数年前读过Paul A. Cohen的 discovering history in China:American historical writing on the recent Chinese Past的中译本。林同奇翻译的中文书名为《在中国发现历史:中国中心观在美国的兴起》,中文名的副标题并没有直译,直译的话应该是“美国对中国最近历史的叙述”,注意这儿的the recent Chinese Past不能翻译为中国近现代史,柯文反对“传统——现代”的历史二分法,故用the recent Chinese past 代替 the modern Chinese history一词,作者在书的开篇即有说明,林的翻译“中国中心观在美国的兴起”虽然点出了作者的主要观点,但是这并不是全书的主要内容,如果书的内容就是“中国中心观在美国的兴起”,那么这本书除了能激起中国人的自豪感而外并无多大价值,在美国学术界内部也得不到多大承认,以至于成为柯文的代表作了。说实话,当时看中译本看得云里雾里,觉得柯文没什么,他只是为了他跟老师唱反调,批评同行,以提高自己的声誉罢了,印象中最深的就是他不断地批评,却没有任何他自己真正有分量的东西,而且中译本有不少地方根本不通,看不懂说的是什么,所以我对此书的评价一直很低,还搞不懂中国人为什么推崇此书,也许是因为柯文提倡以中国为中心写历史迎合了我们而已,大家平心而论,有多少人正是因为这样才推崇这本书呢?(当然,是否真的读懂或者只是读过,那就值得拷问了)最近有同学需要此书的读书报告,我借此机会就把英文版找来好好读了一遍,发现和我原来读中译本的感觉完全不一样,我发现英文版中的柯文是娓娓道来,而不是像个刺猬似的随意刺人,柯文是一个了不起的哲学家,彻底改变了我对此书的印象。
中译本把副标题翻译为“中国中心观在美国的兴起”我想应该是出于商业的考虑,但是如果读一读英文版的,我们发现中国中心观在每一章中有提及,但是对中国中心观的阐述集中于最后一章,此书能启发人的地方不在于作者的中国中心观,而是作者对于美国中国史研究的反思的睿智和对历史学学科的哲学思考。
作者在此书中反复提及历史研究与过去的关系。作者认为每一个历史学家都是他的时代和环境以及个人观念的囚犯,所以对历史的考察,无一例外都是带有偏见的研究,所以得到只能是一种洞见,而不能窥其全豹,我们认为某些东西很重要,所以我们对历史提出了这样的问题和假设,而恰恰是这些我们关注的问题和假设使决定了我们在历史学中种种结论,但实际上我们忽略了许多历史中存在的东西,我们就把历史简单地化约为冲击-反应,传统与现代,所以后面的历史学家一旦改变了原有观念和假设,必将在历史中发现另外的东西,推翻前辈历史学家的结论。以此为思路,作者认真反省了美国研究中国史的三种主要方法:冲击——反应理论(compact-response approach),现代化理论(modernization approach),帝国主义理论(imperialism approach)。冲击反应理论是费正清的主要观点,认为中国近代史就是一部西方冲击(武力征服),中国为了寻求出路不得作出回应,学习西方,因此近代中国发生了巨大变化,由此中国传统与现代截然两分,得出了传统与现代(现代化理论)的研究思路。帝国主义理论与前两种方法也是如影随形,这是西方的帝国主义使得中国不得不回应西方。值得注意的是作者不是完全否定这三种研究方法,而是一一指出这三种方法的局限。作者认为任何一种理论都像物理学中的牛顿定律一样,有一个适用范围,牛顿定律是物理学中研究宏观物体的主要力学定律,能解决很多力学问题,但是却不适用于微观的分子、原子,任何理论都有一定的适用范围。作者认为对于冲击反应理论,最适用于研究近代的中外贸易和沿海港口城市,研究内陆则不适用。中国很多问题看似由于西方的冲击而引起的,但是中国古代也曾有过类似现象,只有从中国的传统中才能理解最近中国历史(the recent Chinese past)。比如戊戌维新变法,如果不从中国古代的改革传统中去理解,就很难明白康有为为什么要托古改制,又比如农民起义,表面上是受西方的影响,但是如果不从地理环境去研究中国区域史就很难理解为什么农民起义集中于一些特定区域。这些问题都需要跨出简单的冲击-反应模式才能寻找到答案。至于传统与现代理论,作者在书中说到,历史不是必然截然分为传统与现代,这种二分法本来就存在很大问题,把历史化分为传统与现代,就把过去与现在完全分开来了,所以我们对过去很多与现在相同东西就无法理解。帝国主义文化理论研究的是完全沦为半殖民地的国家,比如印度,但是中国则不然,中国是一个半殖民地国家,而且其影响主要集中在一些沿海地区,西方国家对中国的占领是小部分的、短暂的,西方国家主要目的在于贸易,真正有心蚕食中国领土的是俄国和日本,因此西方国家的帝国主义在物质层面是短暂的,但是另一方面,在精神层面却是持久和深刻的,这一点可谓一针见血,看看我们中国现在的整个学术局面就知道了,说现在中国的现代学术源头在西方毫不为过,中国人一波又一波留学海外足可说明此问题。作者在最后部分,提及了在美国在20世纪六、七十年时代,由于越战打得艰难,美国人失去了原有的那种自傲心态,于是在学术上也开始给予别国更多地位,中国史研究领域开始有不少学者批评前辈史学家的观点,兴起了史学新领域,比如中国区域史研究、市场体系研究、城市史研究,以及中国明清史研究(从古代史中探寻最近中国历史,这些进展表明美国中国史研究更趋深化和具体化,作者认为中国特点是多样性,层次性,所以不能笼统地研究中国,作者自己的相关研究中就把中国分为沿海和内陆,而G。William Skinner又从地理角度将中国分为九大区域:东北、北部,西北,长江上游,长江中游,长江下游,东南沿海,岭南,云贵地区。作者还提醒说,其实中国区域的划分不是固定不变的,应该根据所研究的问题进行划分,而且要注意不要习以为常地以行政划分(省州县)为标准,而应该以地理文化的因素来决定哪些地方可以化在一起,哪些不行,因为行政划分是人为的划分,不是地理和文化的区分。作者还总结性地说到,我们研究历史往往是根据历史家自己时代的价值观念和自己的偏见来看过去,如果要相对客观的话,我们必需从历史本身出发才能真正理解,所以研究中国史就必须从中国自身的脉络中才能理解中国史,这正是作者提出中国中心观(China—centered history)的理论依据。
