2017 RFLORES Narration and The Experience of History

Semiotica 2017; 219: 511–528
Roberto Flores*
Narration and the experience of history
DOI 10.1515/sem-2017-0068
Abstract: For a long time, history has been conceived as a textual fact, whether
as positive knowledge of the past, reported in chronicles and original sources, or
through acknowledgment of its textual basis, assumed as historiography, as
narrative history. In either case, the text appears as the source and goal of
knowledge, and has assumed the nature of an immutable monument, an invari-
able object of reference and information. These texts are limited to constituting a
regulatory storehouse of knowledge, a mere object of appropriation. In contrast,
we can consider history not just as knowledge enclosed in textual containers,
but as experience inscribed in peoples´ memory. This is what Mexican historian
Edmundo O’Gorman suggests with his proposal to consider history as readers
formulating their own versions of the past. Through these proposals, semiotics is
in a position to describe the role of texts in the production of a vicarious
experience of history through the act of reading. This paper provides examples
taken from accounts of the Spanish Conquest of Mexico and proposes a semiotic
interpretation of the experience of history.
Keywords: narration, historiography, experience of history, practice of history,

efficiency, empathy
Résumé: Pendant longtemps, l’histoire a été conçue comme une donnée tex-
tuelle, qu’elle soit considérée comme une connaissance positive du passée,
rapportée par des chroniques et des sources originales, ou comme un fondement
textuel de ce savoir, comme une histoire narrative. Dans les deux cas, le texte
apparaît comme la source et le but de la connaissance, comme un monument
immuable, un point de référence fixe et un objet stable d’information. Cette
conception réduit le texte à un dépôt de connaissance, objet d’une appropria-
tion. Or, il est possible de considérer l’histoire, non pas comme une connais-
sance enfermée dans un texte, mais comme une expérience inscrite dans la
mémoire. C’est cela que l’historien mexicain, Edmundo O’Gorman suggère
quand il propose de considérer l’histoire comme le produit des lecteurs qui
*Corresponding author: Roberto Flores, Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia, Centro

i-mar, Universidad de Los Lagos, Puerto Montt, Región de los lagos, Chile,
E-mail: rflores@ulagos.cl
Authenticated | rflores57@yahoo.com
Download Date | 4/26/18 6:21 PM
512 Roberto Flores
élaborent, au fil de leurs lectures, leur propre version du passé. Dans ce cadre, la
sémiotique est susceptible de décrire le rôle des textes dans la production d’une
expérience de l’histoire à travers la lecture. Cet article prend des exemples des
récits de la Conquête de Mexico, pour proposer une interprétation sémiotique de
l’expérience de l’histoire.
Motsclés: récit, historiographie, expérience de l’histoire, pratique de l’histoire,

efficience, empathie
1 Introduction
Historical knowledge is of a textual nature: it is obtained through reading,
criticism and confrontation of sources which are basically written and retell
past events, though this does not mean the content of history is exclusively
event-based. Neither does it mean that history’s only meaning is to advance
towards an end or towards the present. What are these other meanings of
history? What other ways are there of recounting history if it is not through a
concatenation of events leading to a final outcome? There are many ways to do
this, many styles and narrative resources. This paper is based on a conception of
history by a Mexican historian to find experiential meaning in historiography. It
is also based on recent developments in narrative semiotics, especially with
respect to a semiotic interpretation of operations and experiences. These ele-
ments describe the effects of meaning in texts based on empathy rather than a
chain of events. In the first section, I will deal with the conception of history as
experience. In the second, I will present efficient ways in which the addressee
appropriates texts and narrative syntax in an effort to render an account of this
appropriation. In the third section, I will argue for the re-assessment of narrative
forms that do not necessarily channel the story toward a goal and propose an
approach to these forms which revolve around passion in discourse. The analy-
tic proposals offered here are illustrated through examples taken from the
twelfth Book of The Florentine Codex by Friar Bernardino de Sahagún (sixteenth
century; Sahagún 1965).
2 History and experience

