Provincialiser l'Europe: La pensée postcoloniale et la différence historique

by Dipesh Chakrabarty

L’Europe n’est plus au centre du monde, l’histoire européenne n’incarne plus « l’histoire universelle », mais ses catégories de pensée et ses concepts politiques continuent de régir les sciences sociales, la discipline historique et nos représentations politiques. Avoir pour projet de provincialiser l’Europe n’équivaut pas à rejeter la pensée européenne, il ne s’agit pas de prôner une « revanche postcoloniale ». Mais la pensée européenne, aussi indispensable soit-elle, est inadéquate pour appréhender l’expérience de la modernité politique dans les nations non occidentales. Comment s’affranchir de son « historicisme »? Comment interpréter les faits sociaux sans les contraindre à se conformer au modèle, limité et exclusif, de l’accession progressive de tous, au cours de l’histoire, à une certaine conception de la « modernité »? L’enjeu est de parvenir à renouveler les sciences sociales, à partir des marges, pour sortir d’une vision qui réduit les nations non européennes à des exemples de manque et d’incomplétude, et penser au contraire la diversité des futurs qui se construisent aujourd’hui. Ce livre s’y essaie, en décrivant diverses manières d’être dans le monde, qui sont autant d’histoires singulières et fragmentaires, autant de réinterprétations, de traductions et de transformations pratiques des catégories universelles et abstraites de la pensée européenne.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Philosophy, Theory, Academic, Politics, Post Colonial

408 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2000

About the author

Dipesh Chakrabarty (b. 1948) is a Bengali historian who has also made contributions to postcolonial theory and subaltern studies.

He attended Presidency College of the University of Calcutta, where he received his undergraduate degree in physics. He also received a Post Graduate Diploma in Management (MBA) from Indian Institute of Management Calcutta. Later he moved on to the Australian National University in Canberra, from where he earned a PhD in history.

He is currently the Lawrence A. Kimpton Distinguished Service Professor of History, South Asian Languages and Civilizations and the College at the University of Chicago. He was a visiting faculty at the Centre for Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta. Chakrabarty also serves as a contributing editor for Public Culture, an academic journal published by Duke University Press.

He was a member of the Subaltern Studies collective. He has recently made important contributions to the intersections between history and postcolonial theory (Provincializing Europe [PE]), which continues and revises his earlier historical work on working-class history in Bengal (Rethinking Working-Class History). PE adds considerably to the debate of how postcolonial discourse engages in the writing of history (e.g., Robert J. C. Young's "White Mythologies"), critiquing historicism, which is intimately related to the West's notion of linear time. Chakrabarty argues that Western historiography's historicism universalizes liberalism, projecting it to all ends of the map. He suggests that, under the rubric of historicism, the end-goal of every society is to develop towards nationalism.

In 2011 he received an Honorary degree from the University of Antwerp.

Reviews

[Celeste · Rating 5 out of 5]

Dipesh Chakrabarty argues that all history has had Europe as its subject because the intellectual contributions of Europe (Marxism, enlightenment rationality, secular humanism) have been taken as universals. While recognizing that these intellectual theories have relevance outside of Europe (he is himself a committed Marxist), he argues against the idea that all Modernity must be European bourgeois modernity. He argues against a historicism that posits that all history must be progressive,and against the idea that developing nations who manifest capitalism differently should be seen as 'in the waiting room of history or representing an incomplete transition to capitalist modernity. Instead he seeks to demonstrate, through examples from Bengali history, the myriad ways in which indigenous intellectual traditions and cultural values interact with European intellectual traditions to create unique modernities that should be seen as no less whole for all their differences.

[Kastel · Rating 1 out of 5]

On conceptual and theoretical levels, Provincializing Europe provides a corrective to how we approach history as universalistic and deterministic. While we cannot abandon the tools of thinking made to capture the realities of European thought in examining postcoloniality, we should be aware of their limitations. The conclusion says it well.

But on moral and ethical levels, the scholar is a hypocrite. He has been accused by Christine Fair for sexual predation and there’s plenty of evidence to go about (https://shortbustoparadise.wordpress....). This is worth reading.

What makes this book utterly ironic is that it attempts to give light to the truths of those who have been oppressed and neglected by the majority. Chapters dedicated to the plight of women can only be read with sarcasm and this also makes it difficult to take the claim that people who have uncritically adopted rational, secular thinking without spirituality can inadvertently become misogynistic seriously. It is fascinating that a scholar who is part of a project to give light is also someone who is oppressing people and keeping them silent.

