"War, women and waffle": Staines on history
One More Cup of Coffee has a well-written piece on the terrible state of "popular history" and the "tyranny of the Fact":
This is history as trivia; lambasting the "abomination" of George Courtauld's The Little Book of Patriotism, a parade of Great Deeds and Great Men in British history without the slightest grasp of cause or consequence, Ed says:
...and goes on, rightly, to clip Tristam Hunt round the ear and snarl at the nostalgia-wallowing of "family history". ("Family history": a slow route to inevitable disappointment as it is discovered your distant ancestors were just as boring as yourself. I can't see the appeal.) Where I'd disagree with Ed is in his patrician dismissal of "the masses"; the best historians out there can write history that is both convincing to trained academics like Ed, and accessible for the casually interested punter. E.P. Thompson was the best example, but - much as I disagree with him - Niall Ferguson has produced some similar work. Blind commercial pressures in the book trade, as elsewhere, has reduced the scope for such history. These have little to do with inherent popularity, but much to do with the cowardice of the market, brought on by the pronounced herd-instincts of pulishers and marketing departments facing twitchy shareholders: anything outside the perceived "norm", anything viewed as "difficult" beyond a lowest common denominator, is treated with great suspicion - if it is treated at all.
Although mass market history provides some historians with money beyond what they could possibly hope to make from pure academic work, it does pose some problems. For a start, the concept of ‘history’ in the public consciousness is altered. I have had many encounters with the “middle-aged white men” described in the article, who obsess about “blood, tanks and very tall mountains”. Because I not au fait with the type of lapels worn by Napoleon’s troops, such people generally scoff and deem my years of university education as useless.
This is history as trivia; lambasting the "abomination" of George Courtauld's The Little Book of Patriotism, a parade of Great Deeds and Great Men in British history without the slightest grasp of cause or consequence, Ed says:
Although mass market history provides some historians with money beyond what they could possibly hope to make from pure academic work, it does pose some problems. For a start, the concept of ‘history’ in the public consciousness is altered. I have had many encounters with the “middle-aged white men” described in the article, who obsess about “blood, tanks and very tall mountains”. Because I not au fait with the type of lapels worn by Napoleon’s troops, such people generally scoff and deem my years of university education as useless.
...and goes on, rightly, to clip Tristam Hunt round the ear and snarl at the nostalgia-wallowing of "family history". ("Family history": a slow route to inevitable disappointment as it is discovered your distant ancestors were just as boring as yourself. I can't see the appeal.) Where I'd disagree with Ed is in his patrician dismissal of "the masses"; the best historians out there can write history that is both convincing to trained academics like Ed, and accessible for the casually interested punter. E.P. Thompson was the best example, but - much as I disagree with him - Niall Ferguson has produced some similar work. Blind commercial pressures in the book trade, as elsewhere, has reduced the scope for such history. These have little to do with inherent popularity, but much to do with the cowardice of the market, brought on by the pronounced herd-instincts of pulishers and marketing departments facing twitchy shareholders: anything outside the perceived "norm", anything viewed as "difficult" beyond a lowest common denominator, is treated with great suspicion - if it is treated at all.
posted by Meaders at
1:45 pm
