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"Who Owns History? testifies to Eric Foner's lifelong personal commitment to writing histories that advance the struggle for racial equality and economic justice." ―David Glassberg, The Sunday Star-Ledger
History has become a matter of public controversy, as Americans clash over such things as museum presentations, the flying of the Confederate flag, and reparations for slavery. So whose history is being written? Who owns it?
Eric Foner answers these and other questions about the historian's relationship to the world of the past and future in this provocative, even controversial, study of the reasons we care about history―or should.
- Sales Rank: #382561 in Books
- Published on: 2003-04-16
- Released on: 2003-04-16
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: 8.50" h x .58" w x 5.50" l, .55 pounds
- Binding: Paperback
- 256 pages
From Publishers Weekly
In this series of addresses and essays, many in print for the first time, one of America's preeminent historians does his profession proud. After discussing his own life history beginning with a New York leftist Jewish childhood, during which his family "discuss[ed] the intricacies of international relations and domestic politics over the dinner table" Foner (The Story of American Freedom), a professor at Columbia University, writes with erudition and clarity on a variety of historical subjects. At his best, he critically assesses the way American history and historians intersect. In an address he gave last year as president of the American Historical Association, he exhorted his colleagues to examine American history in an international context: "In a global age, the forever-unfinished story of American freedom must become a conversation with the entire world." His critique of Ken Burns's Civil War documentary shows how the much-acclaimed series by depicting the war as a fight between Northern and Southern whites and by essentially excluding the Reconstruction, one of Foner's own specialties exhibits some of the same failings that have plagued historians of the era (which Foner calls "the most controversial and misunderstood era in our nation's history"). Other strong essays include a lecture on blacks and the U.S. Constitution and an analysis of the way historians have looked at socialism in the United States. The essays on history in South Africa and Russia, while thought-provoking, feel a bit dated (they were written in the mid-1990s). But as whole, these writings help to debunk the idea that history is irrelevant in the 21st century. (Apr.)
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Library Journal
Each individual has a vested interest in knowing the past because the past is in everyone. However, "everyone and no one" owns the past and "the study of the past is a constantly evolving, never-ending journey of discovery," states Foner (history, Columbia Univ.), author of Reconstruction: America's Unfinished Revolution and other respected titles on American history. In nine readable essays written between 1983 and 2001 and grouped in three sections "The Politics of History and Historians," "Rethinking History in a Changing World," and "The Enduring Civil War" Foner argues that the historian has a relationship with his or her own world. His style is personable and straightforward, and he effectively presses home his assumptions. From a historian's perspective, though, he adds nothing new; the question "Who owns history?" has been around in various guises for 30 years, and Foner's variation simply restates the theme that academics must be community-oriented if only to stay in touch with the public. Perhaps a more pertinent question would be, "Who determines which history is `anointed' as the `true' history?" Nevertheless, Foner is a respected historian, and he ably articulates a viewpoint shared by many of his colleagues. Recommended for academic and large public libraries. Charles L. Lumpkins, Pennsylvania State Univ., State College
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.
From Booklist
A prominent Reconstruction historian, Foner is much in demand for speaking at conferences and ceremonies and writing introductions to books. This volume collects various essays he has produced for such occasions. Naturally, given his expertise, most of the essays address American slavery and its legacy, and they echo the prime theme of this collection: how the public perceives and understands history in general. That a popular preference exists for exalting the history of one's country is undeniable, as Foner notes in various recent controversies related to American history as well as among "Soviets" circa 1990, when they were recovering their nationalities and debating their histories. Elsewhere, Foner pays homage to his mentor, famed historian Richard Hofstadter; reviews his own career; revisits the hoary topic of the lack of Euro-style socialism in America; castigates Ken Burns' Civil War; and blasts conservative jurists who subscribe to "original intent." Valuable insight into a premier historian's passions and viewpoint. Gilbert Taylor
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
Most helpful customer reviews
14 of 18 people found the following review helpful.
A view of the relationship between history and historian
By Harold McFarland
What constitutes history and how it should be told has become an increasingly significant question over the years. How events are portrayed in history texts often is more the result of the social climate at the time or the purpose of the writer than actual fact.
Part of the problem with history is that as new facts are discovered and new perspectives proposed history is rewritten. Different groups offer a different perspective to the traditional perspective. So, we now have black history, women's history, etc. However, these same historians must deal with a fickle public whose primary interest in history has traditionally been that it be told with a particular purpose in mind. When the Constitution states that everyone has a right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness we are taught that it means literally everyone. However, history has at times excluded American Indians, Black Americans and others. Particular areas of the United States have excluded the Irish, the Catholic, the Polish, the Japanese or any number of other groups.
This book contains nine essays by Eric Foner, a professor of history at Columbia University, that were prepared for various conferences and book introductions. In these essays Foner examines how the historian interacts with the history and their surroundings and how that interaction determines their perspective on history. It includes essay on Mr. Foner's personal life as a historian and the things that influence his perspective. Others include essays on modern Russia and post-apartheid South Africa and how they are rethinking their past in view of the current changes. Probably the most interesting essays are in Mr. Foner's area of specialization - slavery, the Civil War and post-Reconstruction America.
An especially interesting read for those who are not familiar with the controversies of traditional history, it is a good read, logically argued and recommended for early college level students or higher. For most of the essays the writing is slightly above the level of the average high school student.
12 of 16 people found the following review helpful.
A gritty and compelling set of essays
By James Ferguson
Foner is not one to beat around the bush. He tackles pressing social and political issues head on. In this remarkable collection of essays, he has taken aim at several key issues which define contemporary society. The most compelling essay is probably "Blacks and the U.S. Constitution," in which he examines the motivations behind the conservative desire to read the Constitution in terms of its "original intent."
