History and Heritage

In his book The Heritage Crusade and the Spoils of History, David Lowenthal describes the differences between history (defined as critical inquiry into the past) and heritage (defined as the use of the past to support a certain conclusion) and challenges that are faced by both. Lowenthal explains that the popularity of heritage has grown exponentially in recent years: "Memorials and monuments multiply, cities and scenes are restored, historic exploits are reenacted, flea-market kitsch is elevated into antiques. Retro-fashion rages and camcorders memorialize yesterday. Historic sites multiply from thousands to millions; 95 percent of existing museums postdate the Second World War" (Lowenthal 3).

Lowenthal goes on to describe how different individuals, families, communities, regions, and countries as well as ethnic, political, and religious groups use history as a way to find identity or belonging, to justify past or current actions, or to support their position on a current issue. With heritage, people are looking to find certain things and usually succeed. Often what is most significant is not was is said but, instead, what is left out.

In the past, most heritage issues had to deal with the elites of society, often emphasizing their glorious lineages, but today, heritage has become important to the populous. People now want to go to museums about how the common people lived, the small cottage where a country farmer lived, the factory where hundreds of workers eked out a living, etc.

With so many people fighting over heritage, it beg the question of who possesses this heritage. Does a man have the right to hold on to his grandfather's diary of World War II, when there are others who wish to know more about it? Should the nobility still in possession of their English country homes be allowed to keep them private when the English people believe such houses to be a part of their national heritage? Do U.S. museums have the right to hold on to Native American artifacts that many tribes want back? Since heritage deals with people possessing parts of the past, questions like these become huge issues for museums and heritage sites.

Another interesting thing that Lownethal points out is his book is how peoples' admiration of the past causes that past to be damaged or altered. Lowenthal explains how the hoards of people who take pictures of the great works of art in museums cause the paintings to diminish over time, how the steps of castles are worn down by the numerous tourists who come to visit.

Worn Staircase at the Chateau d'Amboise

This is also true of cultures. Admirers of cultures and cultural histories flock to experience them and in their flocking, the original culture and history become scarce. This summer I spent eight weeks in Tours, a beautiful French city of about 200,000 on the Loire River. Besides having a international institute for teaching French, which could not have had more that several hundred students, there were no tourists, no tourist shops, no English spoken.

The only hints of globalization were the few chain restaurants (probably no more than 10 or 20 in the entire city) and Galeries Lafayette, a French department store chain. It was wonderful! I had the chance to speak French with real French people, to see how they really lived, to shop in all of the small boutiques that lined the streets, to walk through Place Plumereau, a medieval square with restaurants on the ground floor and apartments above, to pass by some the ruins of an ancient monument that had been destroyed during World War II.  

Tour de Charlemagne

When I was able to spend a weekend in Paris, it was something of a disappointment. Paris was mainly full of non-French tourists. Even those who were French had learned to speak English to tourists. There was even a Burger King on the Champs Elysees. The culture of what I was able to see of the city was all over-run by tourists. One could observe French culture immortalized in paintings and buildings, but the living, people aspect of the French culture was hard to be found.

Tomb of the Unknown Soldier

My weekend in London was even worse. I planed my trip looking forward to hearing all of those wonderful English accents that Americans love so much, but I hardly heard any. The staff at the hotel and the tourist shops were all recent immigrants, hardly speaking English, little lone the that of the Queen.

Sacre Coeur de Monmartre

Historical Works By Amateurs and Professionals

In chapters 3 (Searching for the General Reader: Professional Historians, Amateurs, and Nonacademic Audiences, 1890-1939) and 4 (The Crusade against Pedantry and Its Aftermath: Allan Nevins and Friends, 1930s-1950s) of Ian Tyrrel's book Historians in Public, Tyrrel discuses how the most popular historical works read by non-academic audiences were those not written by professional historians. On cause of the elaborate and often tedious writing style of many professional historians compared to that of many authors with backgrounds in professional writing or journalism, as well as the failure of professional historians to assess the needs and desires of the non-academic audiences, this trend of amateur historians writing the history read by the public continues to present. Fortunately for a time, professional historians did spend time publishing reviews of popular amateur works, so that the public had a strong idea about which sources were accurate.

Today there is a greater struggle for while there is a plethora of interesting and popular amateur writings on historical topics (New York Times Bestseller Lists: Hardcover Nonfiction and Paperback Nonfiction) it is not always clear how trustworthy the source may be. There are obvious things to look for of course, like the author's background and motivation for writing, along with the sources he or she cited. Unfortunately, there are many works out today that may pass a quick assessment for inaccuracy, but may indeed be extremely problematic. This begs the question of the best ways to discern an accurate and interesting historical text from an interesting and questionable one.

Personally, as a future teacher I really struggle with the question of discernment of non-academic texts. As a teacher, I will need to continue to be learning about all different areas of history. I have always believed that one of the most effective ways of keeping material interesting and fresh for students is to always be making a concerted effort to always be learning more about the material oneself. In addition, students need more than a text book and lectures to get a wide perspective of history: they also need supplementary material in the form of primary and secondary sources. Depending on the level of students, it may be unreasonable to ask them to read the latest academic article on any given subject from a journal such as JSTOR. What they may really need is additional information on specific subjects that is both readable and accurate to help them to expand their historical knowledge. Towards the endeavor of finding these sources, I do not know of any excellent resources that review main-stream histories for historical accuracy or of any efficient way of sorting through numerous books and articles to figure out which ones are reliable.