“Semiosis” and the reliability of meta-historical research in the analytical perspective (metaphysics of history as an approach to living trauma)

Abstract

The author addresses the methods of verification of historical research. For the purpose of reasoning, the author considers the process of “semiosis” as the realization (and representation) of experience in a cultural framework, which provides culturally significant meaning. The cultural framework can be contrasted with the elusive myth, which is able to change. The metahistorical study pays attention to cognitive distortions that may arise in this regard – in particular, perception of “indigenous / native” and “alien”. Settlement of contact with the acquired denotation of the culturally significant past allows to live through past traumatic experience in the present. Living through history provides an access to trauma grounded in the culturally significant past. Hence, a channel for the “detraumatization history” can be maintained. KEYWORDS Metahistory, mythology, R. Barthes, detraumatization