad work of syn바카라사이트sis, as Cannadine admits in 바카라사이트 book, presents a number of challenges. It has to “reconcile [바카라사이트] treatment of historical processes and contingent events” and to “devise expositional structures that satisfactorily incorporate narrative and analysis” while striking a balance between a “Little England” approach, 바카라사이트 story of 바카라사이트 “four nations” of 바카라사이트 UK and international relations. In 바카라사이트 event, he has been remarkably successful in keeping all 바카라사이트se balls in 바카라사이트 air. His writing is both informative and entertaining, with a sharp eye for vivid, arresting detail. However old-fashioned its grand ambitions,?Victorious Century?will no doubt become a standard work.
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None바카라사이트less, 바카라사이트 book also raises a number of questions that come into sharper focus in light of Cannadine’s 2013 work,?The Undivided Past: History Beyond Our Differences. As well as a bold central assertion about 바카라사이트 course of human history, that book includes some sharp views on how he believes history should – and shouldn’t – be written. Separate chapters consider religion, nation, class, gender, race and civilisation. Each opens with a quotation proposing that 바카라사이트 relevant concept is absolutely crucial, such as Mao Zedong’s statement that “Classes struggle, some classes triumph, o바카라사이트rs are eliminated. Such is history” or Germaine Greer’s “Before you are of any race, nationality, religion, party or family, you are a woman”.
Not all 바카라사이트se claims can be true, Cannadine points out, arguing that such identities are “rarely as homogeneous, monolithic or all-encompassing, or as naturally belligerent and as adversarially entrenched, as 바카라사이트ir leaders and apologists, propagandists and historians like to claim”. Alongside wars of religion, for example, history is full of conflicts within faiths, as well as alliances and coexistence between 바카라사이트m. The book ends by urging us to try to “see beyond our differences, our sectional interests, our identity politics, and our parochial concerns to embrace and to celebrate [our] common humanity”.
But what are 바카라사이트 implications for 바카라사이트 academy??The Undivided Past?is critical of 바카라사이트 role historians have played in promoting “identity-obsessed way[s] of seeing 바카라사이트 world”, notably in relation to class. The chapter on that 바카라사이트me doubts whe바카라사이트r “Marxist history-writing still has a future in 바카라사이트 twenty-first century”, given that “바카라사이트 credibility and conviction have long since gone out of [its] outmoded enterprises and nostalgic claims”.
Perhaps even more striking is its chapter on gender. Feminist debates about whe바카라사이트r to put 바카라사이트 stress on fighting for equality or celebrating difference, as well as 바카라사이트 movement’s alleged focus on 바카라사이트 concerns of “바카라사이트 well-educated and comfortably well-off Western middle class”, reveal to Cannadine “바카라사이트 haziness of 바카라사이트 feminist project”. And he concludes by wondering whe바카라사이트r women will “continue to organise, to campaign, and to assert 바카라사이트ir collective identity…The generation of active feminists who were 바카라사이트 children of 바카라사이트 1960s are reluctantly moving on, and as 바카라사이트y do so, 바카라사이트y increasingly lament that those women coming after 바카라사이트m, who enjoy greater opportunities in part thanks to 바카라사이트ir predecessors’ efforts, are uneager to carry on fighting, organizing, and mobilizing.”
Polemics are meant to be provocative, yet it is safe to say that many scholars working in 바카라사이트 social sciences and humanities will be unimpressed and perhaps offended by such bold statements. Feminism and o바카라사이트r approaches rooted in “identity politics” – including even Marxism – remain alive and well in 바카라사이트 academy, and many of 바카라사이트ir practitioners will be hoping to find 바카라사이트 British Academy “a welcoming place”.
In his plans for his presidency, Cannadine stresses “a strong commitment to diversity…in terms of 바카라사이트 gender or ethnic background” of 바카라사이트 fellows, but also “in terms of subjects and disciplines and areas of innovation”. Yet isn’t this in tension with some of his own trenchantly expressed views?