综观全书,柯文是在自己的思维脉络中展开的一次对美国中国最近历史研究的哲学思考,而不是胡斯乱咬美国中国近代史研究的同行和前辈,但是我读中译本时却有如此这般印象,看来中译本真是误人不浅,所以还是劝大家读国外学术著作,最好读外文原著,不要读中译本。对于费正清的观点,我们怎么看呢?我想还是不能彻底否定的,只有站在前辈的肩上我们才能走得更远,这正如费正清自己所言:
How Can mankind move upward except by standing on the shoulders and faces of the older generation?(摘自该书开篇所引非正清语录)
美國的漢學研究起步很早。哥倫比亞大學東亞圖書館的第一套藏書來自於老佛爺慈禧的饋贈,這從側面表現出美國對於中國的研究熱情萌芽極早。至此書出版的一九九七年時,美國的漢學研究早經開枝散葉,無論是研究深度還是研究廣度都已經執世界漢學研究的牛耳了。在先秦與趙宋以後這兩個美國漢學界素所見重的歷史時期,研究成果尤其豐厚。
面對明清民國碩果累累生機勃勃的漢學研究成果,cohen同學不但沒有錦上添花地唱讚歌,反而抽絲剝繭言之鑿鑿地指出這些研究成果的謬誤與不足,僅此一點,其勇氣已足以讓慣於表揚與自我表揚的中國同行們無地自容。而cohen同學這種“蠹生於木還食其木”的求索精神也是美國漢學長盛不衰的要因之一罷。
更爲難能可貴的,是cohen同學不但有破而且有立,提出了新的研究思路與研究方法。十六年後的今天,二〇一三年,我們已經看得到美國漢學研究在他指出的研究向度上的進展與創獲,讓人對於這本書更生崇敬。
順便一提,école des annales對於histoire totale的追求在這本書裡得到了意外的囬應,我想,這一歷史的訴求終會再次得到人們的肯定與發揚。
全書文字極流暢,一氣呵成,閱讀體驗非常好。
具體內容我一如既往選擇三緘其口。想知道的還是去看書罷。
Paul A. Cohen’s Discovering History in China mainly reflects American historiography of “recent Chinese history” (in general, the nineteenth and twentieth century) since the postwar, points out its primary problems, and indicates a new trend, namely the China-oriented approach, in American historical writing in the end. In this book, Cohen handles three different, yet interlaced, approaches, to wit impact-response one, tradition-modernity one, and imperialism one, which had dominated American historical writing before the publication of this very book. As for the reason, or motive, why Cohen intends to write such as book, one involves several intellectual problems forming during his career. Between the publication of his first book (China and Christianity, 1963) and the second one (Between Tradition and Modernity, 1974), the outside environment experienced significant change (mainly the Vietnam War) which influenced the author greatly. For the first time, the author began to reflect his former thinking of China, gradually he doubted traditional approaches, and a new idea germinated. On the other hand, the relative scarcity of self-critical historiographical writing on the filed of recent Chinese history made the author feel discontented. Despite the fact that in late 1960s, a more critical perspective had grown, from the author’s eyes, it was too imperfect to be satisfied. These concern and uneasiness impelled the author to initiate this book.
