A Call for Papers: Public History

Public History in North America and the U.K. are currently soliciting proposals for the third section ("Case Studies") outlined in the attached summary. If you have a case study concept to propose - either UK-based or comparative/transnational in scope - please contact the editors with a brief outline and a CV detailing in particular your practical public history experience and relevant publications.

H. Hoock is the primary contact for UK contributions, but please c/c R. Conard: Holger Hoock: hhoock@liv.ac.uk 

Rebecca Conard: rconard@mtsu.edu  

 

Public History in North America & the U.K. Comparative Perspectives on Theory and Practice

EDITORS Rebecca Conard, Middle Tennessee State University

Holger Hoock, University of Liverpool

CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK

This edited collection, currently in development, is intended to help structure discourse in the rapidly internationalizing field of public history. Recent and forthcoming issues of the The Public Historian, the premier international journal, are providing snapshots of current public history undertakings in many countries. PUBLIC HISTORY IN NORTH AMERICA & THE U.K. will offer a systematic and in-depth comparison of public history practice transnationally. Essays will combine theoretical perspectives and reflections on professional identity with case studies that examine the practice of public history in relation to multiple intellectual frameworks, methodologies, and situations. The goal is to move toward a clearer understanding of the nature of public history as a distinctive mode of scholarly production that transcends venues of practice and national borders. By limiting comparison to North America and the U.K., the intent is not to be exclusionary, but rather to focus discussion and sharpen comparisons.

ORGANIZATION

The edited collection, to be developed in consultation with an advisory board of ten senior historians in the U.S., U.K, and Canada, will be divided into four parts. It is section III that we're soliciting proposals for at this stage.

I. An introductory essay by the editors.

II. Eight commissioned essays offering historiographical and theoretical perspectives on concepts and critical issues that are fundamental to public history practice but which often remain under-theorized, vague, and insufficiently well understood.

• concepts of "the public" and "public" v "applied" history in relation to the utility of history in the wider world;
• concept of "shared authority" and its currency in public history practice, including "collaboration," "co-creation," and "co-production";
• historiographical treatment of "civic engagement" and its currency in public history practice;
• historical perspective on notions of "heritage" in US, UK, CA;
• a consideration of "historical distance" in relation to public history practice
• concepts of "agency" and "authority" in public history practice;
• "reflective practice"
• ethics in practice, incl. personal politics of co-production, situations requiring confidentiality, matters of social conscience.

III. Public Historical Practice in Theoretical and Methodological Perspective

Section Three will comprise case studies to examine how public historians go about doing what they do and cover a wide range of challenges that public history practitioners routinely face in the processes of inquiry, interpretation, and presentation. Essayists will critically examine their practice in relation to theoretical frameworks  that inform inquiry and analysis, methodologies employed, and the relative roles that historian, audience (or end user), collaborators, partners, or governing bodies play in shaping the processes of inquiry and interpretation.

Theoretical models and methodologies informing contemporary public history practice include analytical frameworks associated with sociological, ethnographic, Marxist, and organizational management schools of thought, such as reflective/reflexive practice, shared authority, performance theory, and entrepreneurial theory. Likewise, public history has always had strong interdisciplinary strands, incorporating methods developed in library science, ethnography, cultural geography, mass communications, architecture, and sociology, among others. Public historians ideally should be skilled in multiple methods of inquiry, interpretation, and presentation. Some methods are particularly germane to public history practice, such as oral history, material culture analysis, public records research, GIS and spatial imaging, genealogy, and visual media. More recently, public history has embraced the potential of electronic and digital media to benefit research and outreach. Regardless of theoretical models and methods, however, and regardless of venue, public history practitioners respond to the exigencies of "purpose" and "audience" that are integral to making history useful in contemporary society.

To ensure comparably high degrees of introspection and reflectiveness, all authors will be asked to address the overarching question, "for what purpose is history being engaged or applied?," and the following set of related questions:

• Who is the intended audience?
• What is the goal or purpose?
• What is the historical problem, question, or context?
• What role does the client, collaborator, partner, governing body, and/or audience, play in shaping the problem, question, or context?
• What authority does the historian exercise in the inquiry process vis-à-vis the agency held by client, collaborator, partner, governing body, and/or audience?
• How does the historian go about negotiating the uncertainties that attend the process of inquiry?
• What theoretical frameworks inform inquiry or interpretation?
• Does the historian employ interdisciplinary methods or function as part of an interdisciplinary team?
• What authority does the historian exercise in constructing the interpretation?
• What role does the client, collaborator, partner, governing body, and/or audience play in shaping the end product (e.g., policy brief, legislative or courtroom testimony, exhibit, program, collection, preserved place, technical document)?
• How does the historian maintain the integrity of history in both senses of its meaning: the scholarly profession and the presentation of historical knowledge?

Essayists will reflectively examine practice in a variety of settings-museums, archives, parks, and protected areas and heritage sites, government agencies, not-for-profit organizations, and private firms-revealing national and international differences as well as similarities. They will highlight the ways in which public historians approach inquiry and conceptualize their audiences and differentiate between various meanings of "public", including "popular", "non-specialist", "for mass audience", "pertaining to an entire polity", or "related to the concerns of the state." Additionally, they will focus attention on critical issues of agency versus authority; access to historical evidence and the ways in which those in power shape history; changing conceptions of community; cultural institutions and cultural policy; cultural conflict; and the role of entrepreneurship.

IV. Two commissioned essays will contemplate the influence public history has had on redefining professional identity in the discipline of history as a whole.

EDITORIAL ADVISORY BOARD

Dr. Lonnie Bunch, Director, National Museum of African American History and Culture, Smithsonian Institution Prof. Sir David Cannadine, Chairman, National Portrait Gallery, London, and Commissioner of English Heritage Dr. Mark Damazer, Controller, BBC Radio 4 and BBC Radio 7 Dr. Greg Donaghy, Chief Historian, Historical Section, Department of Foreign Affairs & International Trade, Canada Dr. Norman Hillmer, Professor of History and International Relations, Carleton University Dr. Arnita Jones, Executive Director, American Historical Association Dr. Libby Haight O'Connell, Chief Historian and Senior Vice President, Corporate Outreach, A & E Television Networks Prof. Sara Selwood, Cultural Analyst, City University London Prof. Miles Taylor, Director, Institute of Historical Research, London

Target audiences: With its original approach and focus, and given the lack of a comparable volume, the book will have substantial and sustainable marketing potential in three primary markets:

• Educational market in U.S., U.K., Canada, Australia, and NZ (incl. specialized programs such as heritage and museums studies, historic preservation, archival management)
• Professional and institutional market, esp. U.S., U.K. (incl. U.K. "heritage" and museum professions; US Historical Societies, government agencies)
• University Libraries esp. U.S., U.K., Canada