WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:04.000 music 00:00:04.000 --> 00:00:10.000 music 00:00:10.000 --> 00:00:13.000 I'd like to introduce James Masnov. 00:00:13.000 --> 00:00:16.000 James is a former stellar history student of ours. 00:00:16.000 --> 00:00:20.000 And he's going to speak to us. And I'm just going to kinda 00:00:20.000 --> 00:00:24.000 read a little introduction that even James suggested for us 00:00:24.000 --> 00:00:29.000 to introduce the topic that James is going to talk to us about. 00:00:29.000 --> 00:00:32.000 And this says, James will discuss the various 00:00:32.000 --> 00:00:37.000 views concerning the role of history inside and outside of academia. 00:00:37.000 --> 00:00:40.000 And I think that points to a kind of paradigm 00:00:40.000 --> 00:00:44.000 called public history. Obviously, that's catching on all over the country. 00:00:44.000 --> 00:00:49.000 We have a public sociology might have some parallels that's catching on, too, interesting. 00:00:49.000 --> 00:00:52.000 James will provide an analysis 00:00:52.000 --> 00:00:56.000 of two of the prevailing schools of historical thought. 00:00:56.000 --> 00:00:58.000 I understand one if call social history. 00:00:58.000 --> 00:00:60.000 The other is referred to as a master narrative. 00:01:00.000 --> 00:01:02.000 And he will argue 00:01:02.000 --> 00:01:07.000 for the idea that there is both a synthesis of these two schools 00:01:07.000 --> 00:01:11.000 and maybe some problems or things to reject in these two schools of thought. 00:01:11.000 --> 00:01:14.000 So without further adue, as we say, let's hear James. 00:01:14.000 --> 00:01:19.000 Thank you very much. Applause. Thank you Dr. Braa. 00:01:19.000 --> 00:01:23.000 Yes, I am James Masnov. I am an independent historian 00:01:23.000 --> 00:01:26.000 and a recent graduate of Western Oregon University. 00:01:26.000 --> 00:01:29.000 The talk today is called Public Memory and the Ownership of History. 00:01:29.000 --> 00:01:36.000 The talk is three parts. The first of which we be about the tension between popular history versus academic history. 00:01:36.000 --> 00:01:40.000 The second of which will about the historical literacy 00:01:40.000 --> 00:01:43.000 of college graduates and some methods of discussing history 00:01:43.000 --> 00:01:44.000 for educators and anybody, really. 00:01:44.000 --> 00:01:48.000 And the third and final part of this talk will be about the current debate 00:01:48.000 --> 00:01:51.000 regarding the controversial statues and memorials. 00:01:51.000 --> 00:01:53.000 And a way for the public to recon 00:01:53.000 --> 00:01:56.000 with history with these issues...so. 00:01:56.000 --> 00:01:57.000 We have a lot of ground to cover. 00:01:57.000 --> 00:01:60.000 Part 1, popular history versus academic history. 00:02:00.000 --> 00:02:04.000 It only seems reasonable to define our terms. 00:02:04.000 --> 00:02:07.000 And with that in mind, popular history is written for a general readership, 00:02:07.000 --> 00:02:09.000 non-historians, non-academics. 00:02:09.000 --> 00:02:13.000 It's promoted commercially through mainstream sources, including television talk shows, 00:02:13.000 --> 00:02:16.000 newspapers and other traditional mainstream media. 00:02:16.000 --> 00:02:20.000 The authors are generally not PhDs or professors but instead 00:02:20.000 --> 00:02:23.000 tend to be journalists, pundits and even writers of fiction. 00:02:23.000 --> 00:02:28.000 These words are often used as the source material for TV shows, miniseries and films. 00:02:28.000 --> 00:02:31.000 And they tend to lean traditional or even conservative. 00:02:31.000 --> 00:02:36.000 They have a habit of mythologizing and they have a penchant for hero-worship of their subjects. 00:02:36.000 --> 00:02:40.000 And they generally reinforce cultural assumptions. 00:02:40.000 --> 00:02:44.000 You're not likely to find any groundbreaking, 00:02:44.000 --> 00:02:47.000 historical revisionism in a work of popular history. 00:02:47.000 --> 00:02:52.000 Academic history is written by historians, for historians, scholars and students. 00:02:52.000 --> 00:02:56.000 It's promoted through academic circles including conferences 00:02:56.000 --> 00:02:58.000 academic journals, etc. 00:02:58.000 --> 00:02:63.000 Authors are PhDs who also teach at institutes of higher learning. 00:03:03.000 --> 00:03:08.000 There's a premium put on the use of primary sources, original documents, etc and original scholarship. 00:03:08.000 --> 00:03:13.000 It builds upon a previous scholarship and contributes to a canon of historiography. 00:03:13.000 --> 00:03:16.000 For those of you not familiar with the term, historiography is essentially 00:03:16.000 --> 00:03:19.000 the history of the scholarship of that given field or subject. 00:03:19.000 --> 00:03:24.000 And in recent decades, much academic history has been rooted in social history, 00:03:24.000 --> 00:03:27.000 giving attention to the historically voiceless. 00:03:27.000 --> 00:03:32.000 And this form of history tends to lean toward a left of center political lens. 00:03:32.000 --> 00:03:36.000 And so, the common sort of accusations that these two realms get 00:03:36.000 --> 00:03:40.000 is that popular history is not really much more than hero worship. 00:03:40.000 --> 00:03:44.000 You read a book of popular history, it's going to 00:03:44.000 --> 00:03:48.000 likely deify the subject in someway. 00:03:48.000 --> 00:03:51.000 But then there's also accusations against academic historians. 00:03:51.000 --> 00:03:55.000 That academic historians are essentially hipsters 00:03:55.000 --> 00:03:58.000 looking down their noses at the general readership. 00:03:58.000 --> 00:03:63.000 And that they have some sort of elitist, exclusionary quality about them. 00:04:03.000 --> 00:04:08.000 And of course, these two characterizations are more caricatures 00:04:08.000 --> 00:04:11.000 and as caricatures they're too simple to be true. 00:04:11.000 --> 00:04:16.000 And nevertheless, I do think that each of these accusations have at least a kernel of truth to them. 00:04:16.000 --> 00:04:20.000 So to really look at popular history versus academic history 00:04:20.000 --> 00:04:24.000 I thought it made sense to look at some specific examples. 00:04:24.000 --> 00:04:29.000 And we're going to look at some, what I consider, positive examples of each. 00:04:29.000 --> 00:04:32.000 And some maybe not so great examples of each as well. 00:04:32.000 --> 00:04:36.000 And for what I would think of as a positive 00:04:36.000 --> 00:04:41.000 example of popular history is David McCullough's John Adams. 00:04:41.000 --> 00:04:43.000 This was published in the early 2000's. 00:04:43.000 --> 00:04:47.000 And Chapter 1 opens with this passage quote 00:04:47.000 --> 00:04:55.000 reads slide 00:04:56.000 --> 00:04:60.000 reads slide 00:05:00.000 --> 00:05:04.000 reads slide 00:05:04.000 --> 00:05:08.000 reads slide 00:05:08.000 --> 00:05:13.000 reads slide 00:05:13.000 --> 00:05:15.000 As you can see this is very narrative. 00:05:15.000 --> 00:05:18.000 It's not packed with a whole bunch of historical data. 00:05:18.000 --> 00:05:21.000 Nevertheless, it's very compelling writing. It engages the reader. 