In 1949, Mexican historian Edmundo O’Gorman published Christopher
Columbus’s letters. In his prologue, the historian points out how history, by
giving readers a chance to recreate the past, becomes a source of experience. To
Narration and the experience of history 513
attain this the reader must construct his or her own version of the events, and
thus become a historian. In this sense, history is not merely a repository, but
contemporary experience. It is heritage, not collective, but a matter of indivi-
duals who appropriate and transform it into a vital element, the center of their
existence. History is not a depository or sediment, but rather the raw materials of
personal identity.
O’Gorman focuses on temporality, historiographically viewed as an essen-
tial factor of how mankind places himself in the world, which in turn considers
known events according to the reader’s personal history. This perspective
favors the reader’s role in the creation of historiography, since an event will
only become fully realized through reading and, moreover, framed by opinions
based on personal experience, which in turn leads to adopting a purely
historicist point of view. His position is in apparent contrast to the privileged
narrative that semiotics bestows on the textual character of historiography:
that is, the privilege given to grasping the narrated event, leading to the
transition from res gestae to rerum gestarum. However, this last position is
not so distant from the first, but rather considers it a problem to be solved
through a critical appropriation of the text. This is why it becomes necessary to
link the experience of reading to personal experience, to read history through
one’s own history.
When appropriating history, the reader makes the past his own, not as
knowledge, but with a sense of belonging: it is not history that belongs to
him, since that would imply a simple case of an economic system of ownership,
but rather it is the reader who now becomes part of history. The reader immerses
himself in the temporal flow and allows himself to be swept away by its
currents. More precisely, the reader integrates himself into a community along
with the protagonists of history, so as to make history his own; events become
lived occurrences experienced vicariously by him, through retelling. Thus his-
tory does not bestow a narrative identity; it is not just the shape of a person’s
past, but rather it absorbs the reader, captures him and channels him through its
current. Therefore, from this perspective, it is not history that makes an indivi-
dual, but the individual who makes history, in the sense that the act of reading
is not a passive act, but rather an active experience of a creative and re-creative
nature.
However, while curious, the reader is not content with just any text, since
with the passing of time, he or she becomes selective, and not all history will
please him or her or be able to awaken new concerns. Rather, an intelligent
history is sought, one that is original in its interpretations or imaginative, as
O’Gorman would put it. In this manner, author and reader complement each
other as they cooperate in this creative act. In fact, this is not surprising, given
514 Roberto Flores
that the historian was once a reader too. This is not a trivial fact, since the
produced object is not merely another text, but is destined to become a life
experience. This is expressed by the Mexican historian through a beautiful
blending of mental spaces (Fauconnier and Turner 2002; Brandt 2004), where
the text fuses with its event-driven referent, at the same time as the reader
becomes part of the historical moment.
May the reader read this thrilling history in live letters,in paragraphs still wet with the salt
water of the China Sea and the Gulf of India where Columbus shouldered his illusions
amidst incredible dangers and anguish, and then abandon all those statues and commem-
oration, all those official speeches and histories full of tedium. (O’Gorman 1949: 7)
We can initially see this blending as “living history,” since through the ambi-
guity of the word “history,” referring both to past events (presentation space, see
Brandt’s model 2004),and to the narrative that recounts them (reference space),
this expression does not make the latter a textual support of the former, but
rather a presence within it. Hence the second expression, “paragraphs still wet
with salt water,” shows this blending in its entirety (conceptual integration
space). There is no longer ambiguity, only an effective participation of the
writing of past adventures, whose vital properties (“still wet”) remain within
the current act of reading.
In O’Gorman (1976), traditional pairs in scientific work, “describe” and
“explain,” appear rather as “describing” and “understanding,” presented as
an alternative: “ … the historian must select the facts which, if any, should be
the criteria to be adhered to. The answer, I think, asks for an important distinc-
tion: it will depend on whether his purpose is to (a) describe or (b) understand
the historical process” (O’Gorman 1976: 7).
For him, to describe is to select, order and highlight “according to biases
sympathizing with others, and other individual peculiarities” (O’Gorman 1976:
7).Understanding is an “extra” that is not achieved through the mere gathering
of information, which is an unending process, given that there will always be
something in documents yet to be discovered, some new data to be integrated.
To describe is to give, to offer amounts of information; to understand is to
qualitatively appropriate the meaning of data. Understanding is a personal act,
almost intimate, performed by a person for his own benefit, moved by legit-
imate curiosity. The key to understanding is in the prologue written by the
author himself for Joseph de Acosta’s Historia moral de Indias (‘A moral history
of the Indies’) (seventeenth century; O’Gorman 1979: XXVI), where he proposes
a program for the appropriation of meaning that consists of four stages: (i) to
state the subjects the book deals with, (ii) to reveal the connection between
these subjects, that is, the internal structure of the book, (iii) to discover the
alleged basis of this structure; (iv) to show the demands that motivate it.
Narrative semiotics would not disapprove of the relevance of these analytical
stages, but goes beyond them: understanding is to make sense of an experi-
ence and to turn it into one’s own, to merge it with one’s own identity. This
experience does not have to be narrative, in the sense of being a life story,
because it could also be conceived as episodic (Strawson 2004).1
Experience emerges when the textual representation of events becomes
re-creation. To re-create is more than the construction of an iconic object from
the past, it requires endowing it with the value of presence, to make it a vivid
tale, one that has been lived through. This is only possible when: “ … historical
truth has an apocalyptic element nurtured not only by a testimony’s literalism,
but by a historian’s vital experience, education, culture, preferences, philias
and phobias. It is in this revelation that the true adventure and joy of devotion
to history resides” (O’Gorman 1992: 24).
History is thus presented as an effort in translation and comprehension of
past individuals. This effort requires overcoming obstacles presented by tem-
poral and geographic distance, which suggest the impossibility of postulating
a universal basis for historical evolution–an attitude which could lead one to
conclude that it is impossible to include any type of knowledge from the past.
Thus experience appears as a way of overcoming this impossibility, first by
allowing one a decidedly nominalistic posture, which then allows us to avoid
accepting the existence of any historic entity other than the individual.
Brading (1996: 699) points out, in keeping with Hume’s thesis, that for
O’Gorman an individual’s identity is supported by his own memory and
perceptions: through texts the past is felt in the present of the individual so
as to constitute part of his or her own experience. It becomes part of what is
indistinguishable from the person and lodges there, not only during important
events, but at all times, even during the most commonplace activities. It is an
intimate appropriation of the past and makes history an inextricable part of
consciousness. For the practitioner of history, intelligibility directly becomes
intelligibility of himself, be he an author or a reader. History thus conceived is
written and read only in the first person.
1 Galen Strawson has criticized narrative theory from the avant-garde approach of Cultural
Studies which is supported by Ticosur’s thesis: the intention of making identity turns into an
all-encompassing narrative construction, in counterposition to episodic memory. However, the
criticism was not able to damage narrativity as the title of the article indicates, simply the scope
of what is commonly known as narration (cf. also Hyvärinen 2012).
516 Roberto Flores
History destined to become our own appears first as informative content and
as an expression of ideas about the past, but when becoming a part of the
reader, these ideas, this information, cease to be conceived as alien to him or
herself and become their own beliefs and opinions. This appropriation does not
come about in an instant, nor does it have a definitive character: it is progressive
and provisional, but responds to the evolution of the person involved. In a
certain way, the process assumes constant synchronization and adjustment of
the past with the present. This is also an individual process given that it
responds to the demands of the present.
Approaches to history are indirect, since though the practice of history is set
in motion by language, it is done within the imagination. At first, apprehension
of historical content is conventional, whereas on a second level, this content is
an individual intuition. This is the path to follow:
convention > intuition

