Public History Mini Lecture 2024
UCLHistory
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4hF37_nxc-Y

Transkript (automatisch erstellt)

0:01 hi everyone a very warm welcome to this mini lecture I'm Anna McGuire I'm lecturer in public history in the department and today I'm going to be
0:08 talking to you about what public history is and why we should take it seriously in doing so I'm engaging with a classic genre of public history the
0:17 lecture while you may think about the lecture as purely an educational tool it's also a form of public history one that has historically produced political
0:27 gendered racialized and colonal power the lecture in Western history emerged from the oral performance of History a global phenomenon and grew to be
0:37 associated with academic Authority the lecture is a performance and it involves interaction with the audience so your lectur is usually uh
0:46 get up in a theater to try and inform educate and entertain as the historian Toby green has recently described in his own public lecture the process of
0:56 Awakening in lecture is very important it is one of the things that a lecturer and a lecturer tries to do to awaken in an audience an awareness of the
1:06 significance of the topic at hand so what I want to do in my lecture today is to awaken in you a new appreciation of public history and encourage you to take
1:17 public history seriously it might have been the reason that you chose to study history at University through the horrible history
1:25 books or playing Assassin's Creed it might be what your family talks about about now you've decided to do history whether that's the new David aloga
1:33 documentary the museums that you visit while you're here at UCL or maybe all of your Christmas presents are now public history
1:41 themed all of this is to say that you might think of public history as the extra stuff the historical activity that is happens around the edges of proper
1:51 history done by proper historians like here at UCL but what I want to argue today is that the power of public history can be
2:01 its levity its fun and its joy as part of its effective repertoire by which I mean its ability to generate and produce emotional responses in its ability to
2:13 reach different audiences and communicate something about the past powerful in its very existence Beyond institutional borders and that's why
2:22 historians of all stripes are paying more attention to public history and doing more public history and as future historians here's why you
2:32 should be taking it seriously too Anna what is public history well as historians often like to say it's
2:45 complicated for public history its complexity is mostly in its expansiveness it's a term which can cover all manner of things and that
2:54 creates a challenge for those who practice research and importantly who teach in this field for our students who want to study public history it might be
3:03 about supporting a path in the Heritage sector for others it's about willing history to make meaningful social and political change and for others still it
3:13 might be so that they can contribute to Twitter debates about historical accuracy in Period dramas part of the way that I tend to
3:21 make sense of this is thinking about public history as a practice and as a discipline so I Define it as a practice as any genre process Behavior or
3:32 institution through which publics engage with contribute to produce or preserve historical understanding but there's also public
3:42 history with a capital pH as a discipline or field of study much like social history or political history or cultural history public history is not
3:53 just a practice but a theoretically Rich critical orientation about how we think about the past use in the present having sketched out what we mean
4:05 by public history I now want to explore how and why we do it why do people create and consume public history what are its purposes and what is it
4:15 for one place to begin thinking about public history is through genre the historian lmiller jordanova defines genre in public history as a type of
4:26 representation whether in the form of words displays pictures or film that is governed by recognized literary artistic or institutional conventions like the
4:36 novel The monograph the diarama or the local history lecture the concept remains useful despite the diversity within genres changing conventions and
4:46 the emergence of new forms genres are flexible with intricate histories this is a notion of central importance for understanding public
4:56 history because genres involve elements of convention they are recognized Often intuitively by audiences and readers as a result there are expectations on both
5:07 sides that are in effect informal Rules of Engagement now I've already mentioned quite a few genres in the course of this
5:15 lecture already but let's have a look at some more so we could think about public art uh like this
5:28 video or video
5:58 games to my dearest friends through the evil noise of
6:08 artillery tanks Andes I remember our adventures it could be through historical fiction like the very popular
6:19 series of books that are emerging around the Holocaust at the moment or thinking about comics and zenes like the suffragette one you see on the
6:27 slide it could also be thinking in about walking tours and the occupation of public space about food or about rituals why are these genres important
