Thucydides on colonialism and hegemonic discourse

Abstract

As the anthropologist Marshall Sahlins once observed, Thucydides appears as “the true father of history – Western history, that is.” His work provides an origin myth of critical historical consciousness as a specifically European invention, the basis for claiming an objective understanding of other cultures, extrapolated solely from Western models of the human, and legitimising the exercise of power and violence against the inferior Other. However, this image is largely the product of the modern reception and reinterpretation of his work, or more often of a few passages from it, decontextualised and read according to a contemporary agenda. Read through a postcolonial lens, Thucydides’ account appears rather as polyvocal and deliberately ambiguous, offering material for the critique of imperialism, power, and narrow, overly confident claims about ‘human nature.’