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Δεν παρατίθεται περίληψη στα ελληνικά. ; This paper discusses the politics of historical interpretation as manifested in E. P. Thompson's The Making of the English Working Class. The discussion addresses two main areas of interest:a. The structure of the conceptual framework that organises historical narration and grounds historical analysis and interpretation. It is argued that this framework is based on his insistence on the privileged character of historiography as a field of knowledge and as a critical perspective for social and political perspective on the one hand. The conceptual framework also consists of Thompson's conviction that in the process of class formation experience is the sine qua non historical catalyst that intervenes between the social being (modes of production) and class consciousness. These analytical inclinations are explored with reference to Thompson's engagement with the discussion over marxist reductionism on the one hand, and althusserian structuralism on the other.b. Finally, an attempt is made to trace the particularities of the historical context within which Thompson's perspective was shaped, as well as the influence that his work has had on the orientations of social studies during the period of the 1970s and 1980s.