In the first chapter, the target Cohen intends to assail is “impact-response” approach. This very conceptual framework bases on two basic assumptions, the first one is that “the confrontation with the West was the most significant influence on events in China”, the other one assumes that the role played by the West is active, while china took “a much more passive or reactive” one in this period. The main problem with this approach is that it’s too general, its intellectual realm is not clearly defined and delimited. Furthermore, the concept of West is not a definite notion, even the Westerns themselves couldn’t understand it very well. Two reasons may contribute to this phenomenon, the first one is that the West itself experienced tremendous change during the modern times, the other is that the West is a relative concept, and it’s not a unite and unidimensional idea. Therefore, the “total west”, or west as a monolith, never exist, let alone its impact on China. In reality, the West China encountered was only “a part of a whole”, and even this part changed over time. Moreover, the West confronted by China was not pure, the West mentioned by Chinese was, more often than not, the one created in Chinese minds, just as Cohen has described, it’s some kind of “hybridization”. The other trouble is that historians tend to discuss Chinese-response too abstractly. To illustrate his argument, Cohen reinterprets three sorts of Chinese historical events in recent times, rebellion, reform, and reaction. Under his narrative and analysis, these activities, rather than been regarded as responses to western impact by previous historians, mainly responded to Chinese own problems which had accumulated since eighteenth century or earlier.
In the end, the author provides a method to correct this approach, to contemplate and analyze China in three zones. The outermost zone, which was directly influenced by west; intermediate zone, which was activated or given direction, but was not actually brought into being, by the West; innermost zone, which stands for culture and society without been disturbed by the West. These zones were fluid, yet, and there were interactions between them, which forces us to speculate on this period of Chinese history from a dynamic perspective.