00:05:21.000 --> 00:05:26.000 And a positive example, in my estimation, of academic writing, 00:05:26.000 --> 00:05:28.000 academic history, 00:05:28.000 --> 00:05:31.000 would be The Middle Ground by Richard White. 00:05:31.000 --> 00:05:34.000 And this is a passage taken from page 56 of that work quote 00:05:34.000 --> 00:05:40.000 reads slide 00:05:40.000 --> 00:05:44.000 reads slide 00:05:44.000 --> 00:05:48.000 reads slide 00:05:48.000 --> 00:05:52.000 reads slide 00:05:52.000 --> 00:05:57.000 reads slide 00:05:57.000 --> 00:05:60.000 So as you can see academic history 00:06:00.000 --> 00:06:02.000 is more packed with data. 00:06:02.000 --> 00:06:06.000 It's not so much trying to tell you a story, not utilizing narrative 00:06:06.000 --> 00:06:10.000 as much as it's unfolding and revealing historical data to the reader. 00:06:10.000 --> 00:06:15.000 But now let's also look a some not so good examples of each. 00:06:15.000 --> 00:06:21.000 And I thought for popular history I would choose someone like 00:06:21.000 --> 00:06:25.000 Glenn Beck. Now Glenn Beck calls himself America's historian. 00:06:25.000 --> 00:06:29.000 This is unfortunate. Laughter. 00:06:29.000 --> 00:06:33.000 And it has nothing to do with politics, it's because he's not an historian. 00:06:33.000 --> 00:06:35.000 And so he should not be promoting himself as such. 00:06:35.000 --> 00:06:39.000 But here's an example from his book Being George Washington, quote 00:06:39.000 --> 00:06:44.000 reads slide 00:06:44.000 --> 00:06:48.000 reads slide 00:06:48.000 --> 00:06:52.000 reads slide 00:06:52.000 --> 00:06:58.000 reads slide 00:06:58.000 --> 00:06:61.000 So to me the problem here is not so much 00:07:01.000 --> 00:07:03.000 that he's utilizing a narrative. 00:07:03.000 --> 00:07:06.000 That would be the least of the issues here, as far as I'm concerned. 00:07:06.000 --> 00:07:08.000 The problem is the writing itself. 00:07:08.000 --> 00:07:12.000 It's got a cartoonish, almost swashbuckling nature to it. 00:07:12.000 --> 00:07:16.000 One can almost see George Washington and Thomas Paine 00:07:16.000 --> 00:07:18.000 sprouting wings and ascending into the heavens. 00:07:18.000 --> 00:07:22.000 This is the sort of thing that gives popular history, 00:07:22.000 --> 00:07:25.000 in my estimation, a bad name. 00:07:25.000 --> 00:07:29.000 But, let's not let academic writing off the hook. 00:07:29.000 --> 00:07:33.000 Now when I was doing my research for this presentation, 00:07:33.000 --> 00:07:36.000 I was looking at some not so great examples of 00:07:36.000 --> 00:07:40.000 published academic writing. And I found some doozies. 00:07:40.000 --> 00:07:44.000 And I started to feel like shooting fish in a barrel. Laughter. 00:07:44.000 --> 00:07:48.000 So I actually really held back and I found an academic 00:07:48.000 --> 00:07:51.000 journal article that was published in 2009. 00:07:51.000 --> 00:07:56.000 In an article called Stance. The writer is Jason Hoover. 00:07:56.000 --> 00:07:60.000 quote, reads slide 00:08:00.000 --> 00:08:04.000 reads slide 00:08:04.000 --> 00:08:08.000 reads slide 00:08:08.000 --> 00:08:12.000 reads slide 00:08:12.000 --> 00:08:16.000 reads slide 00:08:16.000 --> 00:08:20.000 reads slide 00:08:20.000 --> 00:08:24.000 reads slide 00:08:24.000 --> 00:08:28.000 reads slide 00:08:28.000 --> 00:08:31.000 reads slide 00:08:31.000 --> 00:08:35.000 enquote...whoo, so 00:08:35.000 --> 00:08:40.000 I'm not using this example to critique the thesis. Though I'm not a fan. 00:08:40.000 --> 00:08:44.000 It's just to take a look at the way it's written. 00:08:44.000 --> 00:08:48.000 And it's jargon filled. It's very inside baseball. 00:08:48.000 --> 00:08:50.000 It's somewhat navel-gazing. 00:08:50.000 --> 00:08:52.000 And in terms of the jargon, 00:08:52.000 --> 00:08:57.000 he uses epistemic or epistemically 4 times in as many sentences. 00:08:57.000 --> 00:08:60.000 I find this to be an example to give 00:09:00.000 --> 00:09:04.000 academic writing a bad name. 00:09:04.000 --> 00:09:07.000 So the question is, is there a balance to be found 00:09:07.000 --> 00:09:11.000 between academic history and popular history? 00:09:11.000 --> 00:09:16.000 I actually believe to some extent that it can't. 00:09:16.000 --> 00:09:19.000 And I think this has to do with finding a balance between 00:09:19.000 --> 00:09:22.000 historiography and narrative. 00:09:22.000 --> 00:09:27.000 Historiography is really the discipline of the academic historian. 00:09:27.000 --> 00:09:31.000 And they generally tend to be 00:09:31.000 --> 00:09:35.000 very reticent to us narrative to tell history as a story. 00:09:35.000 --> 00:09:39.000 And it makes sense why. So, as I said, historiography is 00:09:39.000 --> 00:09:43.000 as sort of history of the scholarship of that given field. 00:09:43.000 --> 00:09:44.000 What have previous historians had to say. 00:09:44.000 --> 00:09:47.000 And what have they agreed or disagreed on. What have the debates been? 00:09:47.000 --> 00:09:51.000 What have the conversations been about this historical figure, etc? 00:09:51.000 --> 00:09:54.000 And that makes sense that historians would 00:09:54.000 --> 00:09:56.000 concerns themselves with such things. 00:09:56.000 --> 00:09:59.000 For one thing you want to make sure that you're bringing something to the table. 00:09:59.000 --> 00:09:63.000 And then I also understand their reticence of a narrative. 00:10:03.000 --> 00:10:07.000 Because to utilize a narrative is to tell a story. 00:10:07.000 --> 00:10:10.000 And to tell a story is to say there's a beginning, a middle and an end. 00:10:10.000 --> 00:10:12.000 That's what telling a story is and 00:10:12.000 --> 00:10:16.000 academic historians are understandable reticent 00:10:16.000 --> 00:10:18.000 to do something like that. 00:10:18.000 --> 00:10:20.000 Because if you put something in the form of a story 00:10:20.000 --> 00:10:24.000 an academic historian will say, well yeah, you say this is the beginning but 00:10:24.000 --> 00:10:28.000 there's all of these antecedents that pre-date the stuff that you're calling the beginning. 00:10:28.000 --> 00:10:31.000 And you say this is the end but there's all these ramifications that happen 00:10:31.000 --> 00:10:35.000 thereafter that you're not taking into account. 00:10:35.000 --> 00:10:40.000 Narrative has a tendency to encapsulate 00:10:40.000 --> 00:10:44.000 and event or person's life, etc. and removes it from 00:10:44.000 --> 00:10:46.000 it's historical context and puts it into a vacuum 00:10:46.000 --> 00:10:49.000 So it makes sense that academic historians would be reticent 00:10:49.000 --> 00:10:53.000 to utilize narrative for that very reason. 00:10:53.000 --> 00:10:56.000 And yet, I do believe that academic historians 00:10:56.000 --> 00:10:58.000 could utilize just a touch of narrative 00:10:58.000 --> 00:10:61.000 in some of their writing because while 00:11:01.000 --> 00:11:03.000 life is not a narrative, 00:11:03.000 --> 00:11:06.000 and so history is not a narrative, 00:11:06.000 --> 00:11:11.000 we think narratively. Human beings think episodically. 