corresponding to the passage of one intention to the next, expressed in one
textual object:
meaning > experience
3 Use and practice of history

In the first section, we saw how appropriation of history through texts can lead
to historic experience. Thus it becomes necessary to examine the ways conjunc-
tion is achieved between the subject and that peculiar object: history, the ways
in which it is efficiently employed and practiced. At the beginning of this
section, I will outline the use and practice of history in terms of efficiency.
Then I will address the efficient use of history shown in the light of a subject’s
operational syntax regarding the text’s content.
3.1 Efficiency
Self-experience refers to the possible use of history: it is in usage that experience

leaves its mark. Landowski (2009) makes a helpful distinction between use,
usefulness and practice; the first is a term encompassing the other two; the
second refers to a use measured in light of its results, whereas the third indicates
the activity leading to the results. The difference is a matter of aspect, since
usefulness refers to a type of event, an accomplishment (Vendler 1967: Ch. 4),
characterized by a transformation in state and of a limited duration, whereas
practice refers to an activity, that is, an event without transformation and not
temporally restricted. In this way, it is possible to present a difference such as
the one between the effectiveness of a singular action, and finally of an instru-
ment and the efficiency of an iterative action and its agent. Finally, I establish a
contrast between two forms of agency: a full-fledged one in the case of the
agent, and the other one attenuated or dependent on the first, in the case of the
instrument, all within the framework of an action transforming the state of
affairs.
History is practiced, and its practice admits various modalities according
to the textual characteristics that determine different ways of grasping it. This
does not mean that the text meekly yields to the reader’s activity as an object,
one that is polyvalent or infinitely deformable or adjustable to all imaginative
use. On the contrary, whatever its nature, the text resists apprehension: it
imposes reading modes and opens or limits possibilities. The chance to
acknowledge the inadequacy produced between utterance and enunciation
is based on the thesis of inadequacy being produced through the postulation
of an ideal adequacy. Standard semiotics does not address this problem since
it stems from the precept that conformity of principle exists between an
enunciative operation and the resulting utterance. And so in the case of the
novel there is no way to question this adjustment between both instances,
because it has been postulated beforehand. But if we take a closer look at
historiography, it is possible to confirm that certain eras, certain cultures,
impose a specific mode of treatment to the detriment of others. O’Gorman
(1979) points out that medieval history was not a narrative of facts, but rather
an exemplary history, a hagiography, a conception that is currently
unacceptable.
At first glance, efficiency is a parameter for acknowledging the relationship
between an action and its results in terms of adequacy. This is in contrast to
efficacy, which refers to whether or not the result was achieved and if it was full
or partial. Efficiency refers to the relation maintained by the action when
compared to the result: it translates adequacy of means with respect to its
ends. It could be considered a quantitative parameter, but efficiency is not a
measure of the means employed, but rather recognition of the way in which
these means participate to obtain an end.
If we consider instruments to be a prototype, then it is possible to establish
that the use of one of them to achieve a certain operation gives rise to judgment
of its suitability to do so. Thus we can determine whether the instrument is
adequate or inadequate, but even in broader terms, and especially when there
are several instruments available for the same operation, we can speak of their
degree of adequacy. Therefore, adequacy is recognized as a matter of finding a
518 Roberto Flores
balance between means and ends, since it is possible to be inefficient both by

