Is historical understanding possible without anachronism?

Abstract

Anachronism is presented as an obstacle to the task of the historian who, in the effort to understand the past, must avoid interference of elements that correspond to a different time from that of her object of study, fundamentally, those that come from her own context. A problem long addressed by the French theory of history as well as by the philosophy and history of the art, anachronism accounts for a problem and at the same time a necessary condition. In this work we are going to assess the role played by anachronism in historical understanding, for which we are going to use two examples: the restitution of objects that museums make in response to claims of the indigenous communities and the application of the categories of analysis that were created later to events of the past to which they are intended to explain, as is the case of the use of the concept of “genocide”. We will finish arguing in favor of the function that anachronism has for the understanding of the past and to illuminate the present world.