00:11:11.000 --> 00:11:14.000 And, in fact, it's part of the human experience that one of the things 00:11:14.000 --> 00:11:17.000 that moves us most is the telling of story. 00:11:17.000 --> 00:11:20.000 And I think it makes sense then 00:11:20.000 --> 00:11:23.000 to not dismiss narrative entirely out-of-hand 00:11:23.000 --> 00:11:28.000 for academic historians. It's just a matter of degrees. 00:11:28.000 --> 00:11:34.000 That said, certainly, popular historians have a lot to gain 00:11:34.000 --> 00:11:36.000 by utilizing historiography. 00:11:36.000 --> 00:11:40.000 Even some of the better, popular writers of history 00:11:40.000 --> 00:11:45.000 such as David McCullough, generally do not use historiography much at all. 00:11:45.000 --> 00:11:49.000 Their works would benefit greatly by utilizing historiography. 00:11:49.000 --> 00:11:52.000 And saying, what has historians 00:11:52.000 --> 00:11:57.000 had to say about this figure, this event, etc. before. 00:11:57.000 --> 00:11:60.000 That's not to say that popular history can't be very well-sourced. 00:12:00.000 --> 00:12:04.000 It can be, such as John Adams by David McCullough's 00:12:04.000 --> 00:12:06.000 00:12:06.000 --> 00:12:11.000 But, McCullough's tendency to not bother to see 00:12:11.000 --> 00:12:15.000 what historians have traditionally, over time had to say 00:12:15.000 --> 00:12:19.000 where they disagreed, certainly weakened popular history. 00:12:19.000 --> 00:12:24.000 By utilizing a little more historiography, popular history could really 00:12:24.000 --> 00:12:26.000 add some credibility to its realm. 00:12:26.000 --> 00:12:31.000 And it could really have a lot to gain by adding some academic rigor. 00:12:31.000 --> 00:12:36.000 I also wanted to note some irony in these 2 realms. 00:12:36.000 --> 00:12:40.000 And the irony is this. I don't think it's insignificant. 00:12:40.000 --> 00:12:44.000 Popular history while it tends to lean conservative, 00:12:44.000 --> 00:12:48.000 nevertheless, has a sort of every man, populous sort of quality to it 00:12:48.000 --> 00:12:52.000 that academic history often lacks. 00:12:52.000 --> 00:12:56.000 And academic history, especially social history, which its mission 00:12:56.000 --> 00:12:60.000 is to give voice to the historically voiceless 00:13:00.000 --> 00:13:04.000 and to offer these new alternative histories that people aren't as used to hearing. 00:13:04.000 --> 00:13:09.000 Sometimes, participants in that field betray their cause, in my opinion, 00:13:09.000 --> 00:13:14.000 by being elitist and exclusionary and looking down looking down the nose at the general readership. 00:13:14.000 --> 00:13:17.000 So I do think the two have something to learn from each other. 00:13:17.000 --> 00:13:20.000 And I think that these ironies within the two 00:13:20.000 --> 00:13:25.000 are somewhat significant. 00:13:25.000 --> 00:13:28.000 Oh, and so about popular history 00:13:28.000 --> 00:13:31.000 I wanted to mention for a moment the work, Hamilton. 00:13:31.000 --> 00:13:36.000 It's probably the best example of popular history entertainment in the past couple years. 00:13:36.000 --> 00:13:37.000 It's been quite a phenomenon. 00:13:37.000 --> 00:13:40.000 And I want to be very clear that I'm actually a very big fan 00:13:40.000 --> 00:13:42.000 of Lin-Manuel Miranda's work. 00:13:42.000 --> 00:13:44.000 One of my favorite things to do with my family 00:13:44.000 --> 00:13:47.000 during the summer is that when were on extended road trips 00:13:47.000 --> 00:13:52.000 we blast the Hamilton soundtrack. And listen to it over and over. 00:13:52.000 --> 00:13:55.000 So I'm a very big fan of the work. 00:13:55.000 --> 00:13:59.000 It's based on Ron Chernow's book Alexander Hamilton which 00:13:59.000 --> 00:13:63.000 I was fortunate enough to read a few years before the Hamilton phenomenon. 00:14:03.000 --> 00:14:06.000 But it's a fantastic, very comprehensive piece of work 00:14:06.000 --> 00:14:08.000 and I highly recommend it. 00:14:08.000 --> 00:14:10.000 But there does begin to be a question 00:14:10.000 --> 00:14:13.000 when you have a phenomenon like Hamilton 00:14:13.000 --> 00:14:16.000 is to ask how much of it is history 00:14:16.000 --> 00:14:20.000 and how much of it is mere entertainment or even 00:14:20.000 --> 00:14:24.000 simply pop culture. I have to say that 00:14:24.000 --> 00:14:26.000 the academic historian in me 00:14:26.000 --> 00:14:28.000 tends to think it is certainly the later. 00:14:28.000 --> 00:14:31.000 Even though it is a wonderful piece of art. 00:14:31.000 --> 00:14:35.000 And I began to think about this as I've had 00:14:35.000 --> 00:14:38.000 had conversations with college students the past couple of years. 00:14:38.000 --> 00:14:43.000 And I actually had some intimate to me that they knew 00:14:43.000 --> 00:14:44.000 the history of the American revolution 00:14:44.000 --> 00:14:48.000 and they knew the history of the Early Republic because they're fans of Hamilton. 00:14:48.000 --> 00:14:51.000 And I probably took this a little personally because 00:14:51.000 --> 00:14:53.000 I am an early Americanist. 00:14:53.000 --> 00:14:57.000 The American Revolution and the Early Republic happens to be my scholarship. 00:14:57.000 --> 00:14:60.000 And so I started thinking about this more and more. 00:15:00.000 --> 00:15:05.000 And I started thinking, well, if one were to get their history from Hamilton 00:15:05.000 --> 00:15:08.000 what misconceptions might they derive from it? 00:15:08.000 --> 00:15:12.000 Well for one, they could very easily make the mistake 00:15:12.000 --> 00:15:15.000 that Thomas Jefferson was the only founder to have slaves cuz 00:15:15.000 --> 00:15:20.000 he is the absolute only founder in the entire play that's referenced as a slave owner. 00:15:20.000 --> 00:15:24.000 Another concern that I have as an historian 00:15:24.000 --> 00:15:27.000 is the character of Alexander Hamilton himself. 00:15:27.000 --> 00:15:32.000 And there's a bit of hero worship in the Broadway musical and perhaps that's 00:15:32.000 --> 00:15:36.000 somewhat inevitable in a work of popular history & popular history entertainment. 00:15:36.000 --> 00:15:40.000 But that's not to say that Alexander Hamilton 00:15:40.000 --> 00:15:41.000 is presented unblemished. 00:15:41.000 --> 00:15:45.000 He's shown to be prideful to a fault. 00:15:45.000 --> 00:15:48.000 To be ambitious to a fault. 00:15:48.000 --> 00:15:51.000 He's shown to be, to have been a philanderer. 00:15:51.000 --> 00:15:55.000 And yet, one of the biggest concerns as to his character 00:15:55.000 --> 00:15:58.000 which is certainly addressed by Ron Chernow in the book 00:15:58.000 --> 00:15:62.000 but is entirely missing from the Broadway musical 00:16:02.000 --> 00:16:05.000 is that Alexander Hamilton had a real penchant for militarism. 00:16:05.000 --> 00:16:09.000 He had some very Napoleon-Like qualities. 00:16:09.000 --> 00:16:16.000 He had a penchant for empire and standing armies that even his contemporaries found a bit dangerous. 00:16:16.000 --> 00:16:22.000 And as an early-Americanist I must note that I find that just a little bit disappointing. 00:16:22.000 --> 00:16:25.000 Because it certainly could've been included. 