The subaltern can’t truly speak not just because of what Spivak has already noted in her essay but also because their voices are represented by hypocrites and abusers of power.

[Pranshu · Rating 2 out of 5]

Dipesh Chakraborty is a modern day mystic who suffers from an insufferable urge to sound extraordinary. Most of the chapters reflect confusion and worse, deliberate obfuscation. Take for example the chapter on Tagore, his poetry had to power to transform reality, without denying it (whatever that means!) and making the tough middle class lives of colonial Calcutta liveable. Sans the jargon, all he is saying is that playing video games might help us in coping with oppression at work place. South Asian working class does not emerge because people are still imbricated in their communities, well this was equally true of premodern Europe as well, but he does not explain how individualism emerges in Europe but not in south Asia. This is little more than the old colonial stereotyping of the orient. The argument about history 1 and history 2 in chapter 2 is ludicrous. Surely we all know by now that freedom and parliamentary democracy do not go hand in hand with capitalism. in fact in today's crisis ridden capitalism democracy has increasingly become and impediment for the ruling elite. Also I cannot see why history 2 which capital fails to subsume must necessarily be opposed to history 1 as he posits. He does not explain. Also capital is interested in surplus extraction, other progressive aspects of modernity that dipesh arbitrarily associates with capital are the least of its concerns. Isn't this why american imperialism had no issues whatsoever in allying with the very worst of dictatorships and monarchies of they proved amenable to surplus extraction.

[Malcolm · Rating 5 out of 5]

Quite simply, and along with Ranajit Guha's Dominance Without Hegemony, one of the most powerful books of postcolonial historiography there is. Chakrabarty sets out to decentre and 'marginalise' Europe by unpacking ways that European histories of India negate India (and by implication, most of the rest of the indigenous and subaltern in Empire). He turns his attention to a range of social sciences as well as history, and quite marvellously exposes ways that Europe ignores and negates India through analyses that impose on India modes of analysis and thought that fail to recognise it. High powered, demanding, unsettling (especially for a resident of Europe), Chakrabarty finishes up not shunning or rejecting European social theory and philosophy, but proposing ways to revitalise it and allow its use in more subtle ways in 'Other' settings.

[Jahangir Alam · Rating 5 out of 5]

বর্তমানে আমরা যে দুনিয়া দেখতে পাই, তা মূলত ইউরোপীয় স্ট্যান্ডার্ডে নির্মিত একটি দুনিয়া। কোনটাকে আধুনিকতা, কোনটাকে কুসংস্কার, এবং কোনটাকে বর্বরতা বলা হবে—এটি নির্ধারণ করে ইউরোপের স্ট্যান্ডার্ড, যা বিগত কয়েকশো বছর ধরে ইউরোপীয় তত্ত্ব ও ধারণার মাধ্যমে গঠিত হয়েছে।

বর্তমান অবস্থা অনেকটা এমন যে কোনো দেশ বা জাতি ইউরোপের মতো হলে তারা উন্নত, কিন্তু ইউরোপ থেকে যত বেশি ভিন্ন হবে, তারা ততটাই পশ্চাৎপদ। সহজ ভাষায়, সবকিছুতেই ইউরোপকে একটি আদর্শ ধরা হচ্ছে, যার মানদণ্ডে আমরা আমাদের সমাজ ও ইতিহাসকে বিচার করছি।

সবকিছুকে ইউরোপের মানদণ্ডে তুলনা করার এই প্রবণতা সমালোচনা করেছেন দীপেশ চক্রবর্তী। তাঁর বই Provincializing Europe: Postcolonial Thought and Historical Difference-এ তিনি দেখিয়েছেন, ইউরোপীয় ধারণাগুলো অপরিহার্য হলেও তা যথেষ্ট নয়।

তিনি যুক্তি দেন, গণতন্ত্র, মানবাধিকার ইত্যাদি যেমন ইউরোপ থেকে এসেছে, তেমনি ইউরোপ নির্ধারিত ধারণাগুলোর কারণে অন্যান্য অঞ্চলের ইতিহাস ও জীবনযাত্রা বিকৃতভাবে ব্যাখ্যা করা হয়েছে। ইউরোপ নিজেদের দৃষ্টিকোণ থেকে ইতিহাস ব্যাখ্যা করতে গিয়ে অন্যান্য অঞ্চলের সাংস্কৃতিক পার্থক্যকে ঠিকমতো তুলে ধরতে ব্যর্থ হয়েছে।

