A Philosophical Inquiry into the Future as a Category of Historical Time

: The significance of future as a category of historical time necessarily refers to the classical Koselleck ′ s study about the origins of history as Ge-schichte. Indeed, history proper is only possible when the time is released from the divine power, then history appears as the result of the human actions. This idea reformulates a Kantian thesis about the plan of history. As it is known, according to Kant history has a meaning and a direction but this cannot put at risk the freedom of humans as moral agents. The future plays here a main role because it allows thinking about the progress of mankind as a regulative ideal. The concept of hope is its necessarily counterpart. In the realm of practical reason the hope works as the basis for our belief in a better world caused by our collaboration (when the good and the virtue go together). In history, this hope is expressed through the expectation of perpetual peace. It is obvious that the future cannot be an object of history because to talk about it would be to make prophecies (as Danto says). But it can be said that without future there is not history in its proper sense. Our aim here is to analyze the role of future as a component of historical consciousness and consequently to show its importance to understand why the human groups build their memories as a legacy for the next generations. In order to do this I intend to identify the political aspects of the hope displayed when the communities seek to conform and keep their collective memory as a heritage to leave for future generations.


Introduction
Every community relies on the future as atemporaldimension that organizes its present and, at the same time, givesm eaning to its past.H uman communities, whose expectations are often related to ab etter futuref or those to come, trans-mit to 'the newcomers' astock of accumulated knowledge that will proveuseful in the further advancement of their lives(Arendt1968). Within this social dynamic, the past and future function as indispensable temporaldimensions. New generations represent the future in the here and now,and they are the ones who ensure the continuingsurvivalofthe group in time. What they deemimportant and choose to transmit to othernew generations constitutes aset of skills, meanings and worldviews, preserved from an earlier time (past) with the hope thati tw ill be passed on to the future.
We shouldn'tconclude from these statements thatsuch communities are homogeneous; it is possiblef or that which they deem important to transmit to be composed of heterogeneoussets of the 'goods',which different groups value differently, which are not organized in ah ierarchical mannera nd which are not consistent with each other. Nor should it be assumed that the transmission of what is considered significant happens 'democratically'.The goods to be transmitted are, in the end, symbolical and cultural resources,which, like anyo ther resource,a re unequallyd istributed. We will return to this issue below.
What Iamconcerned with analyzinghere is the availability of the future as a dimension of historicalc onsciousness,i nr elation to the ways in which social communities choose to conservethat which they wish to transmit to cominggenerations. Iamreferring to what Idenominate, in general terms, 'inheritance'.By this, Iu nderstand that which is transmitted from generation to generation and constitutes the common backdrop thatenables the group to conserveits identity and strengthen the sense of belongingofits members. Ibelievethat,inthis manner,itwill be possibletorecover the concept of hope in apolitical and historical sense, stripped of its religious connotations (insofar as it remits to the theological virtue).
It'sclear that since the eighties we have been living in aworld immersed in what is referred to as the 'memory boom'.This situation has been critically analyzed by such authors as A. Huyssen and F. Hartog,who think that the emphasis on memory in current Western societies doesn'ts heds ufficient light on the complex ways thats ymbolic constructions (which communities pass on as their inheritance)are constituted. Huyssen has established connections between the excess of memoryand ac ertain risk of amnesia, whereas Hartoghas identified the oppressive danger in the current attempt to turn everything into something worth remembering. Having said that,what interests me here is the possibility of understanding the current state of collective memory as as ymptom of modes of conceptualizing the future, for which the aforementioned notion of 'inheritance' will proveu seful.

