The distortion of history, which constitutes the denial of historical crimes, is called negationism. In attempting to revise the past, illegitimate historical revisionism uses techniques inadmissible in proper historical discourse. These include tactics such as presenting known forged documents as genuine, inventing ingenious, but implausible, reasons for distrusting genuine documents, attributing ones own conclusions to books and sources reporting the opposite, manipulating statistics to shape perspectives and deliberately mis-translating writings.
According to many scholars, the study of history has always been of a controversial nature. Truth about events, occasions and happenings of the past get so twisted that it becomes difficult to prove the realities set forth by various trusted sources. But the fact is that historical facts remain in a state of crisis. National educational modules have been intended to ingrain in students a wide range of ‘key concepts’ like ‘chronological comprehension’, ‘social, ethnic and religious diversity’, ‘change and congruity’, ‘cause and outcome’, ‘importance’ and ‘interpretation’.
These concepts are lagging far behind in requisite critical thinking. Many consider it hard to put the historical episodes they studied within any coherent, long-term narrative. They are only aware of particular occasions, events, characters and periods. Their chronological comprehension is often immature thus they find it difficult to link incidents with developments. The problem is not only with the theory but with the practical application of these concepts in educational institutions.
Many consider it hard to put the historical episodes they have studied within any coherent, long-term narrative. They are only aware of particular occasions, events, characters and periods. Their chronological comprehension is often immature, thus they find it difficult to link incidents with developments
History is emphatically not being made available “to all” in schools and universities. Too few students, especially in the public sector, spend too little time engaging in study methods which allow them to gain a grasp of history. And what they study lacks all cohesion.
The use of national and religious rhetoric has been intensified in history syllabi in Pakistan. For instance, the ideology of Pakistan occupies a central position in all history textbooks and is defined as follows:
“… that guiding principle which has been accepted by the Muslims of the majority regions of the South Asian subcontinent and which allows them to lead their lives individually and collectively, according to the principles of Islam.” (MD Zafar, Pakistan Studies for Medical Students)
Shireen Mazari’s book on the issue of Kargil is a classic example of distortion of history, in which she asserts that the Kargil operation was planned only to counter moves expected by the Indians in this area, whereas it has been historically proved that this plan was of Pakistan to send in a mixture of Kashmiri fighters and regular and paramilitary troops to gain territory in Kashmir.
The study of history is no longer concerned with the exploration of knowledge, but rewriting for imprinting student’s minds with the ideologies of ruling regimes. This includes the ideology of Islamic fundamentalism, which has played a critically important role in transforming history into an instrumentalist discipline. It is worth mentioning here that such historical writings are the products of colonial modernisation, since religious nationalist identities created by the colonial masters have been used to foster essentialised religio-ethnic identities before and after the British Raj.
A crucial role has been played by the modern globalised structure of politics in sustaining and disseminating such religious nationalism. Hence it can also be argued that the rising strength of religious nationalism in Pakistan has been contemporaneous with the blatant subjection of the state to the force of globalisation. This may propose that the academic historians are gotten in a trap.
They are generally loyal individuals of a national community, which is built around a manufactured national identity. Since history is a basic part of the image, the academic historians — when they are composing the historical backdrop of their own nation — may feel a commitment not to harm or subvert. Our educational establishment is still in profound refusal about the harm its beloved ‘new history’ has done.
The writer is currently serving as a lecturer a university’s department of Political Science and Pakistan Studies. She can be accessed at [email protected] or [email protected]
Published in Daily Times, October 13th 2017.