00:16:25.000 --> 00:16:28.000 But that's my personal take on that. 00:16:28.000 --> 00:16:31.000 Moving on to part two of this talk 00:16:31.000 --> 00:16:33.000 this is the briefest part of this talk. 00:16:33.000 --> 00:16:38.000 And so the historical literacy of college graduates and methods for history. 00:16:38.000 --> 00:16:42.000 As I was thinking about the college students I've talked to over the past couple of years 00:16:42.000 --> 00:16:48.000 who seemed to know the history of the early-American Republic because they know the play Hamilton 00:16:48.000 --> 00:16:53.000 it got me thinking what really is the historical literacy of people in this country 00:16:53.000 --> 00:16:56.000 but specifically of college graduates. 00:16:56.000 --> 00:16:58.000 I did some digging 00:16:58.000 --> 00:16:63.000 and in my research I came across a study that was conducted in 2015. 00:17:03.000 --> 00:17:06.000 Its findings were published in 2016. 00:17:06.000 --> 00:17:13.000 And several hundred college graduates were polled of various disciplines. 00:17:13.000 --> 00:17:18.000 And they were all at least earners of bachelor's degrees. 00:17:18.000 --> 00:17:21.000 Some of them had earned advanced college degrees. 00:17:21.000 --> 00:17:26.000 And the results were rather disquieting to say the least. 00:17:26.000 --> 00:17:32.000 In the publication called a Crisis in Civic Education 00:17:32.000 --> 00:17:36.000 a report by the American Counsel of Trustees and Alumni in 2016. 00:17:36.000 --> 00:17:41.000 I'm going to share just a handful of the findings with you here. 00:17:41.000 --> 00:17:47.000 Among college graduates polled 60 percent knew that Congress and not the President had the power to declare war. 00:17:47.000 --> 00:17:48.000 Not terrible but not great. 00:17:48.000 --> 00:17:54.000 But only 38 percent knew that senators serve six years and representatives serve two years in office. 00:17:54.000 --> 00:17:60.000 Forty-nine percent of college graduates polled knew that presidential impeachments are tried before the U.S. Senate. 00:18:00.000 --> 00:18:04.000 Only 45 percent knew the process for amending the Constitution. 00:18:04.000 --> 00:18:09.000 And amazingly almost 10 percent, 9.6 percent of college graduates polled 00:18:09.000 --> 00:18:12.000 thought that Judge Judy sat on the Supreme Court. 00:18:12.000 --> 00:18:13.000 laughter 00:18:13.000 --> 00:18:17.000 It would be funny if it weren't so tragic. 00:18:19.000 --> 00:18:23.000 And there's a lot of questions that come out of this. 00:18:23.000 --> 00:18:28.000 I was talking about academic historians earlier. 00:18:28.000 --> 00:18:32.000 It would be easy to think well this is the fault of the academic historians. 00:18:32.000 --> 00:18:36.000 After all, it's their day job to teach history to college students. 00:18:36.000 --> 00:18:40.000 And yet I think that'd be a very unfair analysis 00:18:40.000 --> 00:18:44.000 because it's also the fault of public educators. 00:18:44.000 --> 00:18:51.000 Young people are coming into college already unbelievably deficient in their historical literacy. 00:18:51.000 --> 00:18:54.000 So what can be done about this? 00:18:54.000 --> 00:18:56.000 I think a handful of things can be done. 00:18:56.000 --> 00:18:64.000 And this is for educators but it's certainly for the biggest novice of history. 00:19:04.000 --> 00:19:07.000 If you just have a little bit of discipline in how you look at it and how you talk about it. 00:19:07.000 --> 00:19:11.000 It doesn't matter who you are. These things could really make a difference. 00:19:11.000 --> 00:19:13.000 One is that historians are time travelers. 00:19:13.000 --> 00:19:18.000 And as time travelers there's a certain responsibility and obligation 00:19:18.000 --> 00:19:22.000 to travel to the past and bring the past into the present 00:19:22.000 --> 00:19:28.000 and analyze it, disseminate it, and discuss the various interpretations that you're going to have. 00:19:28.000 --> 00:19:34.000 What one shouldn't do is travel to the past and impose your present-day worldview 00:19:34.000 --> 00:19:38.000 upon a completely different era. 00:19:38.000 --> 00:19:40.000 This is called presentism. 00:19:40.000 --> 00:19:44.000 Most historians know that it's wrong. A lot of them do it anyway. 00:19:44.000 --> 00:19:48.000 And certainly the general public is very guilty of this. 00:19:48.000 --> 00:19:52.000 It makes sense that you would use your own worldview 00:19:52.000 --> 00:19:56.000 and therefore you would use some presentism when you analyze history. 00:19:56.000 --> 00:19:60.000 In fact on some level it's inevitable. 00:20:00.000 --> 00:20:05.000 Part of analysis is actually using your personal worldview to interpret data. 00:20:05.000 --> 00:20:10.000 So to that extent it's going to happen. 00:20:10.000 --> 00:20:16.000 But that doesn't make it ok. All the more reason to keep it in check as much as humanly possible. 00:20:16.000 --> 00:20:20.000 I very much advocate for not committing the crime of presentism. 00:20:20.000 --> 00:20:24.000 And then I advocate work for what I call the three C's of history. 00:20:24.000 --> 00:20:28.000 Teach the complexities, emphasize the role of contingency, and promote the principle of context. 00:20:28.000 --> 00:20:30.000 Teach the complexities. 00:20:30.000 --> 00:20:34.000 It's the complex matters of history that make it fascinating. 00:20:34.000 --> 00:20:38.000 There aren't usually simple answers anyway. 00:20:38.000 --> 00:20:45.000 But certainly it's in the complexities that you find the really rich, interesting stuff about history. 00:20:45.000 --> 00:20:48.000 It's in the hypocrisies. 00:20:48.000 --> 00:20:55.000 It's in the contradictions of certain figures, certain eras, certain movements, etc. 00:20:55.000 --> 00:20:57.000 Emphasize the role of contingency. 00:20:57.000 --> 00:20:59.000 Nothing in history was inevitable. 00:20:59.000 --> 00:20:64.000 Nothing in history was inevitable including this moment right now. 00:21:04.000 --> 00:21:08.000 And so the role of contingency is very important for people to understand. 00:21:08.000 --> 00:21:09.000 And promote the principle of context. 00:21:09.000 --> 00:21:13.000 As I was talking about context earlier, why academic historians are reticent to utilize too much narrative. 00:21:13.000 --> 00:21:16.000 Context is certainly fundamental. 00:21:16.000 --> 00:21:22.000 And I would also advocate that we communicate the critical nature of historical literacy. 00:21:22.000 --> 00:21:25.000 And again this is across the board. This isn't just for educators. 00:21:25.000 --> 00:21:30.000 This is for any conversation you have with anybody that's remotely related to history. 00:21:30.000 --> 00:21:36.000 Historical literacy is incredibly important. 00:21:36.000 --> 00:21:44.000 So the third and final part of this talk is about current controversies regarding monuments and memorials. 00:21:44.000 --> 00:21:48.000 As many of you probably remember and some of you might have talked about in your classes 00:21:48.000 --> 00:21:53.000 this monument of Confederate general Robert E. Lee 00:21:53.000 --> 00:21:57.000 there were protests regarding it last summer in Charlottesville, Virginia. 