একদিকে, ইউরোপীয় তত্ত্বের প্রয়োজনীয়তা অস্বীকার করা যায় না, কারণ বর্তমান দুনিয়ার আধুনিক রাষ্ট্রব্যবস্থা ও শিল্পবিপ্লব ইউরোপ থেকেই এসেছে। কিন্তু এই একই দৃষ্টিকোণ অন্যান্য অঞ্চল, বিশেষত উপনিবেশিত দেশগুলোর ইতিহাসকে সঠিকভাবে বোঝাতে ব্যর্থ হয়েছে।

দীপেশ চক্রবর্তী প্রস্তাব করেন, ইউরোপকে বিশ্বের কেন্দ্র হিসেবে না দেখে প্রাদেশিকীকরণ করা উচিত, যেখানে বিশ্বের একক কোনো কেন্দ্র থাকবে না, বরং একাধিক কেন্দ্র থাকবে। সহজ ভাষায়, যদি আমরা আধুনিকতার বৈশ্বিক ইতিহাস লিখতে চাই, তাহলে ইউরোপের আধিপত্যকে প্রশ্ন করা এবং তাকে অন্যান্য অঞ্চলের সমান্তরালে দাঁড় করানো জরুরি।

ইউরোপীয় ইতিহাসবর্ণনার দৃষ্টিভঙ্গি এমন যে, তারা নিজেদের উন্নতির পথকে সার্বজনীন স্ট্যান্ডার্ড হিসেবে ধরে নেয়। এটি ধরে নেয় যে অন্যান্য অঞ্চলও ঠিক ইউরোপের মতোই পরিবর্তিত হবে। উদাহরণস্বরূপ, ইউরোপ যেভাবে সামন্ততন্ত্র থেকে শিল্পবিপ্লব ও আধুনিক রাষ্ট্রব্যবস্থার দিকে অগ্রসর হয়েছে, অন্যরাও ঠিক একইভাবে আধুনিকতা অর্জন করবে। কিন্তু এই ইউরোপীয় স্ট্যান্ডার্ডে একটি বড় সমস্যা রয়েছে—যেসব অঞ্চল ইউরোপের মতো বিন্যস্ত নয়, তাদের "প্রাক-আধুনিক" বা "অনুন্নত" হিসেবে বিবেচনা করা হয়।

ফলস্বরূপ, ইতিহাসচর্চায় ইউরোপীয় দৃষ্টিকোণকে সার্বজনীন সত্য হিসেবে প্রতিষ্ঠা করা হয়েছে, যেখানে অন্যান্য অঞ্চলের আলাদা ঐতিহাসিক প্রক্রিয়াগুলোকে অগ্রাহ্য করা হয়েছে। ভারতের কৃষক বিদ্রোহের মতো ঘটনাগুলোকে "প্রাক-রাজনৈতিক" হিসেবে দেখানো হয়েছে, কারণ সেগুলো ইউরোপীয় রাজনৈতিক আন্দোলনের কাঠামোর সাথে পুরোপুরি মেলে না। ইউরোপ নিজেদের ইতিহাসকে পুঁজিবাদের উত্থানের ইতিহাস হিসেবে তুলে ধরে, যেখানে অন্য অঞ্চলের কৃষি ও প্রাক-শিল্প অর্থনীতিকে গুরুত্বহীন করা হয়। দীপেশ চক্রবর্তী এই দৃষ্টিভঙ্গির সীমাবদ্ধতা তুলে ধরে "হিস্ট্রি ওয়ান" ও "হিস্ট্রি টু" ধারণা উপস্থাপন করেন।