In the second chapter, Cohen tackles the “tradition-modernity” approach. This paradigm, from Cohen’s perspective, receives a great deal of influence from nineteenth century’s thoughts about China. The fundamental assumption shared by the historians of this paradigm, such as Joseph R. Levenson and Mary Wright, is consistent with nineteenth-century western view of China, regarding it as a “static, unchanging society, a society in a state of perpetual repose.” It was the modern West that activated static China, and its final fate would be a Western-styled modern society. In this sense, all kinds of transformation in modern China were influenced by the West, without West, it’s impossible for China to make any fundamental change during this period. Cohen, however, is not satisfied with this sort of interpretation of Chinese history, and unearths several severe problems involving in this very approach. One trouble is that there is no middle zone between “modern” and “tradition”, every historical event must be tilted by one or the other. In reality, yet, just as Schwartz claimed that some areas of human experience are not readily identifiable as either “traditional” or “modern”. Another lethal problem is the one described by J. H. Hexter, the “assumption of the conservation of historical energy”. From the “tradition-modernity” perspective, once the “modernity” wins a battle in certain area, then, the “tradition” must retreat from this very area proportionally, vice verse. It’s entirely possible, however, that both could make progress in certain period, since the “cake” they intend to divide might swell at the same time. A third problem with this approach is that it “employs concepts that neatly symmetrical to describe and explain realities that are fundamentally asymmetrical”. In the end, to get rid of the burden and difficulty imposed by modernization theory, Cohen recommends superseding it with another one, which is less Western-centered.
Toward the end of the 1960s, with the increasingly escalating of the Vietnam War, young American historians began to rethink the abovementioned two approaches which had dominated historiography over the past two decades. This new trend, Cohen denominates as “imperialism” approach, asserted that imperial invasion was the bane of modern Chinese backwardness, poverty, and chaos. Compared with the foregoing two chapters, the third one is much more controversial and debatable. Just as A. Feuerwerker has pointed out, the length of this chapter is not proportionate to the figures or thoughts Cohen intends to handle. Compare to J. K. Fairbank and Levenson, James Peck (Feuerwerker describes him as one “who knew little about China and was concerned mainly with America’s failings in Vietnam”) and Frances Moulder (“lacking any intimate knowledge of either China or Japan” depicted by Feuerwerker) are far less significant and influential in Chinese history area.
With respect to the internal problems of this very approach, the primary one is that it pays too much attention to exogenous factor. The advocates of this approach, such as James Peck and Frances Moulder, strongly backed the argument that the West was the most important, and sometimes the solo, element which hindered the development of China in modern times. It also implies that China itself alone couldn’t make tremendous change, only under the invasion of the West, could such change took place in China. Moreover, this approach fails to separate imperial influence from other Chinese self factors, and combine them together under the name of imperial invasion. Another problem is that the appropriateness of adopting the entire China economy as the only unit of analysis. Cohen suggests subdividing the whole China into different regions, and then analyzing exogenous influence on different regions respectively. The final problem involves the concept of imperialism. Chinese colonial framework, as Cohen has summarized, is “partial, multiple, and layered” , therefore the discussion of imperial influence on modern Chinese society must be more precisely than before.
The three approaches-the “impact-response” one, “tradition-modernity” one, and “imperialism” one-are three different variants in the same tone, they all establish on the “Western-centeredness”, just as Cohen has concluded, it “robs China of its autonomy and makes of it, in the end, an intellectual possession of the West.” Contrast to these Western-oriented approaches, ultimately, Cohen points out a new trend in American historical writing since the 1970s, which he designates as “China-oriented” approach. In the final chapter, he mainly discusses its four characteristics. The first one is that it “begins with Chinese problems set in a Chinese context”, which means these problems must be experienced by Chinese themselves and the criteria for judging the consequence of these very problems must be Chinese, rather than Western. Another identifying feature is that this approach attempts to comprehend China by dividing it into “smaller, more manageable spatial units”. Since China is so vast and complicated, different regions have respective languages, customs, traditions, and other material conditions, the generalization which is popular among the foregoing approaches should be replaced with differentiation, a more precise picture of Chinese history should be depicted by American historians. Furthermore, this sort of differentiation is applicable to separating Chinese hierarchy into various levels as well. Not only should we differentiate between the gentry and the peasant, but among the peasant, it should be divided into much more detailed strata. The final facet of the China-oriented approach is the combination of history with other disciplines, especially social sciences. By introducing the techniques and strategies of other disciplines, one could expand the field of history study and interpret history more precisely and closely.