6:38 for us to think about as public historians we need to think about what genre is appropriate for the kind of story that we want to tell and what
6:47 expectations that sets for our audience for instance is Tik Tok the best place for sharing traumatic veteran oral histories might be your immersive or the
6:58 immersive experience of Oran augmented reality work best to transport your audience into a different andf familiar time
7:04 period we also have to think about our own technical skills and capabilities and the budgets that we have to hand and about thinking about what best suits our
7:15 audience genres help us to think about how history is produced and to think about the Rules of Engagement that sets this for audiences but there are other
7:25 processes for making history that we can think about to extend our understanding of public history and I'm going to focus on just two here applying the past and
7:34 playing with the past applying the past speaks to how historical sources and narratives are applied to create social and political
7:43 change applied historians who have produced manifestos like the example on screen about history's utility argue that we should both we we should use
7:54 both historical content and historical reasoning to clarify public and private challenges and choices one way of doing this is through
8:03 history and policy history and policy is a nonprofit network of over 500 academic historians committed to producing better public policy through a greater
8:14 understanding of History work featured on their site thinks about history for policy makers in a number of ways making comparisons between past and present
8:23 drawing lines of continuity between past and present which might be easier for modern historians to do or using historical thinking to analyze
8:32 contemporary issues in the last couple of years historians have written policy papers covering medieval res revolts and modern Mass protest food banks and the
8:43 history of mutual Aid or how the first world war might help us respond to mass deaths during the covid pandemic but applying history can take
8:52 some other directions as at a Grassroots or Ground Up level this could be in the work of history acts who who bring together historians and activists to
9:01 build solidarities across time or in the work of Truth and Reconciliation commissions and processes where people share memories and experiences as part
9:11 of a society's transition from Civil War authoritarian re regime or genocide as in Rwanda or Argentina or in the 1619 project which
9:22 reoriented US History by placing the consequences of enslavement and the contributions of black Americans at the the center of the national
9:32 narrative playing with the past is altogether more playful than the messages of Applied history but that doesn't mean it's any less effective or
9:41 powerful in introducing the public to history in fact it might even be more so as it's a kind of form of History by stealth playing is an important part of
9:52 learning to play something means understanding how the world of the game functions and to be able to situate ourselves
9:59 sufficiently within it to imagine how the world could change as the game develops so this could be through pageants or reenactments or theatrical
10:09 Productions many of you may have been on a school trip where you dressed up as a viking or a Victorian it can also mean being playful
10:17 with the past either through memes or through comedy or it can be literal play from board games to video
10:27 games the Counterpoint to the processes of producing public history might be how audiences receive it the behaviors that we undertake to engage with the past
10:39 this is one of the key themes of Jerome deg's work consuming history here degut is particularly interested in history as a Leisure Pursuit as something that is
10:50 entertaining to be enjoyed and by understanding public history as something that is consumed or commodified we start to think about the
10:58 impact of supply and demand of commercial priorities or what the consumer wants on the kinds of history that are produced so we could think
11:07 about the Bridget in effect not only on TV but on historical fiction or Tik Tok [Music] trends for the continued dominance of
11:18 War documentaries and biographies there is scope though within history as part of popular culture to shape Trends offer new understandings or
11:29 to read against the grain so to push back against the dominant narrative by looking at what's been unsaid especially through collaboration with audiences we
11:39 can work with our audiences to encourage their participation and contribution to the process of historical production to create new knowledge and understanding
11:49 whether that's through Big Data projects where volunteers contribute metadata transcription or cataloging work to designing and co-producing together
12:00 and I've got one example here for you to have a look at which is uh the work of the pit Rivers Museum in Oxford which done which has done work with its source
12:08 communities for uh many of the very Colonial items that it holds in its collection in the photographs you can see on the slides there are examples of
12:17 reinterpretation or updated descriptions that also think critically about how knowledge was produced and shared in the past these examples not only think about