excess as well as by insufficiency.
Recognizing adequacy demands knowing beforehand the means employed
and the results obtained. However, under certain circumstances, though it is
possible to have knowledge of the means, the result obtained is unknown; in
other words, we are unaware of its effect. Therefore it becomes necessary to
perform a detailed examination of the functionality of the means to determine
the nature and range of its possible effects.
Historiography involves knowing the means but ignoring the end goals;
from here stems the semiotic relevance of history’s usefulness. Beyond the
possible value of truth in a historic tale, history is about inferring the effects
of narrative content: more than information, history is understanding. This
history bores or interests, touches the reader, teaches him or serves as an
example: it seems plausible or implausible, it determines to a greater or lesser
degree the future course of our actions and opinions. All of these effects, and
many more, must be accounted for in historiography’s efficiency. The variety of
forms and “styles” in recounting history will be considered as the origin of this
diversity of effects.
If postulating the existence of efficiency in historiography may seem
unquestionable, only because we are not indifferent to it, acknowledgement
still remains problematic. What properties and effects in historical discourse
affect us and in what way do they do so?
To begin with, reading history determines expectations about the course of
narrated events, not only established through rational judgement of the factors
that intervene or through an objective deliberation of the circumstances, but
also through recognition of the relevance and importance of these events in
relation to the previous experiences of the reader. The same situation is subject
to various interpretations according to different experiences. In certain cases,
the account itself will offer clues for detecting these interpretations. Consider
the case of the last chapter in Book 12 of Bernardino de Sahagún’s The
Florentine Codex, known in its Spanish version as Historia general de las
cosas de Nueva España (The universal history of the things of New Spain),
which tells of the interview between Mexican nobles and the conqueror,
Hernán Cortés. The Mexicans’ surrender is followed by their offer to pay
tribute, according to their habits and customs, which directly contradicts our
expectations, since from our perspective several centuries later we recognize
them as a conquered culture. Indeed, the reader knows this is a conquest that
marks the end of the indigenous world, the disappearance of traditional forms
of imposition and tribute. Therefore the nobles’ offer cannot be judged but as
an erroneous interpretation, not of specific circumstances, but of the evolution
of events as a whole. We do not know what the conqueror’s reaction was, since
the account makes no mention of it, so to judge this interpretation as erro-
neous is left to the reader.
History’s efficiency is its capacity to arouse the effect of lived history.
However, it is not an objective property of the narrated content, since in this
sense, it is inextricably linked to the addressee’s willingness to be captivated by
the story. This unfolding of competence goes beyond a simple process of
adequacy, such as what happens with the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. In the
case of history this is not about a passive competence, an inert property of the
actant dependent on its counterpart, but rather it is an active and autonomous
capacity, not linked to a single story or to a particular subject, but creative and
sensitive to evolution. These assessments must be considered as forms of enun-
ciative sensitivity: they are forms of adaptability that change according to their
environment. An efficient historic account is thus an account suitable not only
for a certain type of reader, but one which can adapt to all readers and thus offer
them a sense of living in the past. An efficient reader is someone capable of
actively receiving the story as though it had been written specifically for him.
Lived history is history that lends itself to multiple conditions, a flexible history
adaptable to the circumstances, a history that offers a plethora of lessons and
not a single dogma repeated endlessly. History belongs to those who read it,.
Such history makes the reader a virtuoso historian, capable of interpreting his
knowledge of the past and obtaining from it an opinion, which is the ultimate
goal to strive for.
3.2 Operativity
From the above we can infer the need to have at least four operational levels
(Landowski 2009: Section 2) to describe the syntax of experience lived by read-
ing historiography. The first level is reading as a perceptual operation with no
consideration of the content; the second refers to the encounter with knowledge
contained in the account; the third deals with understanding incidents as
events; and the fourth constitutes their transformation into personal experience.
At an actantial level, participants in this reflexive syntactic appropriation utter-
ance go through a correlative transfiguration: the participants are basically the
text and its reader, the first as an object and the second as the operating subject
in syncretism with the Subject of state.
To operationally approach this proposal we can make use of the distinc-
tion expressed by Landowski (2009) aided by the Latin terms operator, oper-
andum and operans, with untranslatable overtones, supported by a single
520 Roberto Flores
term. If the first matches the name of a common action in many languages,
the second refers to the gerundive form which captures the object through a
progressive, or even cursive gaze able to express the progressive “(being)
operated on”. The third is a participle expressing perfective aspect with
the possibility of being glossed as “the one who operates”. Therefore, at
first glance, it is possible to say that the reader takes on the role of
operator when reading a historic text – which, as a tool of knowledge, is the
operans – through which an operandum is obtained, corresponding to events.
These roles are reassigned when one assumes a concept of history such as
O’Gorman’s: reading as historiographic experience is situated precisely in the
displacement of historic knowledge from its status as operandum to that of
operans. From being the goal of reading it becomes an instrument of experi-
ence and, more precisely, the means by which the operator achieves this
passage, an operation which, according to Landowski (2009: 23), creates a
surplus of meaning.
From this perspective, the reader is basically the operator, since if he
didn’t enjoy this fully active role, he would have to be content with an
instrumental one, at the service of the writer –histories are written to be
read. As for the text, by alternating between object and a medium of knowl-
edge, it also alternates between operandum and operans. Indeed, the book
goes from being a storehouse of knowledge, accessible through reading, to
becoming its instrument, and finally becomes a lived world. For his part, the
reader goes from being an agent in the act of deciphering signs in books, to
being the subject of knowledge, and finally, to being a protagonist of history.
The characters of history itself become associated with this transfiguration as
well, since they may go from existing on paper to becoming the protagonists of
past events and, lastly, for lack of a better term, become fellow men or an equal
to the reader.
It has already been established that while experience makes way for a
history formulated by the reader, formulation is a cursive activity of an imper-
fective nature, culminating not only in the reading of a book: this activity is
inexhaustible, as long as the reader remains insatiable. This articulation
between an endless activity leading to attainment of a cognitive object could
constitute a paradox, unless the obtained object is recognized as being provi-
sional, subject to being modified or substituted by new ones. By being provi-
sional, this object has no definitive identity and is relegated to the status of
operandum. This proposal merges with O’Gorman’s in not considering the reader
as simply a passive receiver of “hieratic,” “tedious” histories (as determined by
O’Gorman 1949: 5 and 7, respectively), but rather deeming him a dynamic
evolving actant.
4 Content of history
Transfigurations of text and reader are accompanied by a process of demater-
ializing history, since in its first stages it is almost equal to the book in terms of
materiality, whereas in the last stage it becomes part of the reader’s identity.
Simultaneously, history goes from one semiotic dimension to another, to the
extent that historiographic content is no longer a cognitive object and becomes
charged with emotional and passionate content. Therefore this section will first
examine the status of the text as knowledge and beliefs before turning to it as an
emphatic source of experience.
4.1 Knowing and believing
Historical texts present themselves at first as objects of knowledge, with a content

