You Are A Dangerous Revisionist!

I can't tell you how many times I have been called a "revisionist" by friends and family members. This label is cast upon me whenever I offer up an interpretation of American history that does not conform to the views of the person doing the labeling. I often speak to parents of potential Messiah College students who ask me if we teach "'revisionist history" here. In some circles, to be called a "revisionist" is synonymous with being called a "liberal."

Actually, as many of my readers already know, revisionism is the lifeblood of the historical profession. We all want to "revise" our understanding of the past based on new findings and insights. What would we do without revisionism? Historians have been revising their interpretations of the past since the time of Thucydides.

My thoughts on revisionism were prompted by Historiann's recent post on the subject. Here is a taste:

How long has it been since you heard someone called a “revisionist,” or heard someone muttering darkly about “revisionism” after a job talk or search committee meeting? (For all of the non-historians out there who might still be reading: “revisionism” was a charge thrown around a lot in the 1980s and 1990s by those historians who imagined that history is the pursuit of Unchanging Truth, and who were generally quite hostile to most of the new approaches to history since 1960 or so–social history, subaltern history, feminist history, queer theory–pretty much everything except political and intellectual history focused on DWEMs, that is, Dead White European/Euro-American Males. Anyone who had different ideas or subjects in mind were called “revisionists,” which implied that we were doing Made-Up history, which was seen as an attack on the Unchanging Truth.) I think it’s been nearly a decade since I’ve heard these terms in serious conversations.

Is the debate over revisionism still taking place? Absolutely. Just look at what is going on in Texas today. I think Historiann asks a great question. Have historians have given up on engaging the larger culture? Have they isolated themselves in the guild or the university? It seems to me that historians have a public responsibility to educate the American public about the meaning of history in a way that goes beyond their content specialties. What is it that we do? Why can revisionism be a good thing? Why can it also be a bad thing when it becomes little more than a disguise for the politicization of the past?

Yesterday I spoke to a local chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution. Now I am guessing that many academic historians would not be caught dead at such a meeting. This is unfortunate. These kinds of gatherings present a great opportunity to discuss things like the nature of history. We had a great conversation yesterday about revisionism, textbooks, and the meaning of history in American life. At one point in the conversation I warned them that the things I had to say about the meaning of history might not be well-received among their group. (A risky move!) But the more we talked the more I realized that my warning was informed by my own stereotypes about this organization. It said more about me than it did them.

Why aren't more historians speaking to these kinds of groups? If we could have real discussions about the discipline of history and the meaning of words like "revisionism" it might do some good in ending the kulterkamph that Historiann mentions. Maybe we need to stop hiding in our ivory towers throwing down thunderbolts on all those Americans who we think just don't get it and actually engage in civil conversation.