00:21:57.000 --> 00:21:59.000 A little bit of background. 00:21:59.000 --> 00:21:65.000 In 2016 the City of Charlottesville voted to have the monument removed. 00:22:05.000 --> 00:22:11.000 This decision was met with some legal action. 00:22:11.000 --> 00:22:16.000 And as of August of last summer it was still in this spot. 00:22:16.000 --> 00:22:20.000 But it was nevertheless bound for removal. 00:22:20.000 --> 00:22:26.000 A sizable group of white supremacists descended on the town square of Charlottesville 00:22:26.000 --> 00:22:33.000 with torches in hand and chanting anti-Semitic remarks and staged their protest. 00:22:33.000 --> 00:22:37.000 That protest was met with a larger counter-protest 00:22:37.000 --> 00:22:41.000 and tensions escalated. 00:22:41.000 --> 00:22:48.000 There were injuries and even one woman Heather Heyer, one of the counter-protesters, was struck by a vehicle and killed. 00:22:48.000 --> 00:22:55.000 The events in Charlottesville reignited and re-amplified an already ongoing debate 00:22:55.000 --> 00:22:59.000 over what to do about controversial monuments. 00:22:59.000 --> 00:22:62.000 In the wake of Charlottesville a day or two later 00:23:02.000 --> 00:23:05.000 President Trump made the slippery slope argument 00:23:05.000 --> 00:23:08.000 of well if we start removing these kinds of monuments 00:23:08.000 --> 00:23:14.000 then soon enough people are going to be calling for the removal of Jefferson and Washington. 00:23:14.000 --> 00:23:22.000 This comment was met with commentary by the media and members of the intelligentsia. 00:23:22.000 --> 00:23:28.000 And in fact CNN on their website published an article where they consulted a number of historians 00:23:28.000 --> 00:23:30.000 to get their take. 00:23:30.000 --> 00:23:39.000 And one historian saw a difference between a Robert E. Lee statue and a George Washington statue. 00:23:39.000 --> 00:23:41.000 And she put it this way. 00:23:41.000 --> 00:23:48.000 Amy Greenburg said, quote, one devoted over 25 years of his life to creating a republic the likes of which history had never known 00:23:48.000 --> 00:23:51.000 and for his sacrifice gained the title Father of his Country. 00:23:51.000 --> 00:23:54.000 The other was a traitor, end quote. 00:23:54.000 --> 00:23:60.000 Now I actually agree with Professor Greenburg's overall point. 00:24:00.000 --> 00:24:04.000 I too see a difference between monuments to the Founders and monuments to the Confederacy. 00:24:04.000 --> 00:24:08.000 I'd be more than happy to talk more about that during the Q and A. 00:24:08.000 --> 00:24:11.000 But I actually find this argument to be a terrible one. 00:24:11.000 --> 00:24:14.000 And maybe some of you see what I see. 00:24:14.000 --> 00:24:19.000 But historically speaking, George Washington was a traitor. 00:24:19.000 --> 00:24:25.000 Right? George Washington was arguably the most famous traitor of the 18th century. 00:24:25.000 --> 00:24:33.000 He did after all lead a continental army that raised arms against its mother-country, the British Crown. 00:24:33.000 --> 00:24:40.000 So I agree with her overall point but find this specific argument to be a terrible one. 00:24:40.000 --> 00:24:41.000 Just my opinion. 00:24:43.000 --> 00:24:48.000 But about that slippery slope argument. It might not have been as ridiculous as one might think. 00:24:48.000 --> 00:24:54.000 A pundit for CNN, Angela Rye, said on the air on August 17th of last year 00:24:54.000 --> 00:24:60.000 she said quote, George Washington was a slave-owner. We need to call slave-owners out for what they are. 00:25:00.000 --> 00:25:04.000 Whether we think that they were protecting American freedom or not, he wasn't protecting my freedom. 00:25:04.000 --> 00:25:07.000 I wasn't someone. My ancestors weren't deemed human beings to him. 00:25:07.000 --> 00:25:13.000 To me, I don't care if it's a George Washington statue or a Thomas Jefferson statue or a Robert E. Lee statue 00:25:13.000 --> 00:25:16.000 they all need to come down. 00:25:16.000 --> 00:25:24.000 Right around this same time I happened to attend a talk at the Willamette Heritage Center in Salem 00:25:24.000 --> 00:25:28.000 just after this, August of last year. 00:25:28.000 --> 00:25:32.000 And I was an audience member and they had a panel discussion about this very issue. 00:25:32.000 --> 00:25:35.000 And there was a woman on that panel making this same exact argument. 00:25:35.000 --> 00:25:38.000 So certainly these are debates that people have been having. 00:25:38.000 --> 00:25:45.000 And then we have this Roger Taney statue in Maryland. 00:25:45.000 --> 00:25:50.000 This memorial was removed just after the events in Charlottesville. 00:25:50.000 --> 00:25:55.000 This Roger Taney monument had been debated like all of these 00:25:55.000 --> 00:25:58.000 there had been debates going on for some time about its removal. 00:25:58.000 --> 00:25:64.000 But it appears that the events in Charlottesville really provoked the city of Annapolis, Maryland 00:26:04.000 --> 00:26:08.000 where this is located in front of the state house 00:26:08.000 --> 00:26:12.000 to make the removal happen much sooner. 00:26:12.000 --> 00:26:18.000 Reporting on this event in an article online by the Smithsonian 00:26:18.000 --> 00:26:24.000 a writer wrote this, quote, the Taney memorial is the latest in a string of Confederate monuments 00:26:24.000 --> 00:26:27.000 that have been taken down across the country, end quote. 00:26:27.000 --> 00:26:32.000 I must tell you I found this quote astounding. 00:26:32.000 --> 00:26:36.000 Because Roger Taney was not a member of the Confederacy. 00:26:36.000 --> 00:26:42.000 Roger Taney was chief justice of the Supreme Court during the 1850s. 00:26:43.000 --> 00:26:51.000 He wrote the majority opinion in what is the most egregious Supreme Court decision of all time which is really saying something, 00:26:51.000 --> 00:26:59.000 Dread Scott, where Taney stated that African-Americans were never intended to be citizens of the United States, 00:26:59.000 --> 00:26:63.000 that African-Americans could never be citizens of the United States, 00:27:03.000 --> 00:27:11.000 and that neither the states or federal government had any power to stop the institution of slavery. 00:27:11.000 --> 00:27:16.000 That was in 1857 and it helped to lead to the Civil War. 00:27:17.000 --> 00:27:20.000 So was Roger Taney a racist? Yep. 00:27:20.000 --> 00:27:22.000 Did he defend slavery? Yes. 00:27:22.000 --> 00:27:29.000 But he was not a Confederate. He didn't leave the bench when the Civil War broke out to go and side with the South. 00:27:29.000 --> 00:27:34.000 He stayed on the bench until he died of natural causes in 1864 00:27:34.000 --> 00:27:37.000 when the war was only a year away from ending. 00:27:37.000 --> 00:27:42.000 There's a real danger here in conflating and adding to the distortion. 00:27:42.000 --> 00:27:45.000 Conflating someone like Roger Taney with the Confederacy. 00:27:45.000 --> 00:27:53.000 And the danger is that it makes one overlook the racism of the U.S. Federal Government and the Union North. 00:27:53.000 --> 00:27:56.000 Kind of a big deal. 00:27:56.000 --> 00:27:61.000 And again I was astounded that this was published by the Smithsonian. 