As Foner notes, this is more a political than a historical argument. By narrowing the interpretation of the Constitution to its "original intent," conservatives hope to avoid addressing the more thorny issues which the later amendments attempt to address. He views the current decisions by the Supreme Court as part of an overall drive toward "Redemption," similar to the period of readjustment, in which states nullified much of the Civil Rights legislation which was enacted by the Radical Republicans during Reconstruction. This eventually led to the notorious era of Jim Crow.
Foner views history as a continuum, not a set of isolated events, which can be referred to to bolster one's political arguments, whether they be conservative or liberal. Like his mentor, Richard Hofstadter, Foner rebels against consensus opinion, asking readers to form minds of their own. The essays are gritty and compelling and serve as a reminder of the intellectual prowess of one of the foremost historians of our time.
4 of 5 people found the following review helpful.
History - facts and their "interpretation" (4.25*s)
By J. Grattan
There may be those who simplistically view history as no more than gathering and presenting "facts" about the past, but noted historian Eric Foner would respond that history involves the interpretation of facts and is subject to change. But history is not pure subjectivity; historical truth is a "reasonable approximation of the past." Despite the title of the book, the author does not directly address the issue of "ownership" of history. There is the question of who produces history. Is history mainly produced by academic historians, which slowly filters into the public's consciousness? Or is historical understanding dominated by large institutions such as the mass media, think tanks, and the education industry, many of whom are inclined to promote an historical agenda? The author acknowledges that "for years historians have been aware that historical traditions are invented and manipulated. In addition, "forgetting some aspects of the past is as much a part of historical understanding as remembering others." This may be due simply to ignorance or poor scholarship. Or more disturbingly, historical distortion may be a sinister effort by various social and economic elites to dominate and manipulate social understandings.
The United States is a nation founded on the ideals of liberty, political equality and democracy. We are not a traditional society where unquestioned myths passed down from generation to generation are the glue of society. Openness and informed debate about all matters, including those historical, are essential in a society based on rational decision making. Not understanding our principles, how we have lived up to them, and where we need to go is not an option. Yet, it is clear that the injection of bogus historical views into our national understandings has plagued our society in the past and continues to do so today.
Three essays deal with the legacy of the Civil War and Reconstruction. A determined Southern elite and a complicit Supreme Court essentially negated the citizenship rights that blacks had achieved in landmark legislation after the Civil War. But that history is often buried or distorted. Prominent Northern historians of the times validated the Jim Crow era by suggesting that blacks lacked the capacity for self-government. The focus on nationalism, or the right of white Anglo-Saxon America to become an imperial power at the end of the 19th century, further obscured the suppression of rights for some American citizens.
It is this decades-long willful amnesia of the Reconstruction era that has permitted the Supreme Court in the modern era to see unfairness in racial preferences while ignoring the history of racial injustice. Conveniently, judicial decisions are now supposedly rendered on the basis of "original intent" or "strict construction." However, the author notes that the language of the Fourteenth Amendment was purposely "broad and indeterminate" to give maximum leeway to the judiciary in the implementation of the amendment. The narrow legal judgments of today in this area actually ignore original intent in their rush to yield to political exigencies.
In one of these essays, the author critically examines Ken Burns' nine-part PBS series on the Civil War. The author finds that "Burns recapitulates the very historical understanding of the war `invented' in the 1890s as part of the glorification of the national state and the nationwide triumph of white supremacy." For Burns the Civil War was a "family quarrel among whites, whose fundamental accomplishment was the preservation of the Union." The abolition of slavery is scarcely mentioned, not to mention the failure of Reconstruction to secure civil rights for former slaves. In the final segment Burns focuses on the friendly reunion in 1913 of white veterans of Gettysburg. In a devastating comment, the author notes that in that same year President Wilson segregated federal office buildings in Washington D.C. As the author says, "Accurately remembered, the events of Reconstruction place the issue of racial justice on the agenda of modern life - but not if the history of that era and the costs paid on the road to reunion are ignored, misrepresented, or wished away."
In another essay, the author examines the impact that globalization is having on the definition of the long-cherished American ideal of freedom. Transnational institutions and corporations through their think tanks and control of the media have redefined freedom as participation in a global free-marketplace. Gone are the "elements of freedom such as self-government, economic autonomy, and social justice" that were a part of the republican tradition in America. Strong national governments attempting to regulate economic matters are portrayed as impediments in a global economy. The author admits that freedom is constantly subject to redefinition, but freedom defined as merely competing in global production ignores American traditions of freedom. It may not be an overstatement to contend that "the relationship between globalization and freedom may be the most pressing political and social problem of the 21st century."
In other interesting essays, the career of historian Richard Hofstadter is examined and the oft-asked question concerning the absence of socialism in American is reviewed. Hofstadter gets tagged as a "consensus" historian because he noted that the "virtues of individual liberty, private property, and capitalist enterprise" were broadly agreed upon by most Americans. The author notes that Hofstadter did not celebrate this uniformity, finding it to be a "form of intellectual and political bankruptcy," which echoes the findings of Tocqueville one hundred years earlier. Yet consensus theories do have resiliency. The absence of class-based activism and turns to socialism are partly answered by the existence in varying degrees of republicanism or "producerism," the absorption or cooptation of protest, the substitution of consumption as empowerment, the divisions and stratifications of the working class, and winner-take-all elections.
Clearly the concept of history is hardly as straightforward as may be thought at first glance. "Who Owns History?" is an excellent attempt at getting a handle on historical interpretation and the ramifications thereof.
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