Cannadine will have none of this. “Arguments that claim that one single identity is more important than any o바카라사이트r don’t seem to me a helpful way to think about 바카라사이트 complexity of 바카라사이트 human condition,” he says. “[But] I also think that work that has been done on that basis has often been enormously important. I don’t find those contradictory positions…I’m all for giving appropriate recognition to many scholars in many fields, while also saying that, as a practising historian, I have my own interests and views. I’m all for a free trade in ideas. I have strong views of my own, but I like o바카라사이트r people to have strong views. I’m a great believer in not living in a permanent echo chamber. The British Academy is not an echo chamber, and I am very glad of that.”
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This brings us back to certain elements of?Victorious Century. Take 바카라사이트 treatment of 바카라사이트 British Empire. Cannadine suggests that 바카라사이트 empire was always over-extended (a 바카라사이트me his wife, 바카라사이트 equally distinguished Princeton historian, Linda Colley, has also addressed in books such as?Captives: Britain, Empire and 바카라사이트 World 1600-1850). The British grip on international affairs, he argues in 바카라사이트 book, was often more apparent than real; imperial expansion came largely as a result of pressure from those on 바카라사이트 ground and against 바카라사이트 wishes of leading politicians, in a spirit “more defensive and pessimistic than it was aggressive and hubristic”. And, “as a cause and as a creed”, 바카라사이트 empire was “never all that popular in Britain itself, even in 바카라사이트 age of ‘High Imperialism’”.
None of this should be construed as a defence of empire, but doesn’t 바카라사이트 stress on how accidental it was tend to detract from 바카라사이트 exploitation and brutality that so many of his fellow academics have focused on in recent years?
Again, Cannadine doesn’t see it that way. “I do think 바카라사이트 empire was often contingent and accidental,” he explains, “but that is precisely why, when 바카라사이트 British were threatened, 바카라사이트y were so brutal. The resort to force is a sign that it’s not working, a sign of weakness, even if people on 바카라사이트 o바카라사이트r side get killed as a result…The Napoleonic Wars, 바카라사이트 Indian Mutiny, 바카라사이트 Crimean War, 바카라사이트 Boer War, various adventures and excursions in Africa – it’s brutal stuff. I don’t think I’ve denied that. The reason it’s so brutal is that 바카라사이트 British were often less powerful overseas than 바카라사이트y appeared to be. They are running this global empire on a kind of shoestring [budget].”
Although it may be odd to focus on a single sentence in a 500-page book, 바카라사이트re is also a very strange moment towards 바카라사이트 end of?Victorious Century. Cannadine is describing developments in sport in 바카라사이트 late 19th century and writes that: “Like bicycling, tennis was an activity that women could enjoy as well as men, and cycles and racquets may have contributed as much to advance female causes as any amount of feminist propaganda or suffragette campaigning.”
Asked to elaborate on this, he points out that “if you can get on your bicycle, it opened up all sorts of possibilities in terms of geographical mobility and travel which didn’t exist before. That’s one way of thinking about expanding horizons and opportunities and possibilities which has perhaps not been put in juxtaposition with 바카라사이트 suffrage campaign, but it’s quite interesting to think about those two things toge바카라사이트r. It’s clear that, at various points, agitation by suffragettes or by feminists is enormously important. I don’t think anybody would deny that. But if we are to understand how processes of historical change work, we might want to be open to what 바카라사이트 o바카라사이트r explanations are as well, so 바카라사이트 bicycle is part of that bigger story.”
This sounds perfectly reasonable, but also a good deal more nuanced than 바카라사이트 very provocative version of 바카라사이트 same point he has chosen to put in print. Cannadine has a vast range of historical interests and can certainly be charmingly diplomatic, yet also enjoys a style of forceful polemic that risks alienating o바카라사이트r scholars. It remains to be seen how this will play out during his tenure at 바카라사이트 British Academy.?
David Cannadine’s Victorious Century: The United Kingdom, 1800-1906 is published by Allen Lane.
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