00:28:01.000 --> 00:28:04.000 And then we have the University of Virginia 00:28:04.000 --> 00:28:08.000 which as you may know is also in Charlottesville. 00:28:08.000 --> 00:28:15.000 And they have a number of monuments to Thomas Jefferson on their campus. 00:28:15.000 --> 00:28:20.000 As with the Roger Taney memorial statue 00:28:20.000 --> 00:28:22.000 at UVA, there have been debates for decades now 00:28:22.000 --> 00:28:28.000 about whether or not to remove images and statues of Thomas Jefferson. 00:28:28.000 --> 00:28:32.000 And actually just last month of this year 2018 00:28:32.000 --> 00:28:37.000 this statue was tagged with racist and rapist. 00:28:39.000 --> 00:28:48.000 The thing is that it's no small complication that Thomas Jefferson was the founder and creator of the University of Virginia. 00:28:50.000 --> 00:28:54.000 And he wasn't some detached benefactor. 00:28:54.000 --> 00:28:58.000 He didn't simply leave a bunch of money in his will for the creation of this university. 00:28:58.000 --> 00:28:61.000 He didn't simply write a check. 00:29:01.000 --> 00:29:05.000 Thomas Jefferson designed the most famous structures. 00:29:05.000 --> 00:29:10.000 He was an architect among many other things. He designed the Rotunda and many other buildings on campus. 00:29:10.000 --> 00:29:13.000 He designed the landscape of the university. 00:29:13.000 --> 00:29:21.000 He hired the earliest professors and even helped to write some of the institution's earliest curriculum. 00:29:22.000 --> 00:29:28.000 Think whatever you want about Thomas Jefferson. It's a historical fact that he's a man who accomplished many things. 00:29:28.000 --> 00:29:32.000 And yet he only wanted three of those things mentioned on his gravestone. 00:29:32.000 --> 00:29:37.000 He left off that he was the third president of the United States. He left off that he was the first secretary of state. 00:29:37.000 --> 00:29:40.000 He left off that he was the second vice-president. 00:29:40.000 --> 00:29:43.000 He left off that he signed the Louisiana Purchase. 00:29:43.000 --> 00:29:48.000 The three things he wanted mentioned on his gravestone: he was the author of the Declaration of Independence, 00:29:48.000 --> 00:29:51.000 author of the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom, 00:29:51.000 --> 00:29:56.000 and that he was the founder, as he put the father, of the University of Virginia. 00:29:57.000 --> 00:29:66.000 Is it so crazy that an institution would have images of the person who is responsible for that institution's very existence? 00:30:06.000 --> 00:30:12.000 It's an open question but not an easy one necessarily to answer. 00:30:12.000 --> 00:30:20.000 But I want to make it clear that this issue of monuments and memorials doesn't always go in one direction. 00:30:20.000 --> 00:30:22.000 I think this is really important. 00:30:22.000 --> 00:30:28.000 Case in point, in 2015 this bust of Planned Parenthood founder Margaret Sanger 00:30:28.000 --> 00:30:31.000 was protested and called for removal. 00:30:31.000 --> 00:30:36.000 This bust can be found at the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, D.C. 00:30:36.000 --> 00:30:42.000 And an association of ministers from all over the United States, many of whom are African-American, 00:30:42.000 --> 00:30:46.000 wrote an open letter to the National Portrait Gallery in 2015 00:30:46.000 --> 00:30:50.000 the letter called Ministers Taking a Stand. 00:30:50.000 --> 00:30:57.000 They wrote, quote, we demand that all images, statues, busts, and likenesses of any kind of Margaret Sanger be removed 00:30:57.000 --> 00:30:63.000 notwithstanding the fact that many of us are black, we are a national organization of pastors from various races and backgrounds 00:31:03.000 --> 00:31:09.000 and we stand together in opposition to the racist and genocidal legacy of Margaret Sanger, end quote. 00:31:10.000 --> 00:31:15.000 Now the connections that Margaret Sanger may have had 00:31:15.000 --> 00:31:20.000 with the eugenics movement of the early 20th century are murky at best. 00:31:20.000 --> 00:31:23.000 What we do know because it's by her own account 00:31:23.000 --> 00:31:26.000 is that she did speak to a group of woman Ku Klux Klan members. 00:31:26.000 --> 00:31:29.000 She recounted as much in her autobiography. 00:31:29.000 --> 00:31:33.000 Quote, always to me any aroused group was a good group. 00:31:33.000 --> 00:31:38.000 And therefore I accepted the invitation to talk to the women's branch of the Ku Klux Klan at Silver Lake, New Jersey. 00:31:38.000 --> 00:31:42.000 One of the weirdest experiences I had in lecturing, end quote. 00:31:42.000 --> 00:31:44.000 I have no doubt about that. 00:31:44.000 --> 00:31:49.000 The issue here is not whether or not Margaret Sanger might have been a eugenicist or a racist. 00:31:49.000 --> 00:31:50.000 That's beside the point. 00:31:50.000 --> 00:31:56.000 I used this example to show you that these debates don't all go in one direction. 00:31:56.000 --> 00:31:62.000 You have different special interests calling for the removal of very different kinds of historical monuments. 00:32:04.000 --> 00:32:08.000 So finally, finally I get to this question. 00:32:08.000 --> 00:32:10.000 Who gets to decide? 00:32:10.000 --> 00:32:17.000 Who gets to decide these things about which historical figures should be given the elevated status 00:32:17.000 --> 00:32:21.000 that monuments and memorials seem to invoke? 00:32:21.000 --> 00:32:24.000 Who owns history? 00:32:24.000 --> 00:32:30.000 The answer of course is that it's up to us collectively. 00:32:30.000 --> 00:32:32.000 The living generation. 00:32:32.000 --> 00:32:38.000 And perhaps somewhat ironically, I think it's a quote by Thomas Jefferson that's actually very appropriate here. 00:32:38.000 --> 00:32:43.000 In a letter that he wrote in 1789 to James Madison 00:32:43.000 --> 00:32:48.000 Jefferson said, the earth belongs to the living. The dead have neither powers nor rights over it. 00:32:48.000 --> 00:32:52.000 The portion occupied by an individual ceases to be his when himself ceases to be 00:32:52.000 --> 00:32:55.000 and reverts to the society. 00:32:55.000 --> 00:32:59.000 A decision regarding which monuments should go and which should stay 00:32:59.000 --> 00:32:64.000 what historical figures should be revered and which shouldn't, and why 00:33:04.000 --> 00:33:10.000 requires a level of historical literacy that's sorely lacking at the moment. 00:33:11.000 --> 00:33:17.000 I'm hoping that talks like this one today will add to that level of historical literacy. 00:33:17.000 --> 00:33:20.000 Because with issues like this 00:33:20.000 --> 00:33:24.000 with controversial or supposedly controversial monuments and memorials 00:33:24.000 --> 00:33:27.000 it almost matters less what side you end up on. 00:33:27.000 --> 00:33:30.000 What matters is that you have an informed view. 00:33:30.000 --> 00:33:35.000 And like I said I hope talks like this will add to that level of historical literacy. 00:33:35.000 --> 00:33:36.000 Thank you very much. 00:33:36.000 --> 00:33:41.000 applause 00:33:41.000 --> 00:33:43.000 Do these controversies inform the public? 