Paths, Possibilities, and Promises of Doing “Contemporary” History

Can there be a history of “contemporary” past? What constitutes “contemporary history”? What are the prospects of reading contemporary history? How is School of Liberal Studies at UPES leading the way in this direction?

Contemporary history is not an oxymoron, and it exists with pride and promise in history departments across the world.

The Institute of Contemporary History in London has an operative definition of the term contemporary history. Simply put, contemporary history is the history of the twentieth century. As a separate specialisation, it describes the historical period from approximately 1945 to the present. It is significantly marked by teaching and researching various landmark events of twentieth century, such as, but not limited to, decolonisation, democratisation, countercultures (related to sex, race, gender, class, caste, religion); recently also covering climate, environment, technology, and planet as a whole. A contemporary history specialist may cover any and every concern that plagues human society today, an understanding of which requires a historical analysis. Using historicity to contextualise and situate the pressing matters of the present can offer multifaceted insights, expediting a way forward in the twenty first century.

Institutions were established in Europe since the 1930s to study recent past. The first institute to have used the term as part of its name was the Institute of Contemporary History, established in the early 1930s in the Netherlands, and then brought to London in 1939. The founders wanted the world to know what was happening in Nazi Germany. Since then, it has transformed itself into a leading centre for the study of the Holocaust, anti-Semitism and neo-Nazism. In Britain, the emergence of contemporary history as a distinctive academic discipline began to take place in the 1980s. Many of the contentious issues centred around the interpretations of the behaviour of the political parties and elites in relation to the setting up of the welfare state after the traumas of the Second World War.

To better study and analyse this contested recent past, using historical and other academic methodologies, the Institute of Contemporary British History (now Centre for Contemporary British History (CCBH)) was established in 1986 and since then it has acted as a focal point for historians. The need to study a recent past also led to the establishment of similar centres for contemporary history in other parts of Europe, e.g. the Federal Republic of Germany, the Czech Republic, Slovenia and Romania. However, in other countries the development of contemporary history was arguably more the result of a need to employ historical and related methodologies, such as oral history and women’s studies to name just two, in order to open up the recent past.

Is contemporary history same as current events or current affairs? No, it is not.

Practitioners of contemporary history make a conscious distinction between immediate present, recent past, and distant past. To borrow words from Louis Halle, “…the essential difference between current events and history, whether contemporary or otherwise, is qualitative rather than chronological.” Halle made a strong objection to comparing contemporary historians with journalists. He wrote, they are two different persons with “quite different faculties of observation”.

Objections are raised regarding doing contemporary history. Many of these are concerned about the lack of official records to write and research contemporary history. Such objections seem to be more a created one than a real one. Archival sources, contrary to the claims, for most contemporary historians have been generally plentiful. Most modern states have relatively good record keeping practices and, the quantity and quality of organised paper archival material has been abundant. Additionally, the interconnectedness of modern states, and digital humanities and technology has made records accessible, and readily available. The contemporary history field has also endorsed sources which were considered inapt previously. Some examples of this new source material are newspapers, press periodicals, audio-visual content, cartoons, songs, posters, political party booklets, booklets related with films and culture, speeches, magazines, etc.

Such vastness of archives has enabled the practitioners of contemporary history question the inclination of providing grading to one kind of source over the other, privileging government records ‘securely’ kept in state archives. Also, inter and trans-disciplinarity has made things easier for the contemporary historians. Interdisciplinary links are equally important for them. For instance, those interested in political history have to be aware of the work of political scientists; in constitutional development, with legal studies; and in social history, with the work of sociologists, anthropologists and other social scientists.

More and more historians and students are taking interest in contemporary history, in India as well as abroad. The Centre for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS) offered a two-month intensive course on researching the contemporary, where media and historical method was an essential unit of analysis. Vinay Lal, an Indian historian based at UCLA, offers a course on Political and Cultural History of Contemporary India. The Nehru Memorial Museum & Library (NMML) (now Prime Ministers Museum & Library (PMML)) has a centre for studies in Contemporary India, and also provides senior and junior research/visiting fellowships to scholars working on contemporary India, including historians. Ramachandra Guha’s New India Foundation supports publications of books/works on contemporary India. Some of the recent publications on history of contemporary India include titles on Films Division, and Planned Economy.

Appealing the historians to contribute in the vast and historically unexplored territory of contemporary India, Ramachandra Guha carefully selected certain themes that demanded a historian’s attention. These included, social history of elections in India with special focus on the role caste plays, a historical study of the linguistic reorganisation of states, protests, struggles, social and agrarian movements, history of institutions and policy history, etc. He believed, “Seen from the perspectives of the disciplines, the orientations of the historian [on these subjects] are different from that of the sociologist and the political scientist; seen from the perspective of human knowledge as a whole, they are also complementary.”Pushing further for contemporary India’s history writing project, Guha wrote, ““The India of the 1950s, the 1960s, the 1970s – this was an extraordinary country living through extraordinarily interesting times…. Never before had a society so large and so diverse sought to make itself into a single territorial unit; never before had a population so over-whelmingly poor and illiterate based its political system on universal adult franchise.”

How is the History programme at SOLS accommodating contemporary history?

One of the assignments given to the History students was the creation of the state of Uttarakhand (2000). The students successfully planned an exhibition, using maps, images from the movement, and newspaper clippings. The assignment was a training in historical method and contemporary history.

Apart from a fully focused core course on history of contemporary India (1947-1992), the History programme at SOLS, UPES, does engage actively with contemporary history of India, South Asia, and Asia. The program features various courses on ecology and sustainability, social justice, leaders of modern Asia, India’s intellectual history, Partition of India, migration and citizenship, medicine, educational policy in India, introduction to Indian cinema, culture and governance, legal history, Gandhian approaches to peace and conflict, and women’s movement, etc. These courses are rooted in present concerns of India, and trains the student to look at them from a historical lens, aiming at formulating a long-term and sustainable solution for a better tomorrow. The History program at SOLS is a fascinating incorporation of learning about the most remote and distant pasts, to more recent and immediate pasts. In the process, the programme never loses sight of the importance of the rigour of historical methodology, and does not fall prey to any populist approach. The programme, in the most committed way, prepares a history graduate to face the peculiar challenges of job-market, or further higher studies.

The writer is Dr. Sudha Tiwari, Assistant Professor (History), School of Liberal Studies