Public History and Interpretive Stances

[mamselle]

Each summer in July and August, I discuss historic sites, including those that made use of the labor of enslaved individuals, and the markers that memorialize their contributions to the society (sometimes in very backwards ways: three gravestones give more lines to naming the owner and their honorifics than the first-name-only servant--an anomaly I point out and raise discussion about).

Just last week, a visitor said, "I thought there were no slaves in the North," and I had to correct her, explaining that until 1824, this colony/state permitted slavery; while there were a notable number of manumissions, a freed black community in one part of a larger nearby town, and legendary figures in many towns, at least 5-10 households out of any 100 settled homes probably had at least 1 or 2 enslaved servants--usually those of the ministers, upper-class merchants, lawyers, doctors, etc.

Larger homes usually ran with 5-8 servants, some of whom might have been indentured individuals (many Irish), but most of whom were blacks brought up from the owners' plantations in the Antiguas, Jamaica, etc. The National Park site associated with one of those homes has done extensive work on the issue and participates in Black Freedom Trail activities in that town; the larger town nearby has an Afircan-American Freedom Trail as well. All its docents are well-versed in the issues and problems and include them in their tours.

I've likewise been encouraged to see how places like Colonial Williamsburg and Monticello have sought to redress previous (unspoken, usually) policies to overlook or underreport on (mostly) black enslavement (Native Americans were also so used), and how interpretive approaches have been re-thought and re-structured to be more forthcoming about the realities of the individual lives of persons in those situations, and more honest about the high human cost in their treatment and living conditions. 

But it's looking as if there is push-back. All the programs (including my own) are based on careful research, much of it ongoing, and none of it exaggerating anything (if anything, I try to be very careful to present all sides of the situation, and I'm sure others in this situation do so as well.) I don't press any points, but I do bring out the issues, and invite commentary, as I do for all the sites I visit.

So, reading an article like this one, which just appeared, I was surprised (and saddened) to realize that people take this very important aspect of (human) American history as an "infringement" on their ability to enjoy their vacations.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/history/2019/09/08/plantations-are-talking-more-about-slavery-grappling-with-visitors-who-talk-back/?noredirect=on

I'd be interested in others' input from any perspective.

M.

[craftyprof]

I'm aware that my skin color affords me the extraordinary privilege of being able to parachute into a discussion of historical injustice and then go on about my day because I don't have to live with the ramifications the way that others do. Everything I'm about to say makes me feel a little gross.

But I think the vacation issue is a real hurdle.  I genuinely want to learn more about history when I travel to new places, but I also want to have a good time.  I want to go to the beach and laugh with my friends and have too much wine with dinner because I'm on vacation.  So there is some balance between confronting our ugly history and sitting with that discomfort... but also being able to compartmentalize the discomfort in order to get back to the beach and the friends and the wine.  I can read a book and be sad, or take a day trip in my hometown and be sad, but if I'm in the middle of an expensive vacation, I need to be able to push past the sad.

I've not been to Germany, so I don't know how you make the transition from visiting Auschwitz and bearing witness to that history and the going back to biergartens and frivolity.  I know that they do a good job at the US Holocaust Memorial Museum of having you walk down to the depths of horror but then walking back up a path of hope and light.  You're still pretty gutted, but you're able to function and continue on to the rest of your day.  My local Holocaust and African American history museums both take a similar approach -  so museum curators must have done some research on this.  It may be harder to do with historic sites where the architecture wasn't deliberately crafted to elicit an emotional response.

(When I was in France, we took a tour of the D-Day beaches and cemeteries.  The lunch on our tour included three desserts.  I'm not sure of the science behind that, but there might also be something to the literal spoonful of sugar.)

Ultimately, we can only learn from our history if we show up for the tours.  So the tour providers can't really ignore the vacation factor.  It may mean finding ways for guests to take meaningful actions before they leave so that you can leave them with some hope and the sense that they have contributed.  I don't know what the magical balance is that makes tourists more attuned to fighting injustice in perpetuity starting the day after tomorrow when they get home from vacation... but that's what you're aiming for.  And there should probably be pie.

[mamselle]

Hmm. Thanks for your thoughts.

It raises the question of purpose for such tours, doesn't it?

I mean, I work at keeping things balanced, but I don't tell silly ghost stories because I think of what I'm doing as primarily educational (and there's a lot of mis-information around some topics so one has to always be addressing those issues as well.)

My character may be rather light-hearted in some ways, but she's not trying to be entertaining--she's trying to be honest.

It's therapeutically good to lead people back to a place of hope, definitely. It's good to have that in mind.

But I actually do the opposite: I end my tours with the question, "where are all the other stones?"...because with at least 10-20 persons of color in the town at any one time, there are really very few markers: 10 all told in the twenty or so towns along the coast that I've visited.

And I want to leave them a bit changed, too--that's also part of the point, I think. Maybe not let them play "Accidental Historical Tourist," as you suggest, but bring them to a different place by the end...at least on this particular tour. (I do others in which other issues are the focus, or we just reach the end of the chronology...)

Insights appreciated.

Others?

M.

