At 10:04 AM -0500 3/17/04, Ron May wrote:
>Public history embraces geneologists, local museums, oral
>historians, folk historians, and local community history buffs. Most
>importantly, it embraces the folks who were the "salt of the earth"
>and not just dead
>presidents or wars. I am sure you know this, but I just wanted to toss it out
>there.

Yes, I am aware of the movement to public history. I'm also a member
of the NCPH.  But that organization is more involved with museums and
public agency history, which is great.  Graduate programs in historic
preservation generally are geared to produce generalists. And we need
generalists.

But what we need are historians, not people who took a bit of history
in a larger program.  We need guys (and gals) who are obsessed with
interpreting the site from all the evidence, just as the
archaeologists are supposed to be dedicated to interpreting the site
from physical evidence.

Yes, there are some damn fine programs in historic preservation,
public history, or whatever you want to call it.  But they fall
woefully short of providing sensitive and well-rounded historians who
can take a few deeds and interpret a site's history in the larger
contexts of local and regional historical development.

So the history departments are not off the hook, just by creating
some "program" to provide employability for those who are not capable
of tenure-track appointments.  I'll believe they have seen the light
when I see some doctoral program bragging about how many of their
graduates got plum appointments with CRM firms or state agencies.
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