On the return of “history

I’ve being seeing the word “history” propping up frequently in the titles of articles.

Those of “a certain age” will remember talk, a few decades ago, of the end of history. History being a force that moulded the world that was done, because presumably there was nothing fundamentally going to change anymore.

Several times over decades, the arc of history has been invoked. History being some sort of predictable pattern of changes in the world.

People have spoken of a side of history. History being a continuous moral judgement, reflected on to the past, to classify right and wrong.

Just today I read about the revenge of history, and how we are at a hinge of history.

So here, history is instead … back to being a sort of fabric of the world, that is revealed to have been there all along, and that once again we’ll have to wait and watch to see what happens.