Historical narrative as a means for the reconstruction of historical memory

Abstract

The paper examines historical narrative in a diachronic aspect, to which historians and philosophers of the 20th century have been ambivalent. Historical narrative as one of the ways of presenting and interpreting historical events, characterised by the consistency of the presentation of material, consideration of the causes and consequences of specific events, can take many forms due to the wide variety of purposes faced by historians, including both printed material and visual material embodied in documentaries and feature films. The importance of historical narrative in historical discourse is considerable. Historical narrative is not limited to the description of facts and events, it contributes to the formation of the perception of history from the position of the historian who created it, since the world view of the historian is conditioned by his or her milieu. The aims and objectives of this article are to analyse the arguments put forward by supporters and opponents of historical narrative; to identify the scale and type of events that allow their representation in the form of historical narrative. The results of the research show that historical narrative plays a key role in the perception and understanding of the world of the past. The research methods consist of analysis and synthesis of the studied narratives, coding, inductive and deductive methods, necessary to identify the patterns of the narratives’ themes. As a result of the research conducted, it was established that historical narrative plays an important role not only in the understanding and perception of historical events by the recipient, but also in the formation of his/her historical memory.

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