তিনি "হিস্ট্রি ওয়ান" বলে উল্লেখ করেন সেই ইতিহাস, যা ইউরোপের দৃষ্টিকোণ থেকে লেখা হয়। এটি মূলত পুঁজিবাদ ও আধুনিক রাষ্ট্রের ইতিহাস, যেখানে পৃথিবীর সব অঞ্চলকেই পুঁজিবাদ-পূর্ববর্তী এবং পুঁজিবাদ-পরবর্তী পর্যায়ে ভাগ করা হয়। এই ইতিহাস একটি নির্দিষ্ট অঞ্চলের জীবনধারা ও সাংস্কৃতিক বাস্তবতাকে বিবেচনায় নেয় না। উদাহরণস্বরূপ, উনিশ শতকের ভারতে ব্যাখ্যা করতে গেলে আমরা সেখানে কৃষিভিত্তিক অর্থনীতি এবং শিল্পের উন্মেষ দেখতে পাই, কিন্তু সেই সময়ের ভারতীয়দের কর্মসংস্কৃতি (ওয়ার্কিং কালচার) কেমন ছিল, তা এতে বিবেচিত হয় না।

এই কারণে লেখক হিস্ট্রি টু ধারণার প্রস্তাব করেন এবং একটি নতুন ধরনের ইতিহাস রচনার প্রয়োজনীয়তা অনুভব করেন, যেখানে প্রতিটি অঞ্চলের নিজস্ব সংস্কৃতিও অন্তর্ভুক্ত থাকবে। "হিস্ট্রি টু" ধারণাটি তুলে ধরে প্রতিটি অঞ্চলের নিজস্ব ইতিহাস, যার ভিত্তিতে তাদের সংস্কৃতি ও রাজনৈতিক চিন্তা গড়ে উঠেছে। ভারতের আধুনিক রাজনৈতিক পরিসরে গ্রামীণ নৈতিকতা, ধর্মীয় সম্পর্ক ইত্যাদি যেসব উপাদান সেই সময়ের ইউরোপীয় স্ট্যান্ডার্ডের সাথে মেলে না, সেগুলো পশ্চিমা দৃষ্টিতে অদ্ভুত মনে হতে পারে। কিন্তু বাস্তবে ��গুলো ভারতের আধুনিকতারই বৈশিষ্ট্য। এজন্যই তিনি ইতিহাসবিদ্যার নতুন কাঠামোর আহ্বান জানান, যা একাধিক সহঅবস্থানশীল অতীত ও বিভিন্ন ধরনের সময়চেতনাকে অন্তর্ভুক্ত করতে পারে।উদাহরণস্বরূপ, ভারতের গণতন্ত্র ও জার্মানির গণতন্ত্র এক নয়। কিন্তু যদি জার্মানির গণতন্ত্রকে স্ট্যান্ডার্ড ধরে ভারতের গণতন্ত্রকে অনুন্নত বলা হয়, তাহলে তা ভুল হবে। চক্রবর্তী বলেন, এই ভিন্নতার স্বীকৃতি দিতে হবে এবং ইতিহাসচর্চার জন্য নতুন কাঠামো তৈরি করতে হবে।

মূলত বইটির লক্ষ্য ছিল ইউরোকেন্দ্রিক জ্ঞানকে প্রশ্ন করা এবং বৈশ্বিক বিশ্লেষণের পশ্চিমা জ্ঞানতাত্ত্বিক কাঠামোর সীমা অতিক্রম করা। লেখক চান ইউরোপের ক্ষমতাশালী ইতিহাস-আখ্যানকে সকলের কাতারে দাঁড় করানো, যাতে অন্যদের বয়ানকেও যথাযথভাবে বিবেচনা করা যায়। পোস্টকলোনিয়ালিজম আর সাবঅল্টার্ন স্টাডিতে এটি এক নতুন পথের দিকনির্দেশনা দেয়।

[Leopold Benedict · Rating 2 out of 5]

I still have some difficulties with finding my approach to postcolonial literature. The criticism of European concepts seen as universal is plausible, but it is unclear to me what consequences follow and what alternative concepts they propose. Also, I find a lot of this book just rambling.

[Jee Koh · Rating 5 out of 5]

Chakrabarty's project in this book is not so much to subvert the rational-secular view of history, inherited by postcolonial societies from the European enlightenment, as to see around the limitations of that view. In order to do so, one has to give up historicism, the idea of development in history, and of stages in history. Instead, one holds on to the idea of the heterogeneous present, when different world-views are not judged as pre-modern, modern, or even, post-modern (all stageist concepts) but as all life-possibilities. Only when we see the present as irreducibly plural, can we give an accurate account of the past of post-colonial societies. That is the challenge posed by subaltern studies to the dominant European paradigm. The book lays out its theoretical argument in its first part, and illustrates its argument in the second part with specific case studies about Indian widowhood, Indian nationalism, a form of Bengali sociality called adda, and salaried labor. The author freely describes his own theoretical orientation as derived from Marx but inflected by Heidegger.

