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Performing Public History
200 pages, Paperback
Published April 9, 2025
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Displaying 1 - 1 of 1 review
September 10, 2025
"If accuracy can be defined as being faithful to an original, authenticity refrences sincerity, credibility, and trustworthiness."
I was assigned this book last minute for my Graduate History Colloqium and frankly wasnt going to read it because I already feel like I have a pretty solid understanding of the field, but once I started reading this book I was pleasently suprised.
I don't write many reviews (especially for academic books) but since I am the first one to log this book I figured why the hell not. As someone with an interest in both public history and popular media I thought this book added some more depth to both of those fields. Historians like to only look at archives and old papers, ignoring media such as movies, plays and novels when in reality alot of history, and understandings of history can be earned from such sources. The whole point of public history is to engage with non-academic folk subjects in history, with the hope that they can find something relevant to incorporate into their daily lives. A lot of historians (and some old professors of mine) think that that can only be done by learning histroy the old way, but Dean develops a good framework for considering popular media as legitimate forms of historical repositories (not to dissimilar from archives and museums).
Points off for talking a lot about theater. I find that most people engage with atleast some historical background through movies, television shows and video games. However, if theater is what interests you then this book would be good for you to read. I don't know where this sits in the chronology of looking at historical work in media but, it certainly got me more interested in it as a topic of discussion at the very least.
I was assigned this book last minute for my Graduate History Colloqium and frankly wasnt going to read it because I already feel like I have a pretty solid understanding of the field, but once I started reading this book I was pleasently suprised.
I don't write many reviews (especially for academic books) but since I am the first one to log this book I figured why the hell not. As someone with an interest in both public history and popular media I thought this book added some more depth to both of those fields. Historians like to only look at archives and old papers, ignoring media such as movies, plays and novels when in reality alot of history, and understandings of history can be earned from such sources. The whole point of public history is to engage with non-academic folk subjects in history, with the hope that they can find something relevant to incorporate into their daily lives. A lot of historians (and some old professors of mine) think that that can only be done by learning histroy the old way, but Dean develops a good framework for considering popular media as legitimate forms of historical repositories (not to dissimilar from archives and museums).
Points off for talking a lot about theater. I find that most people engage with atleast some historical background through movies, television shows and video games. However, if theater is what interests you then this book would be good for you to read. I don't know where this sits in the chronology of looking at historical work in media but, it certainly got me more interested in it as a topic of discussion at the very least.
Displaying 1 - 1 of 1 review