How Is Public History Defined?
What is public history? How do we define it? What is a public history project? While there is no single definition, nor does there need to be, it is important that we have a working definition so that we can have common grounds from which to discuss and act.
The Public History Collaborative (PHC) defines Public History as:
Public history is history produced by the public, with the public, for the public and in public spaces.
For more information see the National Council on Public History.
National Public History Institutions:
- African American Intellectual History Society
- American Association for State and Local History
- American Historical Association
- Association for the Study of African American Life and History
- Association of Tribal Archives, Libraries & Museums
- National Trust for Historic Preservation
- National Women's History Museum
- National Museum of Natural History
- National Museum of the American Latino
- National Museum of African American History and Culture
- National Park Service
- Oral History Association
In our effort to shine a critical light on public history, we invited the public to engage with us online #wearepublichistory or by email phc@arizona.edu to start working through some of these questions:
Questions:
- What do we mean by public?
- What do we mean by history?
- Who is “the community”?
- Who is public history for?
- Who gets to decide what it looks like or how it's done?
- How can we as members of the public produce history ethically and responsibly?
- How can we engage in an ethic of care?
- Many public history projects take the memories, ideas, artifacts, bodies of “the community” but what does "the community" get in return? What should they get in return? What do they ask for but don't get?
- Within colleges and universities, public history can be synonymous with public engagement and civic engagement. What does engagement really mean? Does this engagement include all members of the public including people of color, Indigenous communities, queer communities, and socioeconomically disadvantaged communities? Are some people left out and if so who? and why?
- Public history projects are often thought to “give voice to the voiceless" and offer visibility. What do you think of these concepts?
- Public history is often largely written as stories of uplift or triumph. Is this all public history should do? Or can public history be both critical and triumphant?