In my favorite passage, Chakrabarty shows, incidentally, the relevance of his argument to so-called minority pasts in the predominant secular-rational tradition, in this case, the Christian view.

We can--and we do usually in writing history--treat the Santal [Indian peasant] of the nineteenth century to doses of historicism and anthropology. We can, in other words, treat him as a signifier of other times and societies. This gesture maintains a subject-object relationship between the historian and the evidence. In this gesture, the past remains genuinely dead; the historian brings it "alive" by telling the story. But the Santal with his statement "I did as my god told me to do" also faces us as a way of being in this world, and we could ask ourselves: Is that way of being a possibility for our own lives and for what we define as our present? Does the Santal help us to understand a principle by which we also live in certain instances? This question does not historicize or anthropologize the Santal, for the illustrative power of the Santal as an example of a present possibility does not depend on his otherness. Here the Santal stands as our contemporary and the subject-object relationship that normally defines the historian's relationship to his or her archives is dissolved in this gesture. This gesture is akin to the one Kierkegaard developed in critiquing explanations that looked on the Biblical story of Abraham's sacrifice of his son Isaac either as deserving an historical or psychological explanation or as a metaphor or allegory, but never as a possibility for life open today to one who had faith. "[W]hy bother to remember a past," asked Kierkegaard, "that cannot be made into a present?"
To stay with the heterogeneity of the moment when the historian meets with the peasant is, then, to stay with the difference between these two gestures. One is that of historicizing the Santal in the interest of a history of social justice and democracy; and the other, that of refusing to historicize and of seeing the Santal as a figure illuminating a life possibility for the present. Taken together, the two gestures put us in touch with the plural ways of being that make up our own present. The archives thus help bring to view the disjointed nature of any particular "now" one may inhabit; that is the function of subaltern pasts.

[Marcel Patulacci · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have been introduced to this book during a historiography class at the university, where I had to read an extract from it. Though unfamiliar with indian history and culture, I found two points raised by Chakrabarty very relevant: 1- Analytical tools coming from western social sciences (especially those coming from the intellectual production of Marx, Heidegger and Hobbes), though helpful and performant, are not enough to measure a non-western society 2- The rejection of historicist patterns (especially present in Marxism), that every nation has to follow to reach modernity, that the author defines as "western modernity". Indeed, every nation has its cultural backgrounds and is not necessarly able to apply development models from a foreign society. What worked in a country A, won't necessarly be efficient in a country B. Unlike mathematics, social sciences do not belong to the sphere of exactness.

Another question asked by Chakrabarty, though not as broadly explored as the previous ones is the following: why do historians specialized in non-european history (called subaltern studies) still have to be educated in european history, whereas their colleagues specialized in western history, are not expected to know much about subaltern studies. The author advocates for a larger flexibility from the latter ones.

The latter part of the book gets more on the "praxis field" and tells about the encounter of western ideas (introduced through the british colonization) and bengali culture (from where Chakrabarty is originated), and how those ones appropriated themselves "western modernity", how cultural elements overlapped eachothers, how did some traditions disappeared progressively in favor of this same "western modernity" (for example, the concept of the "adda" progressively replaced by the discussions and debates in coffee shops on the western model).

I must say tho, the reading was not always easy for me, as I said, I am not very familian to south asian cultures and often got lost with hindi/bengali terms. Also, some pre-requisites might be recommended, especially on marxist concepts. Still, it was an educative and quite enjoyable reading.

[Miguel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Provincializing Europe is a bizarre text. It is characterized by all the ways it departs from the project stated in the 1992 essay that serves as the text's inspiration and first chapter. Seven years later, when Chakrabarty returns to the notion of provincializing Europe, his thoughts seem altogether more conventional and proceed with a caution and precision not seen in the audacious 1992 essay. Still, Chakrabarty's text is no less useful for its care. Chakrabarty departs from his sweeping theoretical articulations and arrives at detailed close readings of Marx, Bengali cultural practice and history, and various Bengali authors (with a side of Locke, Lefebvre, and Heidegger.)