the reader may trust, that they are telling him the truth about what indeed did
happen. You could say that to achieve this last effect, it is necessary to acquiesce,
to offer an active and rational acceptance of the narrative’s content. The semiotic
question resides in specifying the textual sense and the semiotic foundation of this
act of adhesion, as well as the operations leading to it.
Belief in historiography by laymen is generally quite high, since readers
assume that publication endorses this act of information and its reliability has
been tested. In contemporary culture, there is a generally respected rule regard-
ing this: the less involved the author is with what is narrated historically, the
more reliable the account will be. However, this rule is in opposition to another
one that lends greater credibility to first-hand witnesses, even though these
witnesses might lose their objectivity because they could be involved in the
events. Thus a credibility gap comes about, depending on greater or lesser
distance and greater or lesser objectivity, combined with a degree of veracity,
accuracy or fidelity of the reported facts. This correlation can be the opposite
among three of them or between two, and the third one different. This gives rise
to correlations among these three parameters: objectivity, distance and fidelity
and allows us to propose four types of cases:
a. At a greater distance, more objectivity and detail in stating the facts.
b. At a greater distance, more objectivity, but less fidelity.
c. At a greater distance, more subjectivity and less detail.
d. At a greater distance, more subjectivity but less fidelity.
Figure 1 shows cases of (a) converse correlation between the three and (b)
inverse correlation with fidelity. Critical apprehension and confident
522 Roberto Flores
Figure 1: Correlations between reliability parameters.
apprehension are two ways in which the text reaches the addressee through
textual layout. Standard semiotics establishes these two forms of comprehension
in the domain of manipulative semiotics, as part of the interpretative compe-
tence of the person who receives the text and is founded on an enunciative
contract that determines the conditions of acceptance or rejection of the narrated
content. In this way, the addressee enters into a relationship with the textual
object and accepts or refutes what the text itself has to offer him. Here more than
ever, the curious reader’s satisfaction or dissatisfaction is at stake, since limiting
himself to them would assume that reading consists simply of remedying a
previously defined shortcoming. Curiosity is not a state but rather a permanent
inclination. In other words, it is an activity performed cursively throughout the
act of reading, which increases or tapers off, according to the content of the text.
Therefore, grasping the meaning in the progressive unfolding of an object in
evolution can fulfill the expectations created by surprises that come about or
keep the reader hungry for knowledge.
4.2 Experiencing
The forms adopted by historiographic enunciation considered as a vicarious