[Bede the Vulnerable]

In response to craftyprof:

For what it's worth:  I've been to Auschwitz and Dachau.  For me, those are obvious:  If you go there, you know that the entire focus is going to be on the hideous crimes committed in what were, respectively, a death factory and a brutal concentration camp.  To downplay that would be a sin, no matter how much visitors are disturbed.  In fact, making visitors think about these things is the reason that a place like Auschwitz should be open to the public.  I was still able to enjoy my time in Poland and Germany.  Just not on those days.

Re:  Monticello--To me, a similar principle is involved.  It obviously wasn't a charnel house as was Auschwitz.  So trying to compare the two is weak, and I realize that.  But slavery was also a grave crime against humanity.  I don't see how you play that down and keep a sense of integrity about the place.  If this is too disturbing to too many visitors, resulting in too few visitors to keep the place viable, then just close the site down to the public.  But don't downplay the sins of the place, and of the people who committed them.   Nor the experiences of the slaves who built the thing in the first place, and whose compelled labor was required for it to function at all.

As a thought experiment, I've asked myself what one would do in a class on Southern history if the students were offended by "too much focus" on slavery.  It would be dishonest in the extreme to downplay the issue in the interest of sensitivity, even though students want to "enjoy college."

(And, yes, I said "sin" twice.  I'm Catholic.  It's the way I think of such things.)

[polly_mer]

These short history tours seem like the one-off science experiences: any one experience is not really enough to teach any science or satisfy anyone who isn't already a science buff.  The cumulative effect might lead to something worthwhile if people did lots, but that's a different audience than the one-time vacationer.

The flat truth is, after having been dragged on those kinds of educational experiences through my youth, I won't voluntarily sign up for one as an adult.  At no point has any fun been had at a level high enough to classify it as a vacation.  Seldom is enough education to be had in an afternoon or a day to overcome a lack of background in the history.  Even when I have enough history, yep, that's a house, that's a graveyard, that's a ...  Certain architecture is awe-inspiring, but just history doesn't imbue a place with discernible meaning.  Instead, the last time I was dragged along a historical district by out-of-town visitors (and I assure you this will be the last time I go on one of these things), my sense was more "everywhere has history and the housing crisis is such that many places in the middle of cities should be reconditioned to meet modern people's real needs" and less "oooh, history!"

I suppose if someone were taking one of these tours as a capstone to a class or as a once-in-a-lifetime visit after years of independent reading, then someone might get a benefit, but that's still a different target audience than the one who is really taking a vacation with a vague sense of learning a little bit about something.

[reener06]

I have more than a little familiarity with this topic. I worked twice at Mount Vernon, although 25 years ago. But that was the start of my professional career. I no longer do work that studies this time period, but have many colleagues who do, and I have done tangential research related to this.

I like the WaPo article. I think one key point is that the demographics of who are visiting these sites is changing as a result of this inclusion. In my experiences, it was overwhelmingly white. This results, still, in my field being very white. This biases the historic interpretations. The scholarship on the enslaved has taught us much that is in great contrast to what we thought we knew. Of course there is going to be pushback. I think it's a matter of riding out the wave.

I also teach on related topics, and every semester experience outright hostility from white students. My colleagues of color experience much worse. But I try to approach it--and I'm aware of my power/privilege as a white person to do this--as a way to initiate dialogue, to set an example of dialogue rather than side vs. side. For example, perhaps more people could relate to Washington or Jefferson if they saw them as fallible humans. Indeed, perhaps this would get people to participate more in the political process if we showed that fallible humans made mistakes and yet still attempted to make a better union.

Thanks for the work you do. I know it's not easy.

And, for a laugh, have you seen this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X1IYH_MbJqA ?
I use "Ask a Slave" in a course I teach and it allows people to laugh while realizing their own biases in a safe place. Of course, a bit too difficult to do when you are actively interpreting. It is a good few laughs, though.

[marshwiggle]

For example, perhaps more people could relate to Washington or Jefferson if they saw them as fallible humans. Indeed, perhaps this would get people to participate more in the political process if we showed that fallible humans made mistakes and yet still attempted to make a better union.

Whoa; treating historical figures as fallible human beings instead of lionizing or demonizing them? That's crazy talk. Next you'll be suggesting that we need to consider peoples' words and actions in light of the culture in which they lived, rather than judging them by today's moral standards.

[Bede the Vulnerable]

For example, perhaps more people could relate to Washington or Jefferson if they saw them as fallible humans. Indeed, perhaps this would get people to participate more in the political process if we showed that fallible humans made mistakes and yet still attempted to make a better union.

Whoa; treating historical figures as fallible human beings instead of lionizing or demonizing them? That's crazy talk. Next you'll be suggesting that we need to consider peoples' words and actions in light of the culture in which they lived, rather than judging them by today's moral standards.

Your words and ideas are too confusing.  Mind.  Blown.

[fleabite]

Whoa; treating historical figures as fallible human beings instead of lionizing or demonizing them? That's crazy talk. Next you'll be suggesting that we need to consider peoples' words and actions in light of the culture in which they lived, rather than judging them by today's moral standards.