Future andh istory
The futurei satemporald imension thatr emits to thatw hich could occur in a moment that hasn'ty et transpired. It is ac haracteristic specific to the human consciousness of time; for Kant it is the anticipation of the future that distinguishesh uman beingsf rom other species. This anticipation does not onlyi nclude the more or less specific prediction of what is to come,but it is also molded by an importantd egree of uncertainty.( Later,w ew ill return to this dual character of the future.) The association of the future with history is nothing new.A .D anto (1985) had alreadypointed this out when he critiqued the prophetic aspect of speculative philosophies; in other words, he criticized them for concerning themselves with that which is outside of the scope of history,n amely that which has yet to occur.D anto dealt the lastb low to the aspirations of historical teleologies by formulating the following 'puzzle': "If Ic an do something about the future, the future cannot be known; and if it can be known, we can do nothing about it" (1985, p. 11). While it'st rue thath er ejects the idea of formulating historical prophecies, on the other hand he givesthe future apositive meaning within historical comprehension.F irstly, he exposes the uselessness of the 'Ideal Chronicler' who, lacking perspective on the future, is incapable, strictlyspeaking, of accountingf or what happens. Thus, he reaches the following conclusion: "not being witness to the event is not so bad at hing if our interests are historical" (1985, pp. 152-3), since withoutt his perspective on the future it is impossible to comprehend what it is thath appened. Secondlya nd related to the first,n ot onlyd ow en ot know the future, but we don'te venk now which history will be written of the moment that we are living,b ecause the selection, description and interpretation of the events thata re considered historical are dependent upon interests that we ignore. Theh istorians of the futurew ill have to be the ones who relatet hese events to others thath aven'ty et happened (1985, p. 169).
In this way, Danto considers that the thesis that history is constantlyb eing re-written is justifiable, which enables us to assert that historicism, in ac ertain sense, is triviallytrue. His analysis also enables us to account for something that is oftenu nderestimated in the studyo fc ollective memory,s uch as the fact that the distinction between events that are 'worthyofr emembering' and those considered unworthydoesn'thavetodowith anyfixed aspect or inherent condition, but rather with the ways in which they are deemed meaningful by thosew ho evaluate them.
So far,wecan identify adouble valuation of the future. As aperspective on predictions concerning the actions we are currentlyinvolved in, it is necessary to depend on the futurei no rder to make descriptions that correspond to what we are doing in the present.Without aminimum prediction of what would occur as the resultofour present actions, it wouldn'tbepossible to account for the setof movements of which they are comprised. But,s econdly, the futurei sa lso open and unpredictable, and anyattempt to delimit it or to speak about it causes us to run the risk of reverting to prophecy.
Koselleck, for his part,i dentifies different ways in which the future can be accounted for in the comprehension of history.I tn ol onger has onlyt od o with the distance between expectation and experience-as in his celebratedthesis about modernity-but rather with the degree to which we can speak reasonablya bout the future, about that which is to come. That capacity,which he denominates 'prognosis',isapart of history as adiscipline, since it is history'sjob to studyw hy some of these prognoses have come true and others have not.I n order to do this, he appeals to his theory of the strata of time,s ince it enables him to determine what possibility ap rognosis has of being fulfilled. The more levels aprediction encompasses vertically, the higher its probability of being accurate. He identifies different types of prognosis, accordingtothe rangeoffuture alternativest hey offer to the historical agents. There are those that he describes as 'wishful prognoses',which is to saythose that are the product of the optimism (or pessimism) of an agent,without taking the pertinent factors adequatelyi nto account; then,therea re those that he characterizes as 'compulsory prognoses', which present onlyo ne possiblec ourse of action and exclude anya lternative; and, finally, come the 'alternative conditional prognoses' that contain instructions for ac ourse of action for the purpose of avoiding certain results (such as the repetition of aw ar).
Desire-which is to sayt he expectation thate vents pan out in the wayt hat the agent wants-is an importantcomponent of each of these, but what differentiate the threep rognoses are the relationships that they have with previous historical experiences. Thethird type of prognosisisthe one that seems to make the best use of historicalexperiences, insofar as it is able to present afuture state of affairs that should be avoided,s uch as the (possible but not inevitable) repetition of ap ast that it would be desirable to overcome. When certain past events have been damagingtoasocial group, this type of prognosis attempts to extrapolate them to the future by presentingthem as an outcomethat can be avoided if the correct courses of action are taken (Koselleck 2002b). Thisobservation is accurate and Koselleck expressed it in other terms in referencetothe wayinwhich social groups interpret their experiencesand rewritetheir history once they have been defeated. As he states in "Transformation of Experiencea nd Methodological Change: AH istorical-Anthropological Essay": "the experience of beingv anquished contains an epistemological potential thatt ranscends its cause, espe-ciallywhen the vanquished are required to rewritegeneral history in conjunction with their own" (2002a, p. 77).
