中国地理学史编史方法论考察

基于编史学视角对国外地理学史著作的中国部分以及中国地理学史著作的考察,重点论述了实证主义和思想史两类编史方法论特征。考察表明:国外实证主义地理学史以实证主义方法论为核心,是一种普遍主义和进步主义的叙事模式,这种模式里并不存在实质性的中国古代地理学,而中国近代地理学则是欧美地理学的移植。在后历史的立场上,对地理学应作宽泛的理解,实证主义地理学史是建构的历史,中国学者遵循实证主义方法论的重要意义在于建构了中国地理学理性的一面。中国地理学史人文的方面是通过思想史方法论建构起来的,这种方法通过中国古代原有文化体系、观念、概念、材料来认识地理学的发展史,首要的意义是与实证主义建构相反的还原。基于思想史方法论的中国近代地理学史研究表明,中国近代地理学的形成首要的并不是西方地理学的移植,而是自主地基于中国古代传统的学术重构,反映的是中西学术的双向互动,并不是西方地理学的单向传播。

A historiographical investigation to the methods in histories of Chinese geography

The different as well as contradictory Chinese ancient geographical histories written in the past have made too much misunderstanding about the progress or shift of Chinese geography. Focusing on the methodological problems in writing history, a historiographical investigation is to expose how histories were written at different times and in different places. From a contextualism perspective, geography does not mean the same thing in different contexts, so we can have distinct histories of geography. For that reason, we should think about the histories of geographies not from the perspective of what we see “it” to mean contemporary, but from what “they” might mean in the past. Unfortunately, the leading works which have exerted a great influence on Chinese geographers, for example, All Possible Worlds: A History of Geographical Ideas (by Preston E. James 1972, and now Geoffrey J. Martin, 2005) and A History of Geographical Thoughts (by Paul Claval), developed an ‘essentialist’ historiography which postulated what geography was (and is) as a science ‘in essence’, a kind of “whiggish historiography” emphasized the scientific aspects, as well as positivism and mathematics, geography, and neglected or twisted other geographical traditions. Of course, the authors of these works are powerless to render assistance, because of the language barrier which we explained. Chinese geographers followed foreign positivism tradition conduced a reverse analogical interpretation seemed, but their original intention was analogical interpretation. In any case, both positivism and humanistic traditions were essential content if we want to write new histories of (Chinese) geographies. It is worth nothing that we do not agree with the views what James or Martin has stated, for their ideas about geography implied geography as “many rivers, one sea”, or “oceans of European science”, and insisted Chinese early modern geography was just a tributary spread from Anglophone. We retort that, it is a conceptual syncretism progress for the rise of both Chinese as well as Anglophone early modern geography.