My engagement with history has almost always been mediated through a white institution. In an act of virtue signaling or in order to meet the quotas set out in "inclusive" strategic plans, historians and institutions create exhibits about POC and the working class (if we're so lucky) without actually including POC or working-class folks in curation or interpretation. These exhibits use our memories and materials without full credit, nor do they identify how the subsummation of these materials into the institution's collections will benefit the communities from which they came. Therein lies the rub – the act of "legitimation" that characterizes the public history profession's newfound interest in and consumption of poor, POC histories.
Historians collect, preserve and interpret primary source materials on behalf of their institutions because they are working on projects for non-community members, outside of community contexts. For example, even when graduate thesis projects are meant to serve community interests, students are still doing the work for a degree and for a job in the professional public history workforce after they graduate. Then, white, middle-class scholars who "specialize" in poor, POC histories get chosen for curatorial and advisory group positions over actual Black and Brown community leaders, some of whom these white scholars had interviewed for their professionally lauded projects.
White savior public historians envision themselves "rescuing" or "empowering" Black and Brown people's histories. Their project leadership gets them news headlines, commendations, prestige and position. But what does it do for community members? Public history practitioners and institutions need to yield their resources – funds and labor – for the creation of grass-roots initiatives that take place within and for the community (given community members' interest and assent).
Instead of devoting time and energy to identifying a methodology that encourages white, middle-class, credentialized practitioners to be more cognizant or improves the quality and functionality of their institutions, I'd much rather focus on how we can prioritize and fund grassroots work led by POC, poor and disabled folks. Instead of trying to repair or assimilate to the western, colonial construct of the history institution itself – museums and archives as sanctified, authoritative sites of knowledge production – let's return history to its communal origins.
100% of the SBD rewards from this #explore1918 post will support the Philadelphia History Initiative @phillyhistory. This crypto-experiment is part of a graduate course at Temple University's Center for Public History and is exploring history and empowering education to endow meaning. To learn more click here.
So it seems that centralization of culture cannot ultimately have the desired result? If so, what can be done to support and enhance the collecting of small and non-mainstream organizations? Even though these orgs may lack the capacity, they do have and continue to build extraordinary access, passion and focus.
Big culture is not about to compete with that - ever.
But big culture can help enable and support those activities from afar - in a positive way.
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