There is a lot about Chakrabarty's priorities in this text that are confusing. First, he says that the first half of the book proceeds under the "sign of Marx" and the second half under the "sign of Heidegger." However, while the first half of his text is filled with virtuoso close readings of Marx and his relation to historicism, the second half relegates Heidegger into the subtext of his close readings of Bengali art, literature, and culture. There is something deeply unsatisfying about his organization. The notion of provincializing Europe drops completely from the text until its conclusion. Some of his most fascinating theoretical turns also are withheld until the end. For instance, Chakrabarty elaborates historicism in contradistinction (but not in opposition) to what he terms "decisionism." Decisionism is a version of historical thought that permits the radical heterogeneity of history that he discusses in the 1992 essay.

Furthermore, his Heideggerian intervention is also mostly withheld until this conclusion! Even worse, we get phenomenal, crucial sentences... but on the second to last page! Here, Chakrabarty writes things like "a fore-conception of how we might provincialize the Europe of our desire to be modern by giving reason a place different from the one assigned to it in historicist and modernist thought" and "To provincialize Europe in historical thought is to struggle to hold in a state of permanent tension a dialogue between two contradictory points of view."

I don't mean to bury the text in criticism. It is, after all, awesome. Chakrabarty dodges confusion by doing what many theorists fear to do: putting a number at the end of the same word to signify differently. One reader (me) might've been quite thrilled had Derrida and Malabou opted to do the same thing with their various conceptions of "absence" and "presence." Chakrabarty's articulations of History 1 and History 2 (both drawn from Marx, who simply uses "history" to refer to both) is excellent both for its content and the methodological brilliance of those numerical suffixes.

Ultimately, though, I am left wanting. What the 1992 essay promised is not what Chakrabarty delivered in this book. But to judge it against that groundbreaking essay would be unfair. Chakrabarty, in a way distinct from himself, moves the needle in historical thinking and repositions reason and historicism in a practical fashion for social scientists. Chakrabarty is, perhaps, the best evidence of his own claim in the difference between his writing in 92 and 99. They are two radically heterogeneous texts, and Chakrabarty's freedom to redefine his own past thinking and refigure it in long form is the decisionism Chakrabarty defines in his text's conclusion. For Chakrabarty, history can never be simply a narrative of development that promises mastery of the present through understanding of the past. The same can be said of his two texts. The sequences of events that are organized into history are ultimately chaotic in ways historical work elides. Chakrabarty's theoretical practice, though, makes that chaos quite clear.

[Brandy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read for my Europe and the World grad class... I was dreading this book. Literally. Like I kinda figured that this would be one of the ones that I just vaguely skimmed through and didn't understand a word of the discussion. I have never been able to just sit down and read theory. I just can't. This book, however, actually hooked me for some reason. I won't pretend that I truly understood every page, or that I didn't have to just put it down and watch some mindless tv a couple of times, but as far as theory goes, this book was pretty great. Whether it was his intention or not, Chakrabarty led me to examine my own biases towards writing history and even question my true motives for pursuing the profession. All the while teaching me a lot about Bengali history. If that's not successful history, I don't know what is.

[Emily · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Introduction & Part One are foundational for scholars of any type of history. Chakrabarty deals with the myth of universal, linear history and the problems of trying to study the subaltern by means of historical understanding, theories & methods that do not reflect or originate in subaltern communities. He encourages a de-centering of Europe! Yes, there are other parts of the world!

I thoroughly enjoyed reading & being challenged by the intro & part 1.

Part Two is perhaps more relevant to scholars of subjectivity, literature, cultural belonging etc.

I found some parts of part 2 interesting/entertaining and some parts boring.

As per usual for theory, the writing is sometimes unnecessarily complex & unclear. Definitely worth reading if you're interested in challenging Euro-centrism in your approach to history.

[Andy · Rating 4 out of 5]

An intelligent, productive book, though I'm afraid its reputation may be a bit inflated.

The argument is somewhat damaged by Chakrabarty's rather monolithic view of European history, surprising from someone so influenced by Marx. Occluded from his account are the fissures that made European modernity less a smooth, telelogical unfolding than a contested battleground.

[Jeremy Hurdis · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book presents a very interesting discussion on Historicism and Marxism, followed by a set of intriguing case studies in Indian subaltern studies. However, the author seems unable to escape the broader teleology of the Historicism he attempts to criticize, despite his more successful attacks on the rationalist structure of a Historicist notion of progress.

[Mike Mena · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolutely a must-read for anyone interested post-colonialities, Marxism, modernity, and history. I would also recommend this to linguist anthropologists who are preparing to read, or have read Richard bauman's 'voices of modernity' as they pair well.

