Course Offerings

Public History & Memory

Course Calendar:

Week One: Historical Memory & Public History
Michael Wallace, Mickey Mouse History, "Introduction."
George Lipsitz, Time Passages, "Precious and Communicable: History in an Age of Popular Culture," 21-36. R
John Bodnar, "The Memory Debate: An Introduction" and "Public Memory in Nineteenth-century America," in Remaking America, pp. 13-38. R
Michel-Rolph Trouillot, Silencing the Past, "The Power in the Story," 1-22. R
David Thelen, "Memory & American History," Journal of American History (March 1989): 1117-1129. J-STOR

Week Two: Hidden Histories, Controversies & Publics
National Council on Public History, "Code of Ethics" at http://www.ncph.org/code_of_ethics.htm
Dolores Hayden, The Power of Place, "Los Angeles: Public Pasts in the Downtown Landscape," 82-167. R
Wallace, Mickey Mouse History, "Museums and Controversy," 116-129; "Mickey Mouse History: Portraying the Past at Disney World," and "Disney's America," 133-176; and "The Battle of the Enola Gay," 270-318.
Robert Wyeneth, "History, He Wrote: Murder, Politics, and the Challenges of Public History in a Community with a Secret," The Public Historian (Spring 1994): 51-73. R
Handout: Thomas Schlereth, "American Material Culture Technique: Historical Museum Exhibit Review"

Week Three: World War Two: Homefront & Abroad
John Morton Blum, V Was for Victory (entire book)
Studs Terkel, The Good War (selections)

Week Four: Oral History Workshop
Studs Terkel, The Good War ("Rosie," "Neighborhood Boys," "Growing Up: Here & There," and selections of students' choosing)
Michael Frisch, A Shared Authority, 159-178. R
Linda Shopes, "Oral History and Community Involvement" and Jeremy Brecher, "A Report on Doing History from Below: The Brass Workers History Project," in Benson, et.al., Presenting the Past, 245-279. R
H-OralHist, "Oral History Methods and Guides" at
http://www2.h-net.msu.edu/~oralhist/methods.html

Week Five: Hands-on History: Museum & Archive Diving (Worcester Homefront Project)
Class will meet at the Worcester Historical Museum, 30 Elm Street, Worcester. Parking lot is located on Chestnut Street. (See Handouts)
Reading: John Morton Blum, V Was for Victory (review)

***DUE: Historical Museum Critical Review

Week Six: Museum Exhibits & Material Culture
Guest Discussant: Professor Edward O'Donnell
Steven Dubin, Displays of Power: Memory and Amnesia in the American Museum,
Chapter 3, 64-117 ("Gaelic Gotham" exhibit)
National Council on Public History, "Museum Exhibit Standards" at
http://ncph.org/exhibit%20standards.html
Wallace, Mickey Mouse History, "Visiting the Past: History Museums in the United States," 3-74.
Edward T. Linenthal, "The Boundaries of Memory: The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum," American Quarterly, Vol. 46, No. 3. (Sep., 1994), pp. 406-433. J-STOR
Discuss: Museum critical reviews

Week Seven: Monuments and Symbols
Sanford Levinson, Written in Stone (entire book)
Tony Horwitz, Confederates in the Attic, "Dying for Dixie," 89-124. R
Kirk Savage, "The Politics of Memory: Black Emancipation and the Civil War Monument," in John Gillis, editor, Commemorations: The Politics of National Identity, pp. 127-149. R
National World War II Memorial, browse site and read "Correcting the Critics" at
http://www.wwiimemorial.com
Online Newshour Transcript of "Remembering World War II" at
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/fedagencies/july-dec97/memorial_7-4.html
Web research exercise: World Trade Center Bombings Memorial
Read in preparation to historic site visit:
William Murtagh, "The Language of Preservation," in Keeping Time, 15-24. R
Lies Across America (questions handout)