As Ipointed out earlier,the factor thatK oselleck stresses,i no rder to gauge the precision of the prognoses, is the temporalstrata thatthey encompass. Here, he is referringt ot he different structures,p rocesses and factors that constitute historical reality,w hich have varyingr ates of changea nd don'tr espond to human action in auniform manner.While long termfactors don'tdirectlyorimmediatelydepend upon human action, there are othershort or medium term actions that can indeedbeaffected by it,which is whyhistoricalagents can include their modifications, to acertain degree, in the prediction of the outcomes of their actions.
I'mn ot goingt of ocus on the characteristics of each of the different strata that Koselleck identifies, because what interests me here is something else. What is importanti st heirr elationship to human actions, because this is what leads to historicalcontingence, which is acentral factor in conceiving the future in non-prophetic terms.All historical events are more or less new,which is to say more or less unpredictable, but what is important for historical comprehension is to grasp the contingent nature of their relationship to the events that came before them. It is in relation to historical contingency that the gapbetween prediction (the imaginable future) and its actual fulfillment can best be approached. Historical contingence enables us to conserveintact the two characteristics of future as historicaltime: its open condition and the degree of uncertainty that necessarilycomes with it (inseparable from its availability);and, on the other hand, the fact thati ti sr estricted to as et of options that are in ac ertain sense pre-determined, since that which occurs is always the product of as et of conditions, imprecise and complex, that precededi t.
As Isaid earlier,Koselleck is interested in how the future can be an object of studyfor historians, as 'future past',but some observations can be found in his analysis thatingeneral allow us to think of the future in terms of historical time. Human beingst hink about the past extrapolatingt heire xperiences,b ut not all historical experiencesa re equallyv aluable in predictingt he future. There are some, Koselleck says,t hat possess 'prognostic power' (2002b, p. 148)' which he calls 'meta-historical' (even if they aren'ttimeless). These seem to be general references to the characteristics of human actionand, although they are derived from experience,t hey have as upra-historical value. He includes in this group what could be described as 'popular knowledge',o r' folk wisdom',o ften expressed through proverbs. But,these typesofextrapolation from past situations to future ones possess ahighlevel of vagueness.Aprognosis with agreater possibility of turningout to be accurate will be thatwhich includes the highestnumber of strata of time, which is to saythat which includes avertical temporalgrad-uation and thereforepossesses ahigher number of precise references to the contexts in which the action had taken place.
This analysis should be put alongside Koselleck'sthesis that in history there are processes and structures thatr epeat themselves, which enables him to postulate 'the formal repeatability of history'.Once again, this permits us to see to what degree the future presupposes ac onjunction between novelty and repetition. The human capacity for predictingt he future through prognosis requires an accurate assessment of how both factors (the new and the repeated) interact and, in addition, the capacity of the agent involved to bring about the conditions necessary for the predicted future to come to pass. It is inevitable at this point to bring Kant back into the discussion, since for him the possibility of ap rophetic history necessarilyimplied that the person who made the prophecy was also involved in the conditions of making it come true (which doesn'tseem so far-fetched if we think of the worldo ff inance and international politics).
I'minterested in the relationship between the new and the repeatedbecause it enables us to analyze to what degreethe thought future is adimension that is relevant for understandingh ow human agents and societies, in developing means to achieve what they desire, interpret available historical experiences. In the end, Koselleck concludes that in our current conditions,the variety of factors thatinfluenceour actions (as well as an increase in the rate at which those factors change) makes it difficult to formulate prognoses (2002b,p.148). There is an interesting asymmetry here. As ahistorian, Koselleck is capable of accounting for future past,w hich is to sayt he wayp ast actors werea ble to predict with greater or lesser precision and greater or lesser success that which would happen. As ah istorical actor,h owever,K oselleck findsh imself in completeu ncertainty.T his asymmetry expresses, once again, the dual value of the future: as prediction and as risk.
One of the ways to evaluate the role of the future in human groups is to analyze their ways of conservingt he past.I nf act,t he conservation of the past is necessarilyrelated to its transmission, which is whyevery strategy for conserving the past takes the future into consideration. This, once again, implies adual valuation: in first place, as risk-what is yettocome is unknown and can therefore threaten thatwhich we treasure; and secondly, as hope-thatwhich is to come in the future will permit us to keep the past alive.Inwhat follows, Iwillcontinue to analyze the past in relation to these two sides of the future:a st hat which enables us to conservethe past,but at the sametime represents the threat of losing it.

