ANTi-history

Abstract

ANTi-History (AH) is a postmodern historiographical approach. It relies on actor-network theory (ANT) to expose the sociology of knowledge (in this case believed truth-claims supporting a historical narrative). AH privileges the empirical by searching data, the traces of the past, and permitting them to assemble themselves through the cartological approaches of ANT. As these actors, people, things, and ideas assemble, they expose possible histories and the nature of assemblages which have led to published histories. AH asks how these traces assembled into this history. Every set of events is experienced by many, and the story of those events is also told differently by each actor. These plural perspectives are often distilled by authors who themselves are socially constituent in an actor network, resulting in an account which serves that network and may write out the experiences of others. Ultimately, history is plural, and AH seeks to emancipate that plurality.