Historic Preservation: Collective Memory and Historical Identity compares the history of and current practices involved with the preservation movement in the United States and Great Britain. Diane Barthel examines the elitist roots of the British movement, aimed at preserving a bucolic past that never was and the American movement which has been more inclusive and starting from the grassroots, however, frequently motivated by profit. She also examines a few different genres of preserved structures and how they are adapted and reused today. One such is Industrial preservation, keeping safe buildings and tools that fueled the Industrial Revolution. This preserves the labor and ingenuity of many people’s ancestors. Industry is also a place to look for social and economic change. This is a difficult tightrope to walk though, industry tended to be foul, dirty, and brutal, things many tourists are not looking for. Another arena of discussion was the push for preserving war related materials and sites. On some levels it is obvious why military sites should be preserved, the sacrifice given by soldiers should be commemorated, even if for no other reason than to convince others to make the same sacrifice when the time comes. But just like industrial sites there are difficult political and social issues involved. Who’s idea of the war is correct? How much of the noise and bloodshed should be revealed? How does one portray pain and death on a massive scale to school children? (some of the most frequent visitors to these sites) Barthel also looked at religious preservation in what is largely a secular world. Surprisingly, many of these movements to preserve churches or other religious structures are done for purely secular means, often in the name of the community and to the objections of the religious. Finally, she examines what she calls Heritage Machines, how history is commodified, distorted, and sold back to the public. This book examines the preservation movement in all of its facets, including what it has been, is, and can aspire to.
I appreciated the fact Barthel examined many of the sides involved in the preservation movement, questioning many of the motivations involved with preserving, for instance how often money motivates preserving or destruction. Also the discussions of authenticity. What makes something authentic? Is it the location of the events? Original structures be damned. The building itself? Who cares if it is thousands of miles from where it should be. Also, how far should re-enactments be taken? If one accurately portrays the past, tourists will most likely be scared away having expected a peaceful, calm, happy past, “Disney-fied” like so many people in the world are. However by not going all the way, re-enactments are lying, not revealing the past as it was. So they are doing a disservice to the history they are bringing to life. Unfortunately, the past has become big business, the almighty dollar rules and accuracy and authenticity will suffer for it.
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5 comments:
I like your discussion of the role of "the almighty dollar" in historic preservation as Barthel explains to us. It was interesting to read how in some instances money is what spurs preservation and in others it hinders it. I also like how you brought up the issue of the preservation and presentation of artifacts from the industrial age and how difficult it is to accurately portray the times and not upset tourists who may not realize the "foul, dirty, and brutal" nature of this time period. Your discussion of authenticity brings up a good point. How do we accurately preserve the past and engage the public in the past without either scaring them away or "Disneyfying" the events? It seems that this is the bigger issue facing this industry, and it is in fact a hard line to tow.
I agree, I too appreciated her wide range of discussion topics. And I found her discussion of authenticity to be really interesting. You clearly do not want historic sites to be so realistic that the public does not want to support them (for instance, you don't want your industrial building, or recreated community to smell as awful as it would have in reality) but you want it to be as historically accurate and yet as pleasing as possible.
You have to think about your audience as well. And often times, school groups make up a large portion of the visiors. So do you really want to preserve the terrifying, unpleasantries of war or child labor, etc. But she also discusses selling history to your public. We are, afterall, a consumer-driven society. Overall, I thought that Barthel really does a great job of explaining and presenting some of these issues that are facing historic preservation.
Brent, I agree too agree with your analysis and enjoyed Barthel’s wide range of discussion topics. She made many great arguments through out the book and was able to do this without giving out much of her own opinion. As did Kristen I too thought Barthel’s discussion of authenticity was extremely interesting. Kristen stated in her analysis that we clearly do not want historic sites to be so realistic that the public does not want to support them, but we want historic sites to be as historically accurate and yet as pleasing as possible. I was wondering while many historic sites I have visited the ones that have been altered with recreations seem to have lost something that can never be fixed. What I am trying to say is in my opinion while you can remain historically accurate when preserving by making thing more pleasing to the public it can hurt the significance of the site by trying to hide the past.
While it is true that the audience need to be thought about while do historic preservation, it is my opinion that the true past is far more important to true preservation. Kristen made a good point stating that school groups make up a large portion of the visitors to historic sites and museums but they are not the only visitors. Therefore in my opinion we do want to preserve the terrifying, unpleasantries of war or child labor if these areas are or have historical significance to what is being preserved. The audience should not play but a small role in historic preservation because if we always think about the audience nothing will get preserved for fear of alienating people. Barthel provides the reader with a great analysis of historic preservation. She did a tremendous job in explaining the issues that are facing historic preservation. This book is great but it difficult to understand at times.
I agree with a lot of what you say here. It is difficult to show the industrial revolution since it was a brutal, and not generally tourist friendly place. As well, the author does show the power of the dollar in preservation. How it can work for both sides is quite unique; it can help preservation or it can impede it. One other thing that was interesting was how the British side used the dollar to preserve the elitist side of history and while in the America the preservation movement has led to a tourist industry in some cases.
Your discussion of authenticity and motive are thoroughly expressed in your blog. I agree that historic preservation is economically driven in the U.S. I realize our nation's capitalistic nature has impacted the preservation of history, however, I would like to interject the thought that these funds are needed to maintain the history we are attempting to preserve.
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