Interpreting history : Valuing events in a postcolonial world

‘What do they know of cricket who only cricket know?’ In using this phrase (a reappropriation of one written by Kipling), the pioneering postcolonial historian C. L. R. James synthesised his interpretation of the vital significance of cricket for the growing West Indian nationalism of the twentieth century (James, 1963). Yet for those not familiar with this work, the phrase likely gives little of this meaning or reveals any of its significance. This chapter explores how particular terminology, ways of speaking, and phrases such as this come to be imbued with deep uncommon-sense and values-based meaning in history. Through analysis using a developing model of tenor in Systemic Functional Linguistics, the chapter argues that such axiologically charged rhetoric functions in the humanities in ways like that of technicality in science. Using texts from James’ memoir Beyond a Boundary, it explores how a range of rhetorical strategies draw on the discourse semantic resources of CONNEXION that links stretches of text and APPRAISAL that evaluates and positions meanings in order to synthesise meaning and help transport it to other texts across contexts.

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