Cohen’s Discovering History in China, just as Lloyd E. Eastman has asserted, “Every historian of China should read this book” , in this reflective work, he lays bare “the hidden assumptions that have informed and skewed much American research on nineteenth and twentieth century”. As a Chinese, I wonder that when could our historians write a book like this to reflect our historiography on modern Chinese history during the past century, to demonstrate the assumptions taken by previous historians (one may be the model of peasant war). I believe this would be a painstaking work, yet, it would be tremendous meaningful, since the first step to get rid of bad habits is to know its existence.
数年前读过Paul A. Cohen的 discovering history in China:American historical writing on the recent Chinese Past的中译本。林同奇翻译的中文书名为《在中国发现历史:中国中心观在美国的兴起》,中文名的副标题并没有直译,直译的话应该是“美国对中国最近历史的叙述”,注意这儿的the recent Chinese Past不能翻译为中国近现代史,柯文反对“传统——现代”的历史二分法,故用the recent Chinese past 代替 the modern Chinese history一词,作者在书的开篇即有说明,林的翻译“中国中心观在美国的兴起”虽然点出了作者的主要观点,但是这并不是全书的主要内容,如果书的内容就是“中国中心观在美国的兴起”,那么这本书除了能激起中国人的自豪感而外并无多大价值,在美国学术界内部也得不到多大承认,以至于成为柯文的代表作了。说实话,当时看中译本看得云里雾里,觉得柯文没什么,他只是为了他跟老师唱反调,批评同行,以提高自己的声誉罢了,印象中最深的就是他不断地批评,却没有任何他自己真正有分量的东西,而且中译本有不少地方根本不通,看不懂说的是什么,所以我对此书的评价一直很低,还搞不懂中国人为什么推崇此书,也许是因为柯文提倡以中国为中心写历史迎合了我们而已,大家平心而论,有多少人正是因为这样才推崇这本书呢?(当然,是否真的读懂或者只是读过,那就值得拷问了)最近有同学需要此书的读书报告,我借此机会就把英文版找来好好读了一遍,发现和我原来读中译本的感觉完全不一样,我发现英文版中的柯文是娓娓道来,而不是像个刺猬似的随意刺人,柯文是一个了不起的哲学家,彻底改变了我对此书的印象。
中译本把副标题翻译为“中国中心观在美国的兴起”我想应该是出于商业的考虑,但是如果读一读英文版的,我们发现中国中心观在每一章中有提及,但是对中国中心观的阐述集中于最后一章,此书能启发人的地方不在于作者的中国中心观,而是作者对于美国中国史研究的反思的睿智和对历史学学科的哲学思考。
