Critical historiography and the problem of judgment
| Published date | 01 July 2023 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/14748851221098188 |
| Date | 01 July 2023 |
| Subject Matter | Symposium on Tomba's Insurgent Universality |
Critical historiography and
the problem of judgment
Linda M. G. Zerilli
University of Chicago, Chicago, USA
Abstract
Max Tomba aims to reconstruct how historical actors reconstructed the past to open
the future in ways that diverged from the trajectory of the dominant modernity.
Insurgent Universality would break open the dead logic of the juridical, political, and eco-
nomic trajectory of modernity that limits what is given and constrains what is possible.
This essay reflects on the practice and the role of the historian. Beyond merely adopting
insurgents’perspectives, the historian must engage in a practice of critical and reflective
judgment. The essay draws on Michel-Rolph Trouillot on the silencing of the past,
Reinhard Koselleck on the priority of the future, and Marisa Fuentes on the limits of
the archives for voicing marginalized points of view. It concludes by calling for judgment
and imagination where the archives run dry.
Keywords
Universalism, historiography, judgment, critique, Tomba
Max Tomba has written an exciting book which reinvigorates debates about what univer-
sality can mean in a world of failed universalisms. To narrate insurgent universality,
Tomba reconstructs the manner in which historical actors themselves reconstructed the
past to open the future in ways that diverged from the trajectory of the dominant modern-
ity. The point here is not so much to make visible the actions of those who have been left
out of the classic accounts. Valuable though that may be, Tomba’s project is more ambi-
tious than any alternative historiography of the oppressed and the forgotten. It is to reacti-
vate their stories in the service of a project that aims to “extrac[t] from the past futures that
have been blocked and which are alternatives to the present”(Tomba, 2019: 14)—or,
more exactly, which are alternatives to our present. Narrating the stories of those
Corresponding author:
Linda M. G. Zerilli, University of Chicago, 360 W Illinois St. Apt 602, Chicago, IL 60654, USA.
Email: lmgzerilli@uchicago.edu
Symposium on Tomba’sInsurgent Universality
European Journal of Political Theory
2023, Vol. 22(3) 490–495
© The Author(s) 2022
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DOI: 10.1177/14748851221098188
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