18世纪的英国与西班牙——能将两部帝国史纳入同一宏大叙事吗?
Eighteenth-Century Britain and Spain: Do Their Imperial Histories Fit into a Common Grand Narrative?
-
摘要: 帝国史向来被视作大国兴衰交替的徵象;更确切地说,它常被视作一种历史进程的线性书写。然而大英帝国和西班牙帝国的经历却并不符合这种书写模式。本文不仅探讨了大英帝国与西班牙帝国的帝国史,同时也涉及许多其他帝国——它们有些在历史长河中昙花一现,有的则万古长青。大英帝国与西班牙帝国的帝国史彰显了某些异于主流的兴衰模式,这些模式与历史连续性的强大力量交相辉映、相得益彰。一方面,它们受到特定环境和全球力量失衡的影响而得以成型;另一方面,它们又拥有自身的影响力,在国际历史舞台上长盛不衰。因此光从偶然性层面来看待大英帝国和西班牙帝国的帝国史是远远不够的。我们还需要审视这些大国内外的力量平衡,以及全球社会的风云变幻对帝国性与民族性的结构性影响。历史不是对混沌的随意书写,而是对复杂性的秩序化。Abstract: This essay, first presented as a 2009 conference paper on comparative British/Spanish history in the eighteenth century, was written in 2012 and has been revised/updated in 2019. Imperial histories have often been interpreted as cycles of rise and fall; or, alternatively, as linear tales of progress. Neither the British nor the Spanish experiences fitted into such neat models of historical change. The discussion explores their case histories, and considers also many other empires-some dramatically short-lived, others showing great longevity. Instead, the British and Spanish empires exemplified trends of growth/collapse, which were crosscut with the ballasting forces of continuity. They sprang from specific circumstances and global powerimbalances; and they then became operational factors in their own right, proving both long-lasting and historically influential. It is not satisfactory therefore to interpret their histories as purely framed by accident and contingency. The balance of power and resistance to power with and outside these global empires was crucial-as well as the framing context of changing social attitudes to empire and nationhood. History is not a tale of randomised chaos but one of organised complexity.
-
Key words:
- empires /
- Britain /
- Spain /
- meta-historical models /
- organised complexity /
- trialectics
-
[1] Adelman, Jeremy, ed. Colonial Legacies:The Problem of Persistence in Latin American History. New York:Routledge, 1999. [2] Brown, Judith M. and Louis, Wm. Roger, eds. Oxford History of the British Empire, IV:The Twentieth Century. Oxford:Oxford University Press, 1999. [3] Canny, Nicholas, ed. Oxford History of the British Empire, I. The Origins of Empire. Oxford:Oxford University Press, 1998. [4] Compagnon, Antoine. The Five Paradoxes of Modernity. Translated by Franklin Philip. New York:Columbia University Press, 1994. [5] Corfield, Penelope J. "POST-Medievalism, Modernity, Postmodernity?" Rethinking History 14/3(2010):379-404. [6] ——. Time and the Shape of History. London:Yale University Press, 2007. [7] Eliade, Mircea. The Myth of the Eternal Return:Cosmos and History. Translated by W. R. Trask. London:Arkana, 1989. [8] Elliott, John H. Empires of the Atlantic World:Britain and Spain in America, 1492-1830. New Haven:Yale University Press, 2006. [9] ——. Spain, Europe and the Wider World, 1500-1800. New Haven:Yale University Press, 2009. [10] Fradera, Josep M. The Imperial Nation:Citizens and Subjects in the British, French, Spanish, and American Empires. Translated by Ruth MacKay. Princeton:Princeton University Press, 2018. [11] Gallagher, John A. The Decline, Revival and Fall of the British Empire. Cambridge:Cambridge University Press, 1982. [12] Hillgarth, Jocelyn N. The Mirror of Spain, 1500-1700:The Formation of a Myth. Ann Arbor:University of Michigan Press, 2003. [13] Kamen, Henry. Imagining Spain:Historical Myth and National Identity. New Haven:Yale University Press, 2008. [14] Lamikiz, Xabier. Trade and Trust in the Eighteenth-Century Atlantic World:Spanish Merchants and their Overseas Networks. London:Royal Historical Society/Boydell Press, 2010. [15] Mariana, Juan de. Historia General de España. Toledo:1592. [16] Marshall, Peter J., ed. Oxford History of the British Empire, II:The Eighteenth Century. Oxford:Oxford University Press, 1998. [17] Maltby, William S. The Rise and Fall of the Spanish Empire. Basingstoke:Macmillan, 2009. [18] Mommsen, Wolfgang J. Theories of Imperialism. London:Weidenfeld, 1980. [19] Porter, Andrew, ed. Oxford History of the British Empire, III:The Nineteenth Century. Oxford:Oxford University Press, 1999. [20] Swinburne, Henry. Travels through Spain, in the Years 1775 and 1776. London:1779. [21] Thomas, Hugh. Rivers of Gold:The Rise of the Spanish Empire from Columbus to Magellan. London:Penguin, 2013. [22] Thomson, James K. J. Decline in History:The European Experience. Cambridge:Polity Press, 1998. [23] Toynbee, Arnold J. A Study of History. Abr. ed. London:Oxford University Press, 1972. [24] Winks, Robin W., ed. Oxford History of the British Empire, V:Historiography. Oxford:Oxford University Press, 1999. [25] Yun-Casalilla, Bartolomé. Iberian World Empires and the Globalisation of Europe, 1415-1668. Basingstoke:Palgrave Macmillan, 2018.
点击查看大图
计量
- 文章访问数: 1283
- HTML全文浏览量: 47
- PDF下载量: 382
- 被引次数: 0