Future andm emory: the pasta si nheritance
The relationship between future and memory becomes clear if collective memory is conceivedofasanattempt to transmit thatwhich has been valued as amemory to new (whichistosay future) generations. The origin of this line of analysis can be traced back to M. Halbwachs'sstudies of the 'social frameworks' of memory.The transmission of collective memory,determinedbythe different groups to which the individuals belong,implies an operation of bequeathing,inthe sense of leaving something so that another mayhavea ccess to it in the future. In this way, memory,the trace in the present of an absence and that which is 'from the past' (to use the terminologyo fR icoeur 2000), contains within its structure an intention that is oriented towards the future. This is wheret he principal challengeo fm emoryr esides:i nt ransmitting an experience to those who haven't had it (Vezzetti 2002,p .19). Collective memory implies as et of practices that are related to the consolidation of culturali dentities that strengthent he tie between individual and community.This tie places the tension between the pretension of truthfulness (which distinguishes it from mere imagination) and loyalty to the group (without which there would be no collective memory) at the very center of collective memory. It is apractice thatisconsolidated through storytelling and communallyshared meaningsthat have alreadybeenestablished by the time new subjects are born.¹ Following this line of argumentation, the connection between the concepts of memory and inheritance starts to become visible. Inheritance, as as ocial mode of transferring material and culturalassets, is in itself ah istoriographical object of study. (Here, Idismiss inheritance in the biological sense, to the extent that what is transmittedisdone so without our consent or even being aware of it, apoint Iwillelaborate on later.) The ways in which the transferences are executed and what it is thatisbeing transferred forceustoconsider the social and cultural context in which they wereproduced. Thisiswhy,for example, if we understand inheritance to be the practice of land transferal, Thompson pointsout the risk of assuming that we are dealingwith a 'historical constant',when in reality what is being inherited is not onlyproperty (land in this case) but also aweb of social relationships (Thompson 2000,p .4 5). Cultural anthropology studies in- "'Beingp art of' requires an arrative in which we locate ourselvesa nd arel ocated in. These narratives, which ares eldom of our own making, arec onstituted through representations and performance,c onveyingn ot onlyw ho we areb ut also who we will comet ob e." (Somers 1994), quoted from: (Anico &P eralta 2009,p .1) heritance as the transmission of objects( relics and remains) and of meanings (traditions).² In addition to these historiographical and anthropological resonances, inheritance can be conceivedofasKoselleck'sexperiential space, that is, as acultural reservet hat one generation attemptst otransfert oa nother.E venwhene xperiences crystallize into a 'space',t he availability of that space is not synonymous with its actual use. In asimilar fashion, inheritance contains within it uncertaintyr egarding its ownf uture. One generation mayl eave am emorial legacy, but is faced with the uncertainty of not knowing whether or not the next generation will accept it.AsHassoun indicates, the 'adventure' of the transmission of an inheritance is the product of the difference between our ancestors and ourselves, ad ynamic that will then be repeated between us and our descendants,which means that there is never 'an eternal return' of the legacyt o be transmitted and that ac onsiderable part of it is composed of oversights and annexes (Hassoun 1996). In complex societies like our own, in which traditions come into conflict and it becomes impossible to integrate past events into a singular social narrative,i nheritance is as ymbolic and cultural space where identitiesi nc ontention within the common space are put into question.³ More than af ixed and closed repertoire of shared meanings,i nheritance should be thoughto fi nt his manner-as an attempt to solidify identitiesa nd meanings that are unstable and fragmentary (Betts &R ose2 015,p .2 ). The construction of collective memory,a sw ith all forms of social inheritance, is also riddled with conflicts and threatened by aproliferation of contents and formats that con- In the introduction of the issue of the publication "Past and Present" with monographs about relics and remains,itisstated that the essays presented in the issue "explorethe political, economic and social dimensions of the identification, preservation and fabrication of relics and remains,a nd their meaninga nd function in the spheres of memory, historya nd heritage" (Walsham 2010,p .1 0, italics added). The supplementc orrespondingt oJ ulyo f2 015 of the same publicationi sd edicated to inheritance in the modern world and, while it focuses on the studyo fh istorical preservation, its origins and re-significations throughoutt ime, aq uick look at the table of contents is enough to see the close relationship that exists between inheritance and collective memory (Betts &R ose 2015).  In the case of Argentina, think of the debates concerning the monuments to Julio A. Roca, the general whoh eaded the 'desert campaign'-which in reality consisted of the extermination of the indigenous populationst hat had inhabitedP atagonia during the nineteenth century. Today, thereare manyefforts to removethe monuments that commemorateRoca in different cities throughout the country,amovement that cancels the idea that our country was established peacefullyupon an enormous, uninhabitedterritory-an idea created and strengthened by traditional historiography. tribute to its consecration or banalization ( Todorov 2002-in particular, chapter 3).