experience of the past produce the feeling of establishing an intimate commu-
nication with the facts and protagonists of history, and are not reduced to mere
circulation of information. Obtained knowledge is personal, and consists of each
addressee constructing his own version of history, determined by how the
accounts are received, and the readers’ capacity to understand them. Thus the
addressee becomes an addresser of his own history, a history yet to come.
On the other hand, if historic meaning is not just knowledge, it is loaded

with a strong passionate charge. The receiver of the story is invited to intimately
participate in the narrated content, perhaps not exactly as a protagonist,
although certainly as a privileged witness to history. The version of past events
thus constructed takes the shape of a cognitive and passionate object, whose
conditions of acceptability are determined by the strength of the addressee’s
adhesion to it. This adhesion may be minimal, in which case the validity of the
narrative is questioned, the truth of the information is considered provisional,
and the emotional burden attenuated. But if adherence is at a maximum level,
then the way in which facts are told increases belief in the story and its
emotional intensity, and a chronicle of events develops, turning it into a strong
candidate for becoming an unshakeable version of history, though its validity is
limited only to whoever believes in it.
Such a version must comply with various conditions of acceptability corre-
sponding to different axes upon which intimate communication is established
between the addressee and history. It is possible to summarize these axes built
upon three isotopies of an enunciative nature, here referred to as understanding,
empathy and recreation. The first two represent the conditions required for a
reproduction of history in the form of a new version, which leads us now to
examine them in detail.
4.2.1 Understanding
To begin with, knowledge of the past is determined by understanding the

sequence of events, their order, but also, their place in the tale on a local as
well as a global scale. In fact, it is quite common for a particular episode to be
understood immediately as a crucial event in the progression of narrated
history. The arrival in unknown lands, the death of a main character, the
fall of a city or fortress, are some of these decisive events. But it is also true
that some histories are not composed of transcendental events or at least
don’t appear to be so, but rather string together apparently purposeless
incidents. Zilberberg (1995) would say that in such cases tempo decreases
until almost stopping in a stasis, in contrast to critical incidents that accel-
erate time.
Book 12 of Bernardino de Sahagún’s Historia General de las Cosas de Nueva
España seems to respond to both speeds, since its narrative of the Spanish
Conquest of Mexico in forty-one chapters alternates between moments of great
dramatic tension and an endless account of episodes which seem to lead
nowhere. Thus, for example, (1) the omens of the Conquest, (2) fleeing from
524 Roberto Flores
Tenochtitlan to Tlaxcala and (3) the siege imposed by the Spaniards upon the
city of Tenochtitlan are presented as stasis of global history, where at least in
appearance the plot stagnates, dotted with moments of krisis, notably the arrival
of the Spaniards and the final defeat.
These three parts of the account contrast in their respective compositions,
their type of aspectuality, the type of dominant event and dependence among
events. Thus the first section corresponding to the omens of the Conquest is
presented in an inherently imperfective aspect, constituted by the eight
omens referred to, which is why the sequence’s closing is imposed from the
outside through enumeration. The fragment proposes an additive scanning
(vs. a sequential one; Langacker 1991: 78–79) where the type of dominant
event is accomplishment, that is, a durative event, temporally constrained by
time. However, the fragment does not exactly constitute a narrative sequence,
since each event is independent of the others. The only fact that prevents us
from considering this section as a full stasis is its place at the beginning of the
Historia, which confers on it a feeling of suspense. In contrast, the Spaniards’
journey from the city-state of Tlaxcala to Tenochtitlan is a sequential, perfec-
tive account composed of dependent accomplishments, allowing them to
be taken together and integrated within a further-reaching accomplishment.
This part of the Historia consists of a group of alternating displacements and
rest periods, which together form a journey towards the city-state of Tlaxcala.
However, the goal of this journey is only mentioned toward the end of
the segment; thus the episodes that compose it are thematically classified
by the alternating activities performed (displacement versus rest), as they
lack a sense of progression towards an end. Unlike the first mentioned seg-
ment, where unity is through enumeration, in this other segment a sense of
unity is achieved through geography and not through actions: it is possible to
follow the journey on a map and to guess its final destination. The third
example, the siege of Tenochtitlan, forms an additive narrative, that is to say,
imperfective, but made up of varied perfective events that are independent of
each other. Therefore this part of the chronicle may also be considered a
moment of stasis which does not seem to lead to the climax of the Spanish
Conquest of Mexico.
It can be gleaned from these three cases that they escape the perfectivity
inherent in the global account of the Conquest, but do so by employing
different resources: through a virtually open recounting, covering a limited
journey, or by the endless juxtaposition of events. They challenge the global
comprehension of the account, since they contribute in a way different
fromthat of a sequential and hierarchical order of events. In any case, a
thorough understanding of these fragments within the framework of history
demands that their effects be considered outside the storyitself. This is the part
that corresponds to the empathetic apprehension of narrated events.
4.2.2 Empathy
Understanding the sequence of events depends on how much we attribute to the

