ALEXANDRE CHOULGUINE’S PHILOSOPHY OF HISTORY. ARTICLE I: FROM THE FRENCH REVOLUTION TO THE UKRAINIAN REVOLUTION
Keywords:
philosophical thought of the Western Ukrainian diaspora of the 20th century, philosophy of history, the French Revolution, the Ukrainian Revolution, foreign language Ukrainian studies, French-language works by Alexandre ChoulguineAbstract
The article is the first part of a study devoted to the philosophy of history of Alexandre Choulguine (1889–1960), a Ukrainian statesman, diplomat, and scholar. Based on an analysis of the corpus of works and the political and intellectual trajectory of A. Chouguine, the article draws a number of conclusions, including that his corpus of works is divided into two nearly equal parts — Ukrainian-language and French-language – and that his French-language writings remain the least studied. A. Choulguine’s life trajectory may be divided into three periods: his studies at Petrograd University and his professional formation as a historian and researcher (1908–1917); his active political and public activity from the Revolution of 1917 until the WWII; and, finally, his concentration on scholarly research after the WWII. As a publicist and communicator, A. Choulguine worked in two directions: defending his own political position within the Ukrainian movement (primarily in Ukrainian) and advocating for the recognition of Ukraine’s independence in the West, as well as promoting knowledge about Ukraine and Ukrainian history (primarily in French). As a research, he worked in the fields of the national question and the philosophy of history, and it was in these fields that he published his “major works” in French.
The article demonstrates that A. Choulguine’s views on the philosophy of history were formed within the context of the historiographical field in which he specialized as a historian — the history of Western Europe, above all the French Revolution. At the same time, his understanding of history, formed within a purely academic context, was tested by the Ukrainian Revolution: it was precisely the experience of this revolution that not only transformed him from an academic historian into a public intellectual and communicator, but also shaped A. Choulguine’s historical consciousness and philosophy of history.
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