[Sara Salem · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting and important book, although I expected more due to its prominence in postcolonial studies. Not the easiest read in terms of writing style.

[Yannicke · Rating 4 out of 5]

A must-read for anyone working within the field of postcolonial history.

[Revanth Ukkalam · Rating 3 out of 5]

Dipesh Chakrabarty identifies in his Provincializing Europe that among the almost indelible impressions that colonialism has had on South Asia and everywhere elsewhere, was a cultural and ideological transformation including a complete overhaul of temporal and spatial imagination. In this overhaul, Chakrabarty identifies, two switches remain key: the emergence of historicism and the process of the “provincialization” of Europe. While the former has in its own been a severely contested phrase, to Chakrabarty historicism entails the imagination of one’s own place as being in “unity”, or only in one place in time, and two, placed within a somewhat fixed trajectory of time and history. No matter what form of life one is enjoined with, they are surely on a journey towards fixed goals – goals set by Europe. Here, the second process kicks in for Chakrabarty: Europe since the enlightenment had loudly announced and promulgated the destiny for all the world – “concepts such as citizenship, the state, civil society, public sphere, human rights, equality before the law, the individual, distinctions between public and private, the idea of the subject, democracy, popular sovereignty, social justice, scientific rationality”. Chakrabarty curiously views the liberal democratic process of political activity by conversation and consultation as being a hallmark feature of this historicism: and thus India’s leap into Universal Franchise in 1951 and mass protest and street politics as falling outside historicism. However, in merely pronouncing these ideas, Europe only globalizes itself as the cosmopole. It is provincialized by the colony when – through nationalism and other political dispositions – Europe as a model is replaced by a “locally constructed centre”, a centre that is not just a region, but also a culture, system of thought, or an ideal. While much of Chakrabarty’s book is an exploration of how the Middle Class of Bengal provincialized Europe by not just importing its historicism but translating it into an Indian medium, the author’s engagement with Marxist thought to arrive at the texture of historicism is of interest to me.

[Hafsa · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolutely brilliant. Challenges the way we look at history/modernity through the lens of the European enlightement and European thought. In the second half of the book, actually puts his theory in practice by studying Bengal. But what I found to be most critical is this statement: “provincializing Europe is not a project of rejecting or discarding European thought” but rather “becomes the task of exploring how this thought may be renewed from and for the margins."

[C. B. · Rating 5 out of 5]

A masterful book on the ways in which "Europe works as a silent referent in historical knowledge". It's exceptionally readable, and this is an important plus, given the generally abstruse style of much postcolonialist and postmodernist theory. Recommended to all, and a key text for historians of anything.

[Matthew Robertson · Rating 2 out of 5]

I’m willing to believe this says more about me than about the book, but my word did I have a hard time getting through this. Theoretically really interesting, practically impenetrable as a relative lay-person. I didn’t see much of a throughline through the different chapters, if I’m being honest.

Maybe that’s embarrassing for me, who knows

[Alex · Rating 5 out of 5]

Goodnight nurse! Marx, Heidegger, and some bedtime stories from upper class Kolkata on "difference"! Does Marx really open up a History 2 for wiggle room? Should we really trust Heidegger, a crazy man? I can't tell for sure! I found the argument aesthetically pleasing.

[Walt · Rating 1 out of 5]

One of the worst college textbooks I ever read. The basic argument is that Europe is part of a larger world; and historians should not focus on how Europeans have changed other cultures; but how diverse cultures affect each other.

[Sylvie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very dense reading. Opened my mind.

[Jason Williams · Rating 4 out of 5]

Verbose, but still really important

[Maureen Fadem · Rating 5 out of 5]

also for chapter three, re-reading parts -- such an amazing, insightful book

[Jerry · Rating 3 out of 5]

240b. like it more and more. history 1 and 2 as an interesting way of thinking of history in general. carving out spaces of liveability.

[Sam Grace · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked the way he outlines the relationship between multiple epistemologies of history.

[AJ · Rating 3 out of 5]

very difficult read, but some important insights on trying to decentralize europe's place in history

[Josh Brett · Rating 4 out of 5]

Postcolonialist paean to antihistoricist adumbrations of Bengali bromance.

[Gloria · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really enjoyed this one. Reminded me a bit.