While driving being a passenger on the drive to London I finally finished reading through the August issue of The Public Historian. A couple of the articles in this issue sparked some reflection on my historical practice, including Charles W. Romney‘s “New City Guides and Anachronic Public History” article.
Romney examined historical cities guides including the Cleveland Historical app, the Infinite City atlas, the book Map of Perceptions, and the Wildsam field guides. This examination looked at the ways in which each city guide uses multiple chronologies to tell the history of a place. Romney makes a number of interesting points about contested chronologies that are applicable to many public history projects. His analysis is applicable to many historical narratives outside of city guides.
Most public history initiatives adhere to a single timeline or chronological framework. This can commonly be seen in written narratives, museum exhibits, living museums, and preservation projects. A single chronology often works well to deliver simplified narratives and can serve as an organizing idea.
However multiple chronologies have a place in some public history projects and can be beneficial to project looking to highlight a range of perspectives. As Romney notes
multiple chronologies can enhance public that stress relationships between different developments and that connect events from different time periods. Multiple chronologies also improve public projects showing uneven spatial and temporal shifts.
Fragmenting time and presenting multiple narratives that are intertwined can allow for a diversity of experience and voices to presented in a project. When reading this article I was struck by how this approach would be particularly useful when discussing contested spaces and to bring forward the voices of marginalized groups.
The obvious example in my work is residential school buildings that are now used by mainstream organizations. These spaces have multiple narratives to tell and many are still evolving as living history spaces.
In some cases collective memory is contested. Presenting a timeline of a contested space might involve imposing an unaccepted chronology on a project. There may be better ways to display history for this type of project than using a chronological order. Multiple chronologies, unstable and changing chronologies, and contested timelines all have a place in public history. It’s up to public history professionals to think critically about the best ways to interpret and present historical narratives.