The Making of Salem: The Witch Trials in History, Fiction and Tourism

by Robin Derosa

The Salem Witch Trials of 1692 are a case study in hysteria and group psychology, and the cultural effects still linger centuries later. This critical study examines original trial transcripts, historical accounts, fiction and drama, film and television shows, and tourist sites in contemporary Salem, challenging the process of how history is collected and recorded. Drawing from literary and historical theory, as well as from performance studies, the book offers a new definition of history and uses Salem as a tool for rethinking the relationships between the truth and the stories people tell about the past.

Genres: History, Nonfiction

216 pages, Kindle Edition

First published July 14, 2009

Reviews

[Kate M. Colby · Rating 3 out of 5]

An interesting examination of how the Salem Witch Trials have been represented (and often sensationalized) in historical studies, literature, dramatic media, and tourism. While I disagree with some of the author's conclusions (mainly their assertion that we can't know any definitive facts about the witch trials and their analysis of authorial intent in the literature examples), I appreciated the concept of the study as well as the analyses of the modern Salem tourism industry. I read this book to research the reception of the Salem Witch Trials and the creation of its tourism industry for a fiction novel I intend to write, and for the most part, it was helpful with that goal.

[Kristi · Rating 3 out of 5]

Derosa seeks to deconstruct the nature of history as a representative performance that mediates between the past and the interpretation of the past. While I didn't always agree with the author's theories or conclusions, I appreciated her project and believe that she succeeded in demonstrating that the history, fiction, and tourism of the Sale witch trials share an aspect of performative representation.

The chapters that most interested me as a reader were those towards the end of the book - an analysis of a "Sabrina the Teenage Witch episode" thematically arranged around the witch trials and Salem tourism, and the chapters comparing the self-awareness of repository owning the original trial documents versus the amusement-based attractions in Salem.

While, Derosa is successful in defending her thesis of performative authenticity, it was striking to me that this was the aspect of Salem that disappointed me personally as a tourist. While I am perhaps an atypical Salem tourist, I went there seeking a different sort of authenticity than the one Derosa finds in Salem. I sought out the sites and material remains of the historical events -- Gallow's Hill and nearby Danvers. But I found these site either inaccessible or difficult to locate. There seems to me a symbiotic relationship between presentation and touristic attention, wherein the more historical sites do not receive the same interest and, therefore, less attention to making them tourist-friendly; yet if the site is difficult for tourists to locate and access then, of course, there are going to be less tourists in those locations. This work, then, seems to fail to consider whether or not the town of Danvers welcomed witch trial tourism in the way that Salem, with its manufactured sites, did. In other words, how did the Salem attractions evolve, and what role did the creation of sites have in shaping tourism? This work, too, by its focus on the witch trials leaves out other forms of tourism in Salem (albeit less popular), mainly its maritime, literary, and architectural history, which is also marketed to tourists. Derosa seems to assume that tourist taste and as aspect of performative inherent in the trials themselves made a amusement-based tourism based in the pre-tense of history natural, yet this seems to forget that tourists sites are constructions. Instead of examining how and when this sort of tourism originated in Salem, the project of this book is rather to treat tourism in Salem as a post-modern text to be interpreted as a form of media representation of Salem. In effect, this takes the formation of tourism out of its historical context, and considers it as entity unto its in diachronic dialogue with other "texts" taking the Salem Witch Trials as their subject. an examination of the the history of preservation and the development of tourism in Salem could have contributed much value to this study, by grounding the development of an performative tourism in the time and place of its origin.

[Jessica DeWitt · Rating 2 out of 5]

There were some problematic gender and transgender discussions and comparisons at the beginning of the book that soured me to the rest of it.

Link to Twitter Link of some quotes and comments: https://twitter.com/i/moments/9519379...

[Linds · Rating 2 out of 5]

Too dry and academic. Reads like a thesis.

[Nin · Rating 3 out of 5]

3,5. Interessanter kulturwissenschaftlicher Ansatz, allerdings teilweise etwas far-fetched für das Quellenmaterial. Großes Yikes für Kapitel 1 und seltsame Allegorien zu Transidentität.

[Anne · Rating 3 out of 5]

Unusual but great look at the Salem Witch Trials and how they have been interpreted through tourism and fiction.