Week Eight: History on the Web (Worcester Homefront Project - Technology Workshop I)
MEETING IN STEIN 311
Readings (first hour of class will be discussion of readings and web sites)
Wallace, Mickey Mouse History, "The Virtual Past: Media and History Museums," 101-114.
Michael O'Malley and Roy Rosenzweig, "Brave New World or Blind Alley? American History on the World Wide Web," Journal of American History 84 (June 1997): 132-155. J-STOR
Sue Ann Cody, "Historical Museums on the World Wide Web," The Public Historian 19 (Fall 1997): 29-53. R
Web Assignment: Before Wednesday's class, surf the web for historic sites to discuss as models for your group project. What makes a web site successful? Useful?
Everyone should look at:
The Great Chicago Fire and the Web of Memory
(www.chicagohs.org/fire/intro/)
What did you do in the war, Grandma? (http://www.stg.brown.edu/projects/WWII_Women/tocCS.html)
Black Women at Virginia Tech
http://spec.lib.vt.edu/blackwom/
Oral History and Folklore of the Miami Valley, Ohio--Miami Valley Cultural Heritage Project
(http://www.muohio.edu/~oralhxcwis/index.htmlx)

Other suggested sites to browse quickly for design and content ideas:
American Memory from the Library of Congress (http://lcweb2.loc.gov/ammem/ammemhome.html)
National Archives and Records Administration Exhibit Hall
(www.nara.gov/exhall/exhibits.html)
Anti-Imperialism in the United States
(www.boondocksnet.com/ail98-35.html)
The Valley of the Shadow: Living the Civil War in Pennsylvania and Virginia
(http://jefferson.village.virginia.edu/vshadow2/)

***DUE: Transcribed Interviews

Week Nine: Tourism - Heritage and Historic Preservation
Martha K. Norkunas, The Politics of Public Memory: Tourism, History, and Ethnicity in Monterey, California (entire book)
Edward T. Linenthal, "A Reservoir of Spiritual Power: Patriotic Faith at the Alamo in the Twentieth Century," from Sacred Ground. R
Wallace, Mickey Mouse History, "Preserving the Past," and "Preservation Revisited," 177-248.
John Herbst, "Historic Houses," in Leon and Rosenzweig, eds., History Museums in the United States, 99-114. R
Patricia West, Domesticating History, chapters 3 & 4 (Monticello and Booker T. Washington birthplace) R
***DUE: Historic site review due (discuss in class)

Week Ten: Historical Interpreters
Guest Discussant: Guy Morin, Historical Interpretive Programs
Tony Horwitz, Confederates in the Attic, 3-17; 125-144; 157-189. (Re-enactors)R
Mark Howell, "Interpreters and Museum Educators: Beyond the Blue Hairs," in Public History: Essays from the Field R
Video: "Going Places - The Bloodiest Field" (in Prof. Yuhl's possession - to be viewed in History Dept. lounge before class meets)

Week Eleven: Monumental Memory: Vietnam Veterans Memorial Case Study
Kristen Haas, Carried to the Wall (entire book)
Video: "Maya Lin: A Strong, Clear Vision" (first half on Memorial to be viewed outside class time at MRC)

Week Twelve: Worcester Homefront Project - Technology Workshop II

Week Thirteen: Popular & Documentary Film Perspectives
Guest Presenter: Professor Karen Turner, "Disappearing Women: How the War Story Reflects Post-war Culture in Vietnam."
Excerpts from Karen Turner, Even the Women Must Fight, and Gene Michaud, From Hanoi to Hollywood R
Robert A. Rosenstone, "History in Images/History in Words: Reflections on the Possibility of Really Putting History onto Film," American Historical Review (December 1988): 1173-1185. J-STOR
Robert Brent Toplin, "The Filmmaker as Historian," American Historical Review (December 1988): 1210-1227. J-STOR

Week Fourteen: Website "Conference"
Meet in Stein 311 for Student Presentations