CRITERIA OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE AND ROLE OF IDEOLOGY IN H. WHITE'S LINGUISTIC THEORY OF HISTORY

Abstract

Steady expansion of the research space of historical science occurs under the influence of active integration of various disciplines. However, noncritical methodology adoption results in the loss of understanding of the studied subject specificity. Unlike the traditional historiographic analysis, the American historian H. White to resorted to literary criticism while researching the historical texts of the XIXth century and came to the conclusion that historical cognition has an artistic nature. The article examines H. White’s views on the basis of which the concepts of historical development cannot have a scientific status. They acquire “objective value” only in accordance with ideological discourses. The retrospective analysis of the views given shows them as a result of nonconstructive criticism of the historiographic practice in the period of renovating of the theoretical and methodological base of historical science in second half of the XXth century.