patterns of intentionality. Reduced to mere cognitive grasping, these patterns
refer us to ideal knowledge built upon certain rules of behavior: the contours of
a specific event and its position in the account identify it with an idealized event
of which it forms a part. This ideality seems to be directly associated with the
addressee’s knowledge of comparable situations projected during a specific
event or group of events. It is possible for this knowledge to respond to a
specific previous experience or for it to be obtained by other means. In any
case, it is used as a pattern or model for understanding narrative sequentiality.
The addressee infers the presence of this model from the features in the story he
recognizes and judges how likely it is to be true, based on the narrative’s
plausibility.
But by not limiting comprehension of the historic account to a cognitive
dimension, the story becomes loaded with dramatic strength manifested both as
intensity and seriousness of the narrated events, as well as in the emotions
attributed to the actors as sources of empathy.
Psychology2 has proposed different theories for trying to understand our
fellow men, whether it be through the formulation by the subject of theories
about someone else’s behavior or by the construction of simulations of said
behavior. In the first case it would suffice to have a thematic and sequential
understanding of the events; for passionate comprehension it is necessary to go
through the simulation of situations with which the addressee may identify.
The passion component produces the effect of narrated events being
grasped not only from the outside, but also through an invitation to the addres-
see to participate from within, as shown by the following example. Here the
addressee is led into sharing Moctezuma’s awe in the face of the shots fired by
the Spanish forces that had landed on the coasts of the Gulf of Mexico.
2 Here reference is made to the models proposed by psychology to account for the competen-
cies required for understanding others’ behavior. The first case here mentioned, the construc-
tion of a model of action, corresponds to what psychologists call theory-theory. The thesis being
defended here, which accommodates better to the second case, is that this model only operates
in cognitive situations and requires a simulation theory of a narrative nature each time a
passionate element comes into play (Hutto 2009).
526 Roberto Flores
And when he had so heard what the messengers reported, he was terrified, he was
astounded. And much did he marvel at their food. Especially did it cause him to faint
away when he heard how the gun, at [the Spaniards’] command, discharged [the shot];
how it resounded as if it thundered when it went off. It indeed bereft one of strength; it
shut off one’s ears. And when it discharged, something like a round pebble came forth
from within. Fire went showering forth; sparks went blazing forth. And its smoke smelled
very foul; it had a fetid odor which verily wounded the head. And when [the shot] struck a
mountain, it was as if it were destroyed, dissolved. And a tree was pulverized; it was as if it
vanished; it was as if someone blew it away … And when Moctezuma so heard, he was
much terrified. It was as if he fainted away. His heart saddened; his heart failed him.
(Sahagún 1965: 19–20)
Traditionally, empathy is presented as a decentralization of the subject, as a