00:33:43.000 --> 00:33:50.000 I think they do to some extent. I think the debates and the conversations cause some to investigate further. 00:33:50.000 --> 00:33:54.000 Or somebody hears a crazy thing that they can't possibly believe is true so they look into it 00:33:54.000 --> 00:33:56.000 and maybe it is, maybe it isn't. 00:33:56.000 --> 00:33:60.000 So yeah I think that's true. 00:34:00.000 --> 00:34:09.000 I think that can be true but what's true at the same time is that we also live in a 24 hour cable news and social media culture 00:34:09.000 --> 00:34:16.000 where people are just as likely to think they're right as they are to investigate whether or not they're right. 00:34:16.000 --> 00:34:22.000 As far as I'm concerned almost any conversation is a good one. 00:34:22.000 --> 00:34:28.000 So I'm sure that for some people this has informed their historical literacy 00:34:28.000 --> 00:34:32.000 by talking about these sorts of issues certainly. 00:34:32.000 --> 00:34:35.000 I can't speak to his work on Grant. 00:34:35.000 --> 00:34:42.000 Maybe my criticism of Chernow is that he seems to like man-at-war. 00:34:42.000 --> 00:34:47.000 He likes these sort of war figures like Grant, Hamilton, Washington. 00:34:47.000 --> 00:34:55.000 Why he's interesting is he utilizes that academic historian's discipline 00:34:55.000 --> 00:34:60.000 but he chooses popular history sorts of subjects. 00:35:00.000 --> 00:35:04.000 And by doing so there's some revisionism that happens certainly. 00:35:04.000 --> 00:35:09.000 Maybe it's because a lot of my work has been on people like Jefferson 00:35:09.000 --> 00:35:16.000 but until Chernow's book and especially with Lin-Manuel Miranda's play 00:35:16.000 --> 00:35:20.000 Hamilton has turned into a sort of cultural figure, an historic figure, that he never was before. 00:35:20.000 --> 00:35:27.000 And Jefferson is now kind of in the shadows where it had been the opposite for so long. 00:35:27.000 --> 00:35:33.000 So as far as his recent book on Grant I can't speak to it because I haven't read that 00:35:33.000 --> 00:35:36.000 but I did read his Hamilton book and his Washington book. 00:35:36.000 --> 00:35:40.000 And they're very, very good but there is a little bit of not quite hero worship 00:35:40.000 --> 00:35:48.000 but certainly we all know that it says a lot about us in terms of what subjects we pick to study and to write about. 00:35:48.000 --> 00:35:52.000 And he seems to have a thing for powerful military men. 00:35:52.000 --> 00:35:56.000 Yeah and to give him props as a writer of popular history 00:35:56.000 --> 00:35:60.000 if he had been too overly academic with his Hamilton book 00:36:00.000 --> 00:36:04.000 it may have not been accessible for someone like Lin-Manuel Miranda who is a brilliant guy 00:36:04.000 --> 00:36:08.000 but he's more likely to pick something that's on the bestseller list 00:36:08.000 --> 00:36:11.000 than some sort of arcane, obscure, academic work. 00:36:11.000 --> 00:36:20.000 I think we'll be dealing with the repercussions of Chernow's work for good and for bad for decades to come probably. 00:36:20.000 --> 00:36:24.000 Does anybody own history? 00:36:24.000 --> 00:36:26.000 Well that was my question, right? 00:36:26.000 --> 00:36:32.000 The living generation is what owns history is what it seems to me. That's the best that we can get to. 00:36:32.000 --> 00:36:39.000 But there's a danger in that which is, does that mean that we burn everything down that preceded us? 00:36:39.000 --> 00:36:46.000 And that's the overly radical look at it. Starting the world over again and all that kind of stuff. 00:36:48.000 --> 00:36:53.000 Just as there are dangers to conservatism there are dangers to over-radicalism. 00:36:53.000 --> 00:36:57.000 So I think that ownership of history really has to do with balancing the two. 00:36:57.000 --> 00:36:61.000 For colonial and precolonial America 00:37:01.000 --> 00:37:04.000 a really good writer and historian is Alan Taylor. 00:37:04.000 --> 00:37:09.000 He's actually the history department chair at University of Virginia. 00:37:09.000 --> 00:37:14.000 American Colonies is one of his works. 00:37:14.000 --> 00:37:17.000 Another one of his works that I read this summer I can't think of it 00:37:17.000 --> 00:37:24.000 but he delves a lot into the intertribal relationships amongst Native Americans 00:37:24.000 --> 00:37:27.000 prior to and post European contact. 00:37:27.000 --> 00:37:36.000 He's actually been really good because he tackles things that have not really been looked into that much 00:37:36.000 --> 00:37:43.000 such as the life of the northeastern Native American nations during the War of 1812. 00:37:43.000 --> 00:37:48.000 There's all sorts of histories that have been overlooked for so long. 00:37:48.000 --> 00:37:51.000 I would maybe push back a little bit on the monument issue 00:37:51.000 --> 00:37:59.000 only in the sense that I think there tends to be tendency for us to look at all monuments as created equal. 00:37:59.000 --> 00:37:64.000 And I see a difference there. 00:38:04.000 --> 00:38:08.000 And it's fine to agree to disagree 00:38:08.000 --> 00:38:16.000 but there are monuments to Jefferson and monuments to Washington despite them being slave owners. 00:38:16.000 --> 00:38:19.000 Those monuments were never put up because they were slave owners. 00:38:19.000 --> 00:38:27.000 Whereas Confederate monuments were put up because they were assertions of white supremacy. 00:38:27.000 --> 00:38:32.000 So most of these Confederate monuments came up during the Jim Crow era. 00:38:32.000 --> 00:38:40.000 They're not so much relics of the Civil War as they are relics of the southern states reasserting white supremacist dominance. 00:38:40.000 --> 00:38:44.000 So I have no problem with taking them down. 00:38:44.000 --> 00:38:46.000 I think it's very moral to do so. 00:38:46.000 --> 00:38:52.000 I'd like to see them in a museum or some sort of school or academic setting 00:38:52.000 --> 00:38:56.000 for them to be discussed 00:38:56.000 --> 00:38:60.000 but I think that's a really important distinction. 00:39:00.000 --> 00:39:07.000 These Confederate monuments are relics more of the Jim Crow South that they are of the Civil War. 00:39:07.000 --> 00:39:12.000 And I think a lot of the people who live in these areas who have such monuments don't even understand that 00:39:12.000 --> 00:39:14.000 which is unfortunate. 00:39:14.000 --> 00:39:21.000 There's a reason why most of these monuments happened somewhere just after reconstruction up through the 1920s. 00:39:21.000 --> 00:39:26.000 And that's when you have the reassertion of white supremacy especially in the South. 00:39:26.000 --> 00:39:33.000 Public history is kind of the most complicated and tricky 00:39:33.000 --> 00:39:38.000 because whether you're talking about being on a historic commission like I am 00:39:38.000 --> 00:39:45.000 or if you're working with popular history in the realm of museums or something 00:39:45.000 --> 00:39:50.000 you're really working with a bit of academic history and popular history simultaneously. 00:39:50.000 --> 00:39:54.000 And because of that you're trying to please both camps 00:39:54.000 --> 00:39:61.000 and yet really do your best to almost challenge both camps simultaneously. 