Paradigm Shifts in Historical Theory Since 1990: Memory, Trauma, and the Performative Turn

The landscape of historical theory witnessed a significant transformation around 1990, propelled primarily by the ascendancy of memory studies. This new agenda introduced core issues that expanded beyond the established debates over historical explanation and representation. Specifically, three interconnected themes gained prominence: the problem of 'The Other', the confrontation with the traumatic past, and the understanding of language as a form of action or performative practice. These shifts have fundamentally redirected theoretical inquiry within the discipline.

The first major change involves a critical focus on the subjects of historical representation. Influenced by multiculturalism and postmodernism, the unitary epistemological Self fragmented into multiple, often contesting, Collective Selves—such as those defined by gender, race, ethnicity, and class. This "de-centering" dismantled the ideal of a subjectless 'objectivity', forcing historians to confront the inherent perspectivity of all historical narratives. Consequently, modern historiography must integrate this plurality of viewpoints, acknowledging the perspectives of both the historical actors and the author.

Second, the influence of memory studies shifted attention toward traumatic experiences. Following the trail of Holocaust studies, scholarship became overwhelmingly devoted to traumatic memories and victim perspectives. This emphasis extended the earlier "history from below" approaches of social, gender, and subaltern history, focusing on historically repressed and silenced voices. Trauma, however, poses a unique challenge by destabilizing history's foundational linear time conception, as the traumatic past persists disturbingly into the present.

The third change is exemplified by the interest in Foucaultian discourse analysis and the performative turn in language theory, indebted to J. L. Austin and John Searle. Both lines of analysis are grounded in the insight that language is not merely a medium of representation but a form of social action. This perspective traces back to Wilhelm von Humboldt and reshapes how historians analyze texts and concepts, viewing them as active forces within networks of power.

The Performative Turn and Language as Action. Michel Foucault's approach reconceptualizes history as a critical "history of the present," examining the "microphysics of power." His social constructivist theory of 'power/knowledge' posits that disciplines establish 'truth regimes'—sets of rules that define normality, truth, and legitimacy, thereby governing mechanisms of inclusion and exclusion. Edward Said famously applied this framework to 'orientalism', arguing it was a discursive product of Western imperialism that constructed 'the Orient' through a process of 'Othering'. This analysis fueled the rise of postcolonial theory.

Similarly, the Cambridge School, including Quentin Skinner, built on speech act theory to argue that understanding historical texts requires grasping the author's intended action within a specific context or 'language game'. The meaning of an utterance, like a command or a treaty, is constituted by the performative act itself. Judith Butler extended this logic to gender, arguing that identities are constituted through repetitive performative acts rather than being pre-existing.

Trauma, Time, and Historical Wounds. The study of trauma fundamentally challenges history's linear time conception. Traumatic experience denies "the pastness of the past," creating a durational time (as articulated by Lawrence Langer) that persists into the present, unlike irreversible chronological time. This phenomenon unsettles representationalism, the idea that the past exists only through representations. Scholars like Eelco Runia argue the past is also present in the unrepresented, such as in involuntary memory.

Dipesh Chakrabarty introduced the concept of 'historical wounds' to analyze trauma from past injustices. These wounds are a dialogical mix of history and memory, dependent on political recognition by perpetrator groups and linked to universal human rights. They illustrate the interdependency of history, politics, law, and ethics. Berber Bevernage further argues that the distinction between past and present is itself a performative act, a contested political outcome evident in the workings of truth commissions.

The Crisis of Objectivity and Spatial Frameworks. These developments have turned the discipline's notion of 'objectivity' into an urgent problem. Since Leopold von Ranke, temporal distance was considered a prerequisite for objectivity, allowing partisan perspectives to fade. This link explains the late emergence of contemporary history as a legitimate specialization. The connection between time, distance, and objectivity was central to historicism (Historismus).

A parallel critique addresses history's unreflective spatial frameworks. Historically, the discipline implicitly adopted the nation-state as its natural container, with historians often identifying with national narratives. "Objectivity" was thus conceived as supra-partisanship within the national space. Only recently, with postcolonial, transnational, and global history, has this spatial framing become an explicit problem, challenging the "waiting hall" idea that positioned non-Western worlds as historically behind.

Conclusion: The Return of the Repressed. In the 21st century, historical theory observes a remarkable return to problems of historical ontology—regarding time, space, and the nature of social objects—and to the relationship between history and politics, law, and ethics. These were once dismissed as pseudo-problems under empiricism, making their resurgence a theoretical "return of the repressed." Simultaneously, epistemological and methodological debates persist, enriched by new media (visual turn, digitization) and a lasting awareness from narrativism that all historical knowledge is perspectival and representationally mediated. The theoretical journey initiated around 1990 continues to deepen the discipline's self-reflexivity, confirming the enduring necessity of theoretical engagement in historical practice.