spatial disjunction from a place considered personal to another place considered
alien and where another resides. This displacement is accompanied by a cogni-
tive, but also emotional judgment, supported by a specific competence: the
capacity to close the gap between what is personal and what is not, through
movement from the first to the second, in such a way that it turns what is alien
into something personal. This is a partial process of identification, since the
distinction between one and the other is still cognitively but not emotively valid.
How can we account for this displacement? Certainly it is not a simple
engagement (embrayage, in French) of a cognitive and passionate nature,
since this term refers to “the effect of return to the enunciation” (Greimas and
Joseph 1979). Although it operates on an identification between the subject of
the utterance and that of the enunciation, it does so without returning to the ego,
hic et nunc categories. In the narrated account, it is the addressee moving toward
the utterance to share the Mexican lord’s fear and awe, and not the utterance
going back to the enunciation. It is more like a blending, such as the one
marvelously orchestrated by O’Gorman (Section 1). The presence of blending
in Sahagún’s book is less spectacular, but still very moving as a manifestation of
fear, since the text invites us to share Moctezuma’s emotions by operating a
conceptual integration between reading the chronicle and the utterance. This
procedure is repeatedly resorted to by Sahagún, as shown in the following
example, as well as in other places (Ch. XXII), which is where the Mexicans
manifest their fears, intrigued by the appearance of the recent arrivals:
And when there had been death in Cholula, then [the Spaniards] started forth in order
already to come to Mexico. They came grouped, they came assembled, they came raising
dust. Their iron lances, their halberds seemed to glisten, and their iron swords were wavy,
like a water [course]. Their cuirasses, their helmets seemed to resound. And some came all
in iron; they came turned into iron; they came gleaming. Hence they went causing great
astonishment; hence they went causing great fear; hence they were regarded with fear;
hence they were dreaded.
And their dogs came leading; they came preceding them. They kept coming at their head;
they remained coming at their head. They came panting; their foam came dripping [from
their mouths]. (Sahagún 1965: 30)
5 Conclusions
Knowledge of what is produced in the form of a narrative history does not necessa-
rily entail that we must have a narrow and reductive view of it, as if it were a mere
account of what happened. It is true that historiography continues to be (and will
continue to be in the future) a recounting, even in fields such as economic history,
but this is attributable to the peculiarities of a language which gives narrativity a
central place in how to attribute importance. This importance is not limited to
linguistic meaning, but rather is in keeping with the way we assign meaning to
human experience. Thus, historiography appears as one of the ways to channel this
experience, a particularly fruitful orientation every time it becomes imbued with
special efficiency that allows us to understand and share others’ lives, even those
far removed from the present. An examination of the procedures by means of which
we obtain an understanding of history through texts has emphasized the need to
understand the ways in which historic texts lead to a vicarious experience of the
past. In this assessment, neither spatial nor temporal distance nor subjectivity
constitute an obstacle to understanding, but rather open a path to different ways
one can achieve a re-creation of the past. Nor does the absence of a clear progres-
sion of the story towards an objective constitute an obstacle for historic knowledge:
we see revealed what appear to be empty moments in the development of a story,
when everything seems to come to a halt – and not without irony – as precious
fleeting moments that serve to capture the meaning of human action. This is what l
have attempted to portray in these few lines, to follow the teachings of our fore-
fathers and recent semiotics as well, which attempts to cast history as experience, or
what Greimas has masterfully laid out: “un peu de psychothérapie: ‘transformer
l’agir en faire’; un peu de sémiotique: resémantiser la vie en changeant ‘les signes
en gestes’” (1987: 90).
References
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Brandt, Per Aage. 2004. Spaces, domains, and meaning. Bern: Peter Lang.
Fauconnier, Gilles & Mark Turner. 2002. The way we think: Conceptual blending and the mind’s
hidden complexities. New York: Basic.
528 Roberto Flores
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Greimas, Algirdas Julien & Courtés. Joseph 1979. Sémiotique: Dictionnaire raisonné de la
théorie du langage, vol. 1. Paris: Hachette.
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16(6–8). 9–39.
Hyvärinen, Matti. 2012. “Against narrativity” reconsidered. In Göran Rossholm (ed.), Disputable
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México: FCE.
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Iberoamericana-CONDUMEX.
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vol. 12, Charles E. Dibble, J. Arthur & O Anderson (trans.). Salt Lake City: University
of Utah Press.
Strawson, Gale. 2004. Against narrativity. Ratio 17(4). 428–452.
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Semiotica 2017; 219: 511–528

Keywords: narration, historiography, experience of history, practice of history,

*Corresponding author: Roberto Flores, Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia, Centro

Motsclés: récit, historiographie, expérience de l’histoire, pratique de l’histoire,

2 History and experience

convention > intuition

3 Use and practice of history

Self-experience refers to the possible use of history: it is in usage that experience

balance between means and ends, since it is possible to be inefficient both by

4.1 Knowing and believing

Historical texts present themselves at first as objects of knowledge, with a content

Figure 1: Correlations between reliability parameters.

The forms adopted by historiographic enunciation considered as a vicarious

On the other hand, if historic meaning is not just knowledge, it is loaded

To begin with, knowledge of the past is determined by understanding the

Understanding the sequence of events depends on how much we attribute to the

Traditionally, empathy is presented as a decentralization of the subject, as a

Greimas, Algirdas Julien. 1987. De l’imperfection. Périgueux: Pierre Fanlac.

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