1994/01/01 by Heather Sutherland · 1 citation
Social Sciences · #Asian Studies and History #Philippine History and Culture
paper · pdf · doi:10.1163/22134379-90003071
openalex publication_date 1994/01/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/05/06
There are two obvious ways of writing about the 'state of Indonesian history'. The first could be called Rankean: objective, scientific, and buttressed with a scholarly apparatus of typologies, tables, inventories and notes. The second is more post-modern: aware of artifice, admitting the influence of context, accepting subjectivity, and sensitive to the need for disclosure. This essay is closer to the latter than the former. In a compromise that is perhaps typical of much contemporary history writing, it concedes a fundamental subjectivity, but hopes to achieve some measure of respectability by considering a few external sources and paying attention to circumstances.