作者在此书中反复提及历史研究与过去的关系。作者认为每一个历史学家都是他的时代和环境以及个人观念的囚犯,所以对历史的考察,无一例外都是带有偏见的研究,所以得到只能是一种洞见,而不能窥其全豹,我们认为某些东西很重要,所以我们对历史提出了这样的问题和假设,而恰恰是这些我们关注的问题和假设使决定了我们在历史学中种种结论,但实际上我们忽略了许多历史中存在的东西,我们就把历史简单地化约为冲击-反应,传统与现代,所以后面的历史学家一旦改变了原有观念和假设,必将在历史中发现另外的东西,推翻前辈历史学家的结论。以此为思路,作者认真反省了美国研究中国史的三种主要方法:冲击——反应理论(compact-response approach),现代化理论(modernization approach),帝国主义理论(imperialism approach)。冲击反应理论是费正清的主要观点,认为中国近代史就是一部西方冲击(武力征服),中国为了寻求出路不得作出回应,学习西方,因此近代中国发生了巨大变化,由此中国传统与现代截然两分,得出了传统与现代(现代化理论)的研究思路。帝国主义理论与前两种方法也是如影随形,这是西方的帝国主义使得中国不得不回应西方。值得注意的是作者不是完全否定这三种研究方法,而是一一指出这三种方法的局限。作者认为任何一种理论都像物理学中的牛顿定律一样,有一个适用范围,牛顿定律是物理学中研究宏观物体的主要力学定律,能解决很多力学问题,但是却不适用于微观的分子、原子,任何理论都有一定的适用范围。作者认为对于冲击反应理论,最适用于研究近代的中外贸易和沿海港口城市,研究内陆则不适用。中国很多问题看似由于西方的冲击而引起的,但是中国古代也曾有过类似现象,只有从中国的传统中才能理解最近中国历史(the recent Chinese past)。比如戊戌维新变法,如果不从中国古代的改革传统中去理解,就很难明白康有为为什么要托古改制,又比如农民起义,表面上是受西方的影响,但是如果不从地理环境去研究中国区域史就很难理解为什么农民起义集中于一些特定区域。这些问题都需要跨出简单的冲击-反应模式才能寻找到答案。至于传统与现代理论,作者在书中说到,历史不是必然截然分为传统与现代,这种二分法本来就存在很大问题,把历史化分为传统与现代,就把过去与现在完全分开来了,所以我们对过去很多与现在相同东西就无法理解。帝国主义文化理论研究的是完全沦为半殖民地的国家,比如印度,但是中国则不然,中国是一个半殖民地国家,而且其影响主要集中在一些沿海地区,西方国家对中国的占领是小部分的、短暂的,西方国家主要目的在于贸易,真正有心蚕食中国领土的是俄国和日本,因此西方国家的帝国主义在物质层面是短暂的,但是另一方面,在精神层面却是持久和深刻的,这一点可谓一针见血,看看我们中国现在的整个学术局面就知道了,说现在中国的现代学术源头在西方毫不为过,中国人一波又一波留学海外足可说明此问题。作者在最后部分,提及了在美国在20世纪六、七十年时代,由于越战打得艰难,美国人失去了原有的那种自傲心态,于是在学术上也开始给予别国更多地位,中国史研究领域开始有不少学者批评前辈史学家的观点,兴起了史学新领域,比如中国区域史研究、市场体系研究、城市史研究,以及中国明清史研究(从古代史中探寻最近中国历史,这些进展表明美国中国史研究更趋深化和具体化,作者认为中国特点是多样性,层次性,所以不能笼统地研究中国,作者自己的相关研究中就把中国分为沿海和内陆,而G。William Skinner又从地理角度将中国分为九大区域:东北、北部,西北,长江上游,长江中游,长江下游,东南沿海,岭南,云贵地区。作者还提醒说,其实中国区域的划分不是固定不变的,应该根据所研究的问题进行划分,而且要注意不要习以为常地以行政划分(省州县)为标准,而应该以地理文化的因素来决定哪些地方可以化在一起,哪些不行,因为行政划分是人为的划分,不是地理和文化的区分。作者还总结性地说到,我们研究历史往往是根据历史家自己时代的价值观念和自己的偏见来看过去,如果要相对客观的话,我们必需从历史本身出发才能真正理解,所以研究中国史就必须从中国自身的脉络中才能理解中国史,这正是作者提出中国中心观(China—centered history)的理论依据。
综观全书,柯文是在自己的思维脉络中展开的一次对美国中国最近历史研究的哲学思考,而不是胡斯乱咬美国中国近代史研究的同行和前辈,但是我读中译本时却有如此这般印象,看来中译本真是误人不浅,所以还是劝大家读国外学术著作,最好读外文原著,不要读中译本。对于费正清的观点,我们怎么看呢?我想还是不能彻底否定的,只有站在前辈的肩上我们才能走得更远,这正如费正清自己所言:
How Can mankind move upward except by standing on the shoulders and faces of the older generation?(摘自该书开篇所引费正清语录)