Yes, we need to put the actions of Washington, Jefferson, etc. in the context of the culture in which they live, but it is too easy to default to that and fail to point out how wrong many of those actions were. An appropriate tour of a historic site requires both aspects: both an understanding of the context and explicit moral judgments. Letting people hear just the time-hallowed interpretations that make them comfortable is a falsification in its own right. It ignores the deeper understanding of the past, warts and all, that we have developed over time.

[Hegemony]

I think the problem comes in that people often consider plantations as fantasy settings — "Gone with the Wind," flirtations on balconies, genteel women in floaty dresses sipping lemonade in picturesque surroundings.  And Instagrammable locations for fantasy weddings. They haven't signed up for the reality of the locale.  Now, you may well say, "These are not fantasy locations; they are genuine sites of important parts of our history, built on pain and the labor of enslaved peoples."  Yes, that's true.  But there's going to be a clash of goals, and some resentment, when people come to them for fantasy reasons, to be confronted with real history.  How to resolve the problem?  I can think of some ways to handle it, but one or the other side is going to be upset.

[mamselle]

Maybe the word "fantasy" is indeed at the heart of the issue; with e-media blurring the lines between the concrete world and imagined ones--sometimes in good ways, sometimes less so--the confusion between ones projections on a site and its significance, and the historical events and people that shaped it, create a cognitive dissonance that may be expressed as frustration or anger.

When people become so identified, or their sense of self is so wrapped up in a fantasy narrative that the actual realities make them upset or angry, something has happened to the overall hierarchy of understanding and knowledge--the imagined overtakes the evidence.

Which, of course, is something historians try to avoid.

Interesting input, thank you!

Pray continue!

M.

[Hegemony]

I don't think it's that the actual reality makes them upset.  I think it's that they went there to have a fun fantasy experience, gawking at the lovely plantation house and imagining themselves sipping the lemonade with their gorgeous clothes on.  And someone starts going on about the pain and exploitation, and they think, "That kind of information is all very well in its place, but that's not why I'm here!"  (Offstage commentary from earnest historian: "That's why you should be here.  You should never forget that this picture of luxury and ease was built on the backs of..."  Vacationer: "I'm just trying to have my goddamned vacation!")  It's as if you signed up for a spa day and you're all looking forward to getting a massage and sitting in the sauna, and someone comes in and starts telling you that this land where the spa is was stolen from the Pottawattomi Indians, who were decimated by disease and attack, and then moved to an oppressive reservation after the government violated a series of treaties.  And also for many decades the people who work in spas were exploited members of races against whom there was bigotry.  All of those things are perfectly true, but the spa-goer is going to see it as a kind of self-righteous category error. 

I think one remedy is to make the nature of the tour very clear to people on plantation tours before they sign up. 
"

[mamselle]

Mine are sort of the opposite of plantation tours, but I'll consider that idea, of bringing up a trigger warning at the outset of the tour.

In a wider sense, too, Inthink a guide has a kind of social responsibility not to over-emphasive the more oppositional, crowd-pleasing aspects of historical interaction, and give a more nuanced discussion of the various events one is covering.

Not only American History high-school textbooks, but FamousPlaceFamousEvent tours, have a lot to answer for in presenting and representing those sites and events as markers for the individualistic, "damn-the-torpedoes," "America for Americans" MAGA-like idolatry of triumphalistic history that has fueled a large, and increasingly dangerous, inconsiderate hyperheroism in sectors of this society at present.

Whenever certain trolly drivers go by, I wince, knowing (because I've been on their tours) that their two-second sound bites about various figures' statues and homesites sound sweetly ignorant but in fact underwrite the deep-seated convictions of those who only hear what they want to hear.

We have to be careful not to deliver "Fake News" about the past, as well as the present.

M.

[larryc]

I am a Yankee and not at all surprised that many people on tours in the northeast are surprised to learn that slavery existed in New England. My recollection of my own school days in Connecticut is that we learned that slavery was a southern thing, one of the many sins of white southerners like Nascar and country music. New England slavery (and economic dependence on southern slavery) has been whitewashed for so many generations.

I think you are doing the right thing in bringing it to the forefront. Slavery was by no means incidental--the Hartford Courant ran some articles a decade ago about the discovery that there was a huge slave plantation in eastern Connecticut (I think) that grew and dried onions as a foodstuff for slaves in the Caribbean. Here it is. https://www.courant.com/news/special-reports/hc-plantation.artsep29-story.html

Public historians everywhere are getting more woke, and getting pushback for it. We just have to push through. One of my students volunteers to lead tours of a grand historic house in our town. He uses the biography of a Chinese cook who was employed there to talk about white supremacy in the history of our town, briniging it right up to the present with neo nazi activities in the area. He tells me that the surprising thing is how open and eager most visitors are to hear this story, which they surely did not expect when they signed up for a tour of a historic house. He also gets some pushback, and at least one complaint to his boss, who so far supports him.

[mamselle]

Thanks, larryc. I value your input.

I'll be giving a tour this Saturday for a small group. I'm pondering these things as I plan for it.

M.