Controversial History

How do you deal with controversial history?
Do you shove it under the rug? Give it some tame euphemism? Confront it outright?

These are the questions that this week’s readings on slavery and technology discuss.

A history museum must do more than simply exist. It must engage and enrapture the visitor, while at the same time being aware that it cannot blaspheme or overtly distort history. If visitors do not enter the doors, the museum is not serving any purpose at all. As Slavery and Public History and The Public History of Science show controversial history is often overlooked, tamed, or forced out of the museum.
The difficulty is compounded when one tries to create an overarching national narrative. There is usually not one narrative of history, but several, each more controversial than the ones that were promulgated before. There is also the problem of trying to invoke a past that the entire nation doesn’t share. Rosensweig and Thelen have shown us that most people care about their family history, and those parts of the narrative that they can see themselves, or their family in, but do not care to share those parts of history where they do not see involvement.

Slavery has always been controversial in American life—although it didn’t solely cause the Civil War it didn’t help things any. There is no easy way to interpret slavery. Calling them “servants” or totally ignoring the subject is just bad history. But it is a difficult topic to approach. My personal feeling is that slavery should be portrayed as accurately as possible—a benevolent master (where credit is due) or cruel or indifferent one, some representation of slave quarters (even if it’s a diorama), and of course, if it is a “living history” museum, slaves themselves.

Funny side story: While walking through Old City Philadelphia a black interpreter approached me and asked if he looked like Thomas Jefferson—I asked if his last name was “Hemings”, but the reason he asked was somebody said he looked just like Thomas Jefferson.

Technological History can be almost as difficult to discuss. Especially when it comes to things such as the Enola Gay. (For those that do not know the Enola Gay was the bomber that dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima) Having not seen the Enola Gay exhibit I cannot comment specifically on it, but my hope is that it involved a discussion—not an absolute—of the necessity of dropping the A-bomb in the first place. This problem can be viewed down the road at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum (USHMM). While discussing the American response (or more lack of response), you encounter a massive map of the Aushwitz-Birkenau camp complex. The purpose of the map is to show that the Allies knew of what was happening there, and knew how to stop it. It gives a very negative analysis of the reasons why America did not bomb the camps without giving full credence to reasons why that did not happen. (It’s on their website too http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/article.php?lang=en&ModuleId=10005182)

Controversial history is a tough nugget to deal with—especially in places where the history has been either obliterated or turned into office space—but it must be acknowledged. A museum with a one-dimensional narrative cannot properly evaluate all sides of a controversial problem. Perhaps this is the most important time when the final decision must be left to the visitor, all that can be done is ask thought provoking questions and provide as much evidence as possible.