12:27 the changing behaviors of the museum in deliberately acknowledging their own failures or shortcomings but they also invite the audience to behave in new
12:36 ways no longer passive receivers of knowledge but challenged to think about how that knowledge came to be there in the first place and to reflect on their
12:47 own role as visitors to that space But who are the public and who gets to own the past these are the last
12:58 questions that I'm going to cover in today's lecture but they are not insignificant we should acknowledge that from the outset public is a difficult
13:06 term there is no singular public for any of our activities as public historians there all audiences or publics are most close more closely defined than that so
13:18 that could be a geographically or socially or politically determined public a specific demographic in terms of age education level race class or
13:29 gender or even trying to reach an audience who commonly engages with that form of History these questions pose their own
13:37 ethical challenges for us as public historians as we gauge what is appropriate in the competition for attention and Commercial
13:44 Success different groups also have different relationships and reactions to the past and this can often lead to contestation about how a historical
13:54 event should be communicated or remembered or who should be sharing this history history this is especially true of moments of national
14:02 commemoration um which really help us to understand who and what is seen as belonging to the nation so we particularly saw this
14:12 during the centinary of the first world war in the UK activities for which started in 2014 and which came to close in 2018 despite the best efforts of
14:21 first world war historians to push for a longer chronology this was a period of immense public history activity with multiple
14:30 publics and in the UK some really important themes emerged in locally funded projects particularly thinking about women's involvement in the war for
14:40 instance um as well as the histories of uh Belgian refugees who came to the UK my own work on Colonial experience of the of the war meant that I was
14:51 particularly interested in how race and empire were represented in the centinary in a context of the hostile environment islamophobia brexits and laterally the
15:01 Windrush Scandal there had also been an important study done in 2012 by researchers at the Imperial War Museum called who
15:10 remembrance which showed the importance of this representation uh especially for young people growing up in the UK could a more diverse memory of the first world
15:20 war be inculcated well let's look at a couple of examples of change during the centinary the first are the brand new
15:29 galleries opened by the Imperial War Museum in 2014 one of the core driving features of the gallery was that it first it was the
15:38 first audience without the living memory of the conflict curators couldn't rely on what they called the grandfather tour in audience surveys before the galleries
15:48 were designed the curators were shocked by the lack of knowledge of the conflict Beyond mud and trenches and therefore sought to answer four main questions why
15:58 did the war start why did it go on for so long how was it won and lost and what was its aftermath but they also sought to
16:07 highlight the the global aspects of the conflict and to move to a less Anglo or eurocentric view of the war the galleries included displays which spoke
16:18 to the experience of troops from the West Indies India West Africa as well as New Zealand South Africa Australia and Canada for some though the galleries
16:28 didn't go far enough if they hadn't seen themselves represented previously the changes felt insufficient some other changes brought
16:38 in the memorial landscape of the first world war firstly we have the Lions of the Great War Memorial in smic in the West
16:46 Midlands which is a 10-ft bronze statue depicting a seek soldier in F length trench coat which was designed to honor the sacrifices made by South Asian
16:55 service PE Personnel of all faiths from the Indian subcontinent who fought for Britain in the first world war and other conflicts by choosing a seek Soldier the
17:05 representative is one of the few groups allowed to fight on the Western Front and it speaks to ideas about martial which tells us something about
17:15 who or what is chosen to be celebrated the site was subject to vandalism just 5 days after it was opened in what was described as a
17:24 racially aggravated criminal damage which I think tells us something about the kind of contestation of memory in this
17:31 period secondly we have the new Memorial to African and Caribbean service people that was built in windr square in Brixton what's interesting about this
17:41 Memorial and its public is the choice of location rather than pushing for inclusion in the M Memorial landscape of Central London around Hyde Park where
17:51 there are memorials to Australians and new zealanders as well as the Commonwealth Memorial Gates the the choice of Brixton
17:59 made explicit the connections between this service and migration and the legacies of Empire as well as meeting the public for whom this was for where
18:08 they are as literary and historical scholar shant Nas commented in a piece for the guardian at the beginning of the
