History and Nationalism A Personal Response to the Indian Situation

History and Nationalism: A Personal Response to the Indian Situation Sudhir Chandra HISTORY is a branch of knowledge. It is also the corporate memory of a society. The distinction between these causally related forms of history is elusive. As corporate memory history tends to acquire the character of myth. This happens not because society altogether fabricates the facts it remembers, Rather, it remembers what it wishes to remember. Depending on the character of a society, this wish operates more or less on both the conscious and the unconscious planes. It determines not only the choice of facts that are remembered but also the way in which they are remembered. Some facts are thus brought into limelight and the others are consigned to varying degrees of oblivion. In this manner corporate memory restricts the area of general historical awareness and enquiry. According as the requirements of a society change, a particular myth is modified or a new one created. If necessary even facts are imagined into being.