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Historism (Italian: storicismo) is a philosophical and historiographical theory, founded in 19th-century[1] Germany (as Historismus) and especially influential in 19th- and 20th-century Europe. In those times there was not a single natural, humanistic or philosophical science that would not reflect, in one way or another, the historical type of thought (cf. comparative historical linguistics etc.).[1] It pronounces the historicity of humanity and its binding to tradition.
Historist historiography rejects historical teleology and bases its explanations of historical phenomena on sympathy and understanding (see Hermeneutics) for the events, acting persons, and historical periods. The historist approach takes to its extreme limits the common observation that human institutions (language, Art, religion, law, State) are subject to perpetual change.[2]
Historism is not to be confused with historicism,[3] nevertheless the English habits of using both words are very similar. (The term historism is sometimes reserved to identify the specific current called Historismus in the tradition of German philosophy and historiography.)[2]
- ^ a b Spirkin, Alexander (1990), Fundamentals of Philosophy., translated by Syrovatkin, Sergei, Moscow: Progress Publishers, ISBN 978-5-01-002582-3, retrieved 15 January 2011First published in 1988, as “Основы философии”
{{citation}}: CS1 maint: postscript (link) - ^ a b Boudon, Raymond; Bourricaud (1989). "Historicism". A Critical Dictionary of Sociology. Routledge. p. 198. ISBN 9780415017459.
- ^ Historicism in the sense given to it by Karl Popper, namely the search for historical laws.