00:40:01.000 --> 00:40:03.000 And so it's really tricky. 00:40:03.000 --> 00:40:08.000 What we're doing here in town is pretty minor stuff. 00:40:08.000 --> 00:40:12.000 I'm the only academically-minded historian on the Commission. 00:40:12.000 --> 00:40:21.000 And the fact that I worked for the university archives for a couple years under Jeri Lee really helps my local history knowledge. 00:40:21.000 --> 00:40:29.000 So I'll usually insert something historical about the founding of Monmouth 00:40:29.000 --> 00:40:30.000 or the founding of the University 00:40:30.000 --> 00:40:34.000 something that I can infuse into the Commission about that. 00:40:34.000 --> 00:40:37.000 And we'll include that with what everybody else wants to do 00:40:37.000 --> 00:40:42.000 which is a little bit more traditional I suppose. 00:40:42.000 --> 00:40:50.000 I think the polarization will get worse as long as people on both sides are historically illiterate. 00:40:50.000 --> 00:40:54.000 I think those conversations are really important and really good to have 00:40:54.000 --> 00:40:58.000 when there's some reasonable level of historical literacy on both sides. 00:40:58.000 --> 00:40:66.000 But that means maybe some people in one camp accepting that not all monuments are created equal. 00:41:06.000 --> 00:41:10.000 Not all of them went up for the same reasons. 00:41:10.000 --> 00:41:19.000 And the other side doing something about being awfully slow at defending. 00:41:20.000 --> 00:41:26.000 I've wrestled with this issue internally a lot. 00:41:26.000 --> 00:41:32.000 And I cannot see any historical reason to defend a Robert E. Lee monument 00:41:32.000 --> 00:41:34.000 just on historical grounds. 00:41:34.000 --> 00:41:38.000 He was an enemy of the United States Government. 00:41:38.000 --> 00:41:44.000 And then people after the fact wanting to put him up 00:41:44.000 --> 00:41:49.000 simply as an assertion of white supremacist laws and whatnot. 00:41:49.000 --> 00:41:52.000 That's a little odd to me 00:41:52.000 --> 00:41:56.000 that anybody would defend that as well. 00:41:56.000 --> 00:41:63.000 I completely agree with Dr. Braa and Dr. Henkels that these conversations are really, really good to have. 00:42:03.000 --> 00:42:12.000 But debates are only as good, as informed, as the participants are. 00:42:12.000 --> 00:42:18.000 If neither camp is terribly informed on the issue then debate for debate's sake doesn't really accomplish a whole lot. 00:42:18.000 --> 00:42:22.000 You really gave me an in and I cannot thank you enough because there's something I wanted to mention 00:42:22.000 --> 00:42:25.000 and you opened the door for me. 00:42:25.000 --> 00:42:32.000 I agree with you that it can be said that it's more complicated than either side is making it. 00:42:32.000 --> 00:42:36.000 Like one side is defending it outright. 00:42:36.000 --> 00:42:38.000 The other one is wanting to tear everything down outright. 00:42:38.000 --> 00:42:42.000 And there's probably something that's reasonable that's in between. 00:42:42.000 --> 00:42:46.000 With the Roger Taney statue in Maryland 00:42:46.000 --> 00:42:52.000 as I said he's conflated with the Confederacy though he wasn't a Confederate. 00:42:52.000 --> 00:42:56.000 He was culturally a Southerner and this, that, and the other 00:42:56.000 --> 00:42:59.000 but that sort of conflation is a problem. 00:42:59.000 --> 00:42:62.000 In fact the Smithsonian is making that same mistake. 00:43:02.000 --> 00:43:06.000 And so somebody reads that and they're going to make the mistake because they read it in the Smithsonian. 00:43:06.000 --> 00:43:08.000 That's a problem. 00:43:08.000 --> 00:43:16.000 But what's really interesting is that the descendants of Roger Taney and the descendants of Dread Scott 00:43:16.000 --> 00:43:20.000 in the past few years have started to have conventions with each other 00:43:20.000 --> 00:43:23.000 and they meet up once a year. 00:43:23.000 --> 00:43:26.000 This guy responsible in no small part for the Civil War 00:43:26.000 --> 00:43:29.000 and questions over slavery 00:43:29.000 --> 00:43:34.000 and this man who's very freedom had been left up to the Supreme Court 00:43:34.000 --> 00:43:38.000 their descendants are now coming together and talking to each other. 00:43:38.000 --> 00:43:49.000 And actually a couple years ago the two families lobbied the City of Annapolis, Maryland about the Taney monument. 00:43:49.000 --> 00:43:52.000 And they both said we don't want it to go. 00:43:52.000 --> 00:43:57.000 What we want is we want a Dread Scott statue to go next to the Taney statue. 00:43:57.000 --> 00:43:60.000 And then you really have a conversation there. 00:44:00.000 --> 00:44:06.000 But then the events in Charlottesville last summer made all of that impossible and they just moved the monument. 00:44:06.000 --> 00:44:16.000 I agree with you that sometimes the best intentions cause a kind of erasure of history, an erasing of history. 00:44:16.000 --> 00:44:18.000 And that's not what anybody should want. 00:44:18.000 --> 00:44:24.000 And it would certainly draw more conversation if what we want is conversation 00:44:24.000 --> 00:44:29.000 to have a Roger Taney statue and Dread Scott statue in the same park. 00:44:29.000 --> 00:44:31.000 And have them interrelated. 00:44:31.000 --> 00:44:35.000 Well it's a strange thing that some people do with history. 00:44:35.000 --> 00:44:40.000 I minored in law so I have kind of a legalistic mind as well. 00:44:40.000 --> 00:44:43.000 And there's this thing in law it's kind of an absurdity 00:44:43.000 --> 00:44:46.000 which is well that woman must have bad eyesight because she's a prostitute. 00:44:46.000 --> 00:44:50.000 Right? One has nothing to do with the other but people do that with history. 00:44:50.000 --> 00:44:56.000 Because Thomas Jefferson was a slave owner he did all of these horrific things which is without question 00:44:56.000 --> 00:44:65.000 then we can't admire the fact that he promoted a philosophy that helped unfold an emergence of more freedoms for more people. 00:45:05.000 --> 00:45:08.000 That's an irony that's hard for us to engage with. 00:45:08.000 --> 00:45:13.000 Because it sounds like we're absolving him for those other things when we're not. 00:45:13.000 --> 00:45:16.000 So I agree with you that it's much more complicated. 00:45:16.000 --> 00:45:19.000 This entire issue because it happens in the United States 00:45:19.000 --> 00:45:23.000 it's further complicated by the fact that we utilize federalism. 00:45:23.000 --> 00:45:28.000 We leave a lot of things up to the states and up to local jurisdictions to decide for themselves what they want to do. 00:45:28.000 --> 00:45:36.000 And we generally say well that school or that park is named after this guy that did these horrible things 00:45:36.000 --> 00:45:44.000 but if that's what that community wants, is it for the United States Federal Government to say otherwise? 00:45:44.000 --> 00:45:46.000 And I don't know the answer to that. 00:45:46.000 --> 00:45:48.000 Alright. Thank you everybody very much. 00:45:48.000 --> 00:45:52.000 applause