(Preliminary) conclusions
The concept of 'inheritance' contains various meanings, but it essentiallyimplies something that people take with themselves and which comes from others before them, their ancestors. The construction of an inheritance implies the hope that the temporala nd generational gapc an be bridgeda nd thati ti sp ossible to be able to use todayt hat which has been passed on to us.⁴ Inheritance also refers to that which human beingsc arry within themselves without beingc onscious of it.O akeshott,f or example, refers to genetic inheritance, the information coded in our DNA, which has accumulatedt hroughout centuries of evolution and which we haven'td one anything to receive nor made an effort to preserve. It'sjust there, available to us without our even knowing (Oakeshott 1999). This notion of biological inheritance does not apply to history.A nother form of inheritance would have to be postulated, understood in, say, 'biographical' terms. I'mreferringtoaninheritance which includes an enormous number of conducts, valuations,m eaning constructs,e tc. thatp eople acquire throughout al ongl earning process that begins at birth and continues all throughout life.
There is athird form of inheritance,which is the one that Iwould like to analyze here and which has to do with everythingt hat subjects receive through their social and community context.Understood in this way, inheritance is properlyhistorical, and it is composed of agreat variety of what we can call 'goods', which historicala gents are able to apprehend more or less consciouslya nd whose meanings are more or less explicit to them. The historical inheritance that I'mr eferringt oh ere implies capital that is composed of dissimilar goods being passed from one generation to another.I tisimportanttostress that social actors can be beneficiaries of more than one inheritance, as long as thereare, in our society,different groups to belong to,with varyingdegrees of intimacy or distance (Halbwachs classifies 'belonging groups' as the near, the dear and the far). This historicalinheritance, which is close to different manifestations of collective memory,operates with varyingdegrees of opaqueness. In the same wayasgenetic inheritance, this historicalm emory is alsoh anded down to new generations without theirc onsent but,i nc ontrast to genetic inheritance, it requires some level of acceptance on behalf of the recipients in order to be put into action. It is an offer available to new subjects that would then have to be activated by them.
In all historicali nheritance, therea re thosew ho bequeath and those who receive the legacy. This inheritance demands aparticularattitude from bothparties to ensure that its reception takes place. There are cases of legacies lovingly prepared by one generation for the next thatnonetheless sink into oblivion.But there are also cases in which the successorsl ay claim to al egacyt hat their ancestors did not make available to them. There could be manyreasons whythese kinds of cases might happen, from the fact thatthe inheritance is rendered useless or embarrassing in its new context to the fact that the present raises new questions concerning the past from which the inheritance comes.The questions we have to ask ourselves, then, are about how shared inheritances are constituted, how they are composed and how available they are to thosew ho intend to use them.