18:15 centinary the recent Global turn in First World War studies and commemorative events is partly propelled by Europe's changing image of itself we
18:25 live in Multicultural societies but baress vary leading the colonial war commemoration recently noted our boys were not just tommies
18:34 they were Tariq and tenders too they came from many nations and held many different faiths fares is an important caveat as much too farite parties Keen
18:44 to whiten the war as to ethnic and religious groups who may want to hijack his pluralities Das would go on at the end
18:51 of the Centenary to comment on how Colonial service was instrumentalizes instrumentalized during the four years in many of the ways he had cautioned
19:00 against this leads us to one of the most useful concepts for public historians the idea of a usable past I'm going to quote Jordan over again the idea of a
19:12 usable past is hardly new but is probably more prominent now than ever before if the past is usable then history is an open field that is
19:21 available to be put to diverse even conflicting ends these uses are often found Blended together in a world that constantly affirms the
19:30 value of knowing about the past to inform the present and the future history as entertainment uses the past for commercial purposes history as
19:40 Consciousness raising uses the past for political ends history as public education uses the past to inform audiences about political and social
19:50 trends so this concept can help us identify where narratives are being produced in service of political or econ economic projects and it can be the
20:00 public history project in itself how do we as public historians want or choose to use the past I'm going to finish with one of my
20:12 favorite examples of a usable past that's now 12 years old the Olympic Games opening ceremony from London 2012 this example is particularly in my
20:23 mind because of where the UCL East Campus is in the Olympic Park where I see the stadium every week as Katherine Baker describes the opening
20:31 ceremony is a really important example of public history it's a narrative of national identity anchored in the past and a creative process of telling that
20:42 story similar to theater or pageantry she writes that the London 2012 opening ceremony appeared deeply informed by what one might call such a mosaic mode
20:54 of representing the nation which presents the nation as the sum of of multiple and Divergent political uh personal
21:02 biographies within this Mosaic we see representatives of all four nations markers of progress within UK history not least
21:12 industrialization as well as the NHS important social and political movements like the suffrage movement and the arrival of the Empire wind Rush as
21:21 well as culturally significant characters from children's stories and pop culture uh all the way up to Tim bur late inventor of the
21:30 internet the ceremony was understood to be a moment of national storytelling the creation of a usable past for the Contemporary UK and as a result it
21:40 received Divergent reception whether you saw it as Aiden Burley conservative MP did as Lefty Multicultural crap or as Jonathan freden saw saw it exemplifying
21:52 the ethos of public service and ethnic diversity as an expression of radical patriotism or highly mediated commodity spectacle you understood this was a
22:02 statement to the world about how the UK or at least how Danny Bole Frank Cal Boyce and the Olympic Committee were choosing to present it while Bole has
22:12 been evasive about his political intentions in the ceremony Baker comments that any attempt to define national values which Bole
22:22 sets out as tolerance descent inclusivity engineering culture humor ambition and modesty is of course intensely political and moreover imposes
22:34 an unwarranted universalism on the process of generating Collective narratives from sources so when we critically engage
22:42 with public history projects we need to consider the kinds of usable pasts that are being produced in these forms usable pasts are often seen as a
22:53 quite top-down process but it's important to think about how they can can be generated from the bottom up particularly
23:00 important in political activism as a discipline public history attends to other forms of knowledge and expertise from oral history to Folklore to songs
23:11 or cultural practice and intangible Heritage which expands our definition of sources as we've seen in this lecture the broad modes and means of producing
23:22 history for public audiences has made it increasingly accessible for those wanting to do it for themselves this is particularly evident through
23:30 public digital histories through YouTube Tik Tok or podcasts and our job as public historians is to make sense of this landscape and think seriously about
23:42 what impact this past has on the present so I hope that today I've persuaded you of the importance of public history so that the next time you
23:51 are scrolling through social media or watching TV or even just walking down the street you can think twice about how history is happening in public the
24:01 questions we ask of public history are the questions we can ask to history full stop who owns the past what kind of historical narrative are they telling
24:12 and who for thank you very much