FERNAND BRAUDEL - La Longue Durée and Multidimensional timeframes
In the year of 1958 the French historian
Fernand Braudel published an article by the name of La longue durée which has had an huge impact on the discipline of
history. Braudel was undoubtedly one of the twentieth century’s most influential
historians and as he promoted a certain geographical focus it could be
interesting to investigate the application of his theories unto an urban
material.
According to Braudel, time moves in different ways and he divides time into three
different timelines. The first, and the most central to Braudels history, is La longue durée the most tough and slow
of the three timelines. La longue durée is
the aspects of the human world that was almost unchanging in character and
form, where change only can be created from long periods of time. This timeline
is characterized by different structures, a structure being those created
phenomenon and constellations that have almost completely withstood the test of
time. Geographical relationships are a good example of this, where nature and
climate have formed the possibilities and boundaries of human life. The second
timeline is the Economic and Social one, which is faster in changing yet still
moving so slow that changes not necessarily will be recognized during a persons
lifetime. The third and fastest timeline is the time of Politics and Events,
what Braudel called “quick history”. This third timeline is not concerned with
surroundings and larger contexts (Elgán, E. 2010:740-43).
Braudel was but a part of a larger movement,
mostly based in France, called the Annales
School. Of the persons involved in this movement, Braudel became
undoubtedly the most famed and influential. La
longue durée was central to the Annales School and history according to
them was not entirely determined by humanity. External forces such as geography
and climate have a huge influence on the formation of human society, and it is
therefore vital to study these themes in combination with for an example
politics and economics (Trevor-Roper 1972:470-71).
Before Braudel, historians had mainly
studied the “quick” history or histoire
événementielle. This was still central in the work of Braudel and the
Annales school, was so to speak just the “tip of the iceberg”. The
multidimensional history described above had yet been quite unexplored and
required a total multidisciplinary approach. This was quite revolutionary around
the 60s and enabled previously quite “dead” material to be studied once more
through an other perspective (Trevor-Roper 1972).
What
potentials are there in studying medieval urban society in the manner of
Braudel and his fellows? This is an interesting question and various
researchers have through the years applied the perspective of la longue durée to medieval material. I
am not yet up to date on how much influence Braudel has had on the discipline
of archaeology, but I recall a comment on the matter in Kristina Carlssons
doctors thesis Var Går Gränsen?
(2007) and it cannot therefore be totally non-existent. Of course, it could be
argued that Landscape Archeology in general is concerned with the structures of
la longue durée but as we have said
the wider scope is paradoxically rather ignored and so are the long timeframes
especially in historical landscape archaeology. As a postmodernist would argue:
Historical archaeology does not necessary have to be confined to historical
timeframes, which indeed are modern constructions and not absolutely related to
a past way of thinking. It could therefore be interesting to study the location
of towns in a long-time perspective, say for a 1000 years or more. The location
of prehistoric settlements for example in relation to medieval ones, could
provide interesting information into possible continuity or discontinuity.
What locations are people drawn to and why?
This is an interesting question to which many levels of study can be applied.
Braudel tempts us to study how the geography of an area could have influenced
human settlement and for someone with a quite environmental deterministic approach
such as me it is tempting to merely study how settlements relate to natural
phenomenon such as rivers, mountains, forests etc. But Braudel did not argue
for just focusing on these types of la
longue durée, and we must not confine ourselves to one dimension of time. We
need to be multidimensional. Especially
in studying urban areas, it is important to recognize the fact that geography
is not merely nature, it is also human. A location may be attractive not only
because of the proximity to an ocean, but also because of symbolical meanings
imbued upon the land or of humanly created geographical factors such as
borders. Urban studies should therefore not seek one single reality (as there
may have been several, depending on scope and through whose eyes we are watching)
and Braudel gives us the means to apply several realities through the
application of multi-dimensional timeframes.
REFERENCES:
Elgán, E. (2010). Fernand
Braudels artikel “La Longue Durée” och svensk historieskrivning idag – några
reflexioner. I Historisk Tidskrift
130:4
Länk: http://www.historisktidskrift.se/fulltext/2010-4/pdf/HT_2010_4_739-749_elgan.pdf
Trevor-Roper,
H.R. (1972) Fernand Braudel, the Annales
and the Mediterranean. In Journal of
Modern History, Vol 44, No. 4. Chicago Press. Ss. 468-79
Inga kommentarer:
Skicka en kommentar