As Ialreadymentioned while discussing A. Danto'sthesis concerning historians (wec an'tk now what history will be written in the future because we don't know which interests will guide cominghistorians nor which questions they will address), we can alsoapproach historicalinheritance in this sameway.Societies can more or less consciouslyuse symbolic constructs,examples, moral tales, lineages, etc. to compose the heritaget hat they wish to transmit to comingg enerations. They cannot predict,however,the course that these inheritances will take in the future; it isn'tpossible to predict in detail how future generations willuse them, if they even use them at all. It is in historicali nheritance that the wayi n which communities attempt to deal with the futurei ni ts dual aspect,a sr isk as well as prediction, can be observed. In the first case, the future mayb ring the loss of value, afall into disuse or the distortion of an inheritance. In the second case, the future becomes an ecessary condition for the possibility of the transmission of that which is being preserved. The words that R. Kent,a nA uschwitz survivor, spoke in January of 2015 are worth rememberinghere: "we do not want our past to be our children'sf uture".H ei sr eferringt oa ni nheritance, that of hardships suffered, trying to be preserved for the future (in order to prevent it from being repeated) but that,i na ddition, acknowledgest he open character of the future,s ince that which is to come mayo rm ay not do justice to that inheritance.⁵  In the manner of Koselleck'sa forementioned 'alternative conditional prognosis'.R .K ent's speech was giveno n2 5 th January,2 015 and is available at: http://www.auschwitz.info/en/es sentials/essential-speeches/2015-roman-kent.html, date of register: 09/09/15 While it'st rue thatt he historicali nheritance presented here bears resemblance to collective memory,itisimportant to point out some of the differences. The latter,g enerallys peaking, is the product of the effort of ac ommunity,o r even as tate, to constitutes hared symbolic assets and through which several more or less successful mechanics of transmission can be identified (especially through, but not limited to, the educational system). As such, the features of what Iamcalling historical inheritance aren'tasdefined and its modes of transmission aren'ta sl ineal. Itsc onstitution and regulation consolidatet he generational and intergenerational bond,and the possibilityofits transmission implies challengingt he ever-present risk of beingf orgotten. Historicali nheritancesa re formallyinstituted in order to be handed down through established mechanisms of construction and, even morei mportantly,o ft ransmission and conservation. At the same time, though, they can be re-created (re-signified) with each new generation, who will take from this inheritance what they deem useful.
It seems to me that the idea of historical inheritance that Ia mp resenting here sets alimit to the uses of the concept of collective memory.Actually, the latter always runs the risk of being substantialized, of losing sight of its polemic and plural character,a nd at the same time it has ac omplex relationship with official memory.Historical inheritance,onthe other hand,displays severalcharacteristics that It hink would be revealing to explore: 1. it is shared by social groups of varyingsize, within which the intensity of the bonds thath oldt hem togetherr angef rom subtle to close, in the samew ay that the bond can either be explicitlys ustainedo rn ot; 2. it has ap otential value that can either be activated or not accordingt ot he contexts within which it is advocated; and 3. it possesses an open meaning whose future re-significations are impossible to determine ap riori.
In other words, inheritance is defined not onlybyits relationship to the past that it seeks to preservea nd transmit,but also by its orientation towards the future, since this is what characterizes every inheritance, that is to sayi ts future availability.What defines inheritance is the fact thati ti sm ade available to others, those of the future, with whom those who compiled it intend to share it.Y et, at the samet ime thati to ffers the possibilityo fh istoricalc omprehension, like ab ridgeb etween two temporal (generational) moments, it alsoe xposesi ts limits. The open condition expressedinthe meaning of inheritance prevents us from being certain that it willbeu sed towards the same end for which it was intended. What'smore, it prevents us from being certain that it will even be useful at all in the future. In this manner,the construction of ahistorical inheritance that intends to be shared implies the instituting gesture of the giverwhile it,inevitably, leavesthe decision regardingits use and pertinence in the hands of the receiver. The construction of an inheritance in itself presupposes and at the same time problematizes the temporal continuity expressed through generational continuity. But there is another characteristic that Iwish to point out.H istoricali nheritance, in contrasttoother, 'legal' inheritances,cannot avoid being appropriated by thosewho feign(or truly believe), to be its heirs, without being the originally intended recipients. Historicali nheritance contains an aporia: it is the resulto f the conscious and deliberate effort of previous generations to pass on to others a bodyo fs pecific symbol capital without being able to guarantee who its actual heirs will be. Even further,t hey cannot even guarantee that the inheritance handed down will be transmitted in the wayi th ad been intended, givent hat younger generations are capable of constructingn ew,c ontingentlyd efined ties to the past-ties, in other words, thata re neither authorized by nor contained in the original meaning intended to be associated with that inheritance. This idea of the past as inheritance enables us to characterize the relationship that social communities establish with their past,w hile simultaneouslyh elping us to avoid thinking of the past onlyinterms of its ontological or referential persistence( whichIdon'td ispute).
As ar esult,Iwould like to conclude by claiming thatt he past exists in the form of an inheritance that is reclaimed by those who weren ot its contemporaries. Since this reclamation cannot be controlled ap riori,i ti si mpossible to define the past ap riori,i ndependent of the meaningsb yw hich it becomes operative.R ather than an object in an attic or at erritory to be explored, the past emergesassymboliccapital to be inherited (acceptingordisputing its meaning). In other words, the past will be that which the future allows it to be.