Rewriting the nation's history, how is it to be done?
Rewriting the nation's history, how is it to be done?
JAKARTA (JP): History that serves only to glorify rulers
should never again be allowed to prevail. Historian Arnold
Toynbee's assertion that history is God's own footpaths is
perhaps too ideal, but at least current demands to open up "the
truth" behind versions taught in school should serve to remind
history writers they are no longer the court historians of bygone
kingdoms.
The Jakarta Post contacted writer Pramoedya Ananta Toer,
philosopher Mudji Sutrisno and historian Taufik Abdullah, to
discuss whether history could indeed be written free of rulers'
interests. Their reply: it's possible, but it's far from easy.
Taufik, a historian at the National Institute of Sciences
(LIPI), said that the key factor in writing history was honesty,
to express the truth.
"We cannot say that there is a certain method that historians
can refer to when writing history. There is no such method. We
historians only need honesty and willingness to find the true
facts," he said.
There are different kinds of history, he said; historical
facts and romanticization through stories and films.
There was no problem with romanticization, such as the
G30S/PKI film, he said. "But if it is repeated several times like
propaganda, (people will respond to it like) a myth; the next
step would be that it could be considered a fact."
Taufik did not elaborate.
He cited three types of historical writing, academic books,
popular books and textbooks for school children.
The first, he said, should be strictly based on historical
facts, as they were for scientific purposes.
Popular books do not have to refer strictly to facts, as their
aim is to entertain and to put across certain messages.
Textbooks should help students understand history. This type
of historical writing, Taufik said, was very much influenced by
what the government wanted the aim of history teaching to be.
This could be, for instance, the understanding of a country's
history, or the introduction of a new interpretation, he said,
again without elaborating.
"Generally speaking, the problems facing historians usually
come from sources. These could be living witnesses, written
documents or objects that could be used to explain the past.
Human beings tend to be subjective, written documents could be
forged, and historical objects could be fake or damaged, he said
of the three sources' respective weaknesses.
"Here in Indonesia -- I think this is also a problem --
historical writings after the 1950s were mostly written by
political scientists instead of historians," Taufik said.
He said historians have had difficulty finding sources free of
subjectivity to write the period following the 1950s.
It is no secret, Taufik added, that historians who have
written official versions, have agreed more or less to toe the
government line, or "followed the sponsors".
Pramoedya, one of the few Indonesian writers of world acclaim,
also said history writing should be "scientific" and that it must
side with nothing but the facts.
"So, we 'may' make mistakes in the matter of interpretation
and materials, but we must always side with the facts," said the
73-year-old author of the renowned historical romance trilogy
Bumi Manusia (This Earth of Mankind). Several of his books are
still banned.
Allowing mistakes means that it is human nature, Pramoedya
says, not what one can do as one pleases in compiling history.
And facts develop, he added. New facts might just as well come
out, say, 100 years after a certain chapter of history had been
written.
Presently, to revise the current chapter of the nation's
history -- especially regarding the post-1965 aborted coup blamed
on the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) -- Pramoedya suggested a
"Committee for the Revision of History". The government has
recently set up a team to review the curriculum, including
history.
"Its members should be chosen by the younger generation, as
older experts would have vested interests," he said.
Pramoedya himself would be an unlikely choice; he was an actor
in that controversial part of history. He was a leader of the
left-leaning Lekra literary organization, which senior writers
such as Taufik Ismail have testified waged ideological warfare
through its members' writings.
Unless history writing sides with nothing but the facts,
Pramoedya believed all efforts would only end up in "tragedy".
He said historians needed "intellectual courage" to challenge
the usually offered version of history.
"Over the past 32 years, the nation has been cheated because
our intellectuals lacked courage to challenge the official
version," according to Pramoedya.
Philosopher Mudji highlighted a rather different point to show
how history should be written. Instead of just "dead facts," he
said, history should be written to tell the struggle of
humankind, of civilizations, although those involved might only
be ordinary people and not any political elite.
What also deserves attention, said Mudji, who lectures at the
Jakarta Driyarkara Institute of Philosophy, is "a history of
mentality".
The history of the Javanese's and Sumatra's Minang mentality,
for instance, could be written to help serve as guidance to
understand why a certain ethnic group in power tends to produce a
certain type of political system, he said.
He cited that when the late Sukarno and Soeharto became old,
they increasingly treated the country "like they were their own."
One would argue this was universal of leaders being too long
in power but Mudji says an understanding of their cultural
backgrounds might shed light on the phenomena. The benefit of
such a study was apparent a few years ago when observers
reviewing Javanese values came up with a host of "violations" and
twisting of noble values by Soeharto.
This way of history writing could make history very exciting,
Mudji said. He cited how one would be amazed when entering a
Chinese temple to see different images of deities, some of which
would be a little affected by Western characteristics.
"We would learn to recognize our nation as a nation whose
mentality has developed through the years with all kinds of
layers," Mudji said, referring to influences of pre-historic
times and Hindu-Buddhism, China, Islam and the West.
Mudji suggests if history was taught to raise such an
awareness, the nation would learn that to get rid of one certain
element of society -- Chinese for instance -- would be tantamount
to getting rid of an element that formed the mentality of the
nation itself. (bnt/rei/aan)