I am putting on my historian hat to analyze a website and, perhaps, a trend.
The site is called TwHistory (here’s the About page). The idea is that you recreate historical events by having participants use primary source documents to create tweets. It is certainly a Student Learning Outcome everywhere to have students use primary sources, but there is some discussion among historians about how best to do it. Many documents are written in archaic language, using slow-letter communication patterns we no longer use. That can make them hard for students to understand. One reason for TwHistory seems to be to “bring life” to documents and events.
According to their FAQ:
TwHistory is based on the idea that historical reenactments can take
place online and have positive effects for all involved. In school
settings these virtual reenactments can increase engagement while
providing opportunities for students to research personal journals and
other primary source documents.
I heard about this project at the New Media Consortium Symposium last month and posted a bit about it as part of my review (it’s at the end of the post). I had promised the presenters I would think about the concept, because I confessed it bothered me. They were not historians, and wanted input.
I asked a lot of questions at their session about how the historical sources were used — many students seemed to use actual excerpts from the documents for their posts, which of course are limited to 140 characters. Others posted about what was happening, the context. Some of these tweets used modern net-speak (you know, LOL for laugh out loud, BTW for by the way). I had a bit of trouble with the idea of Lincoln posting “87 yrs ago dudes created new nation”, but thought maybe I was being a fuddy duddy.
Some of the simulated events were deliberately done on certain dates, with certain posts written on the corresponding days of historical events (such as posting on April 9 to report Lee’s surrender 144 years earlier on that day). That was interesting, like anniversaries.
I had previously been accidentally exposed to the idea of historical tweets on Twitter itself, where for awhile I enjoyed following President Harrison. In other words, I very much like the idea of historical figures tweeting. It was very fun. So I needed to explore my gut reaction against the reenactments, and posting on sites in my discipline for Pedagogy First! gives me that opportunity.
So…I took a look today at the Gettysburg scenario. I admit to some enchantment at “seeing” the characters from history come to life in little posts, communicating with each other. Instead of reading a whole document, such as a letter or diary entry, the short format forces a communicating style that is much more direct than it actually was in the 19th century. Nevertheless, there was much that sounded 19th century, that clearly came directly from documents. It was delightful to read what was happening!
What’s created here is clearly story-telling. History is partly story-telling, but it is also making meaning from past events as recorded in documents. It seems to me that the story itself, told this way, could have an entirely different meaning than the actual events support. Abraham Lincoln could have written a letter to a general on a particular day, but it might not have arrived for weeks, so having Lincoln and the general communicate via Twitter makes a false impression, even if the messages are spaced out by the same number of weeks. The fact that communication was not this direct had an extraordinary impact on events. People could not read each other’s diaries and letters to other people.
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| Sort-of 13th century armor, but not really. (http://www.sca.org/officers/media/images.html |
This brings up, for me, interesting questions about the use of new internet communications for the teaching of history. For student engagement, I can easily see how a TwHistory reenactment project could be enlightening, but it seems on the same level as something like the Society for Creative Anachronism, the members of whom frequent Renaissance Faires. Many of them love history, and SCA says they are an “Organisation dedicated to researching and recreating pre-17th century European history.” They are history enthusiasts rather than scholars, and I often see their membership wearing clothes from the 16th or 18th century or, even more often, clothing loosely based on designs from these centuries but no more authentic than a stage costume, complete with contemporary interpretations. As with costume designers for theatre, many are very well read in the period, and I have nothing against SCA or Civil War reenactors or anyone making history come alive — on the contrary. One of my favorite places in the world is the Modern History Gallery at the Royal BC Museum, where I can wander a 19th century street. I’m also quite partial to New Orleans Square at Disneyland.
Those are places to experience what certain elements of the past might have been like, rather than places to do history as a student. TwHistory seems to be the SCA version of history, but developed deliberately as a scholarly project inside schools.
There are also parallels to the History Channel, a popular television channel that features documentaries, most of which focus on the sensationalist aspects of historical events. This make history interesting, it is said, as if it isn’t otherwise. The result is a lack of depth and perspective, the kind of thing that is gained by careful, deep reading of multiple sources, both primary and secondary. Historians develop theses about the past, and prove them with evidence. While perhaps not scientific in the same sense as a laboratory science, there is a methodology that is inherent in the discipline.
TwHistory teaches students one aspect of the method, the use of primary sources within a historical context. But recreation/reenactment is not really historical analysis — it is great for history buffs, but not so much for students studying history as a discipline. I’m not sure where the lines are exactly, between engagement in the events of history and actual inquiry, but I don’t think TwHistory crosses fully into the discipline the way it should with young historians. I remain deeply uncomfortable with it.
[Please forgive the double-post — I wrote this for Pedagogy First! but decided it should also go on my online teaching blog.]
I want to say first Lisa that I really appreciate your frank criticism here and during the NMC conference session. As another non-historian, my first thought on seeing what TwHistory was doing was “that’s neat” — maybe not my exact words on seeing an SCA gig.
But as am amateur, I’d say that (besides time bending science fiction), all history happens but once; and everything, event scholarly historical research with theses and data, is, if not a re-enactment, but a recasting. So are books, documentaries, etc.
So the question is, for you as an expert I respect, are online historical re-enactments (including the projects of re-blogging history) only good for “eye candy low brow” activity? Maybe the issue is seeing the TwHistory re-enactment alone as the whole enchilada- what if there was the analysis around it to validate or de-validate what was done (“well general Scott here on May 20 he said “XXXXX” but according to Blah and Blah’s maps and Scott’s own diary, he was no where near Vicksburg [link, reference etc]).
Another thing I am sure of, what do we know about the experiences of the students who participated in these projects? I’d like to hear more about that.
But I understand what you are saying- this is not a scholarly rigorous activity for those in your field, much the same as my amateur collection of mis-identified rocks is not a lesson in geology. But is there no value at all for learning anything? Is everything split between bins of Pre Academic Stuff in one bin and “Cute Entertainment in another?
At the NMC presentation, I thought it might be a vehicle to explore alternative histories, which yes, is not really what your field is about. But what if Lincoln had not gone to the theater that night, how might have these characters around him played out their roles? Maybe there could be groups that start with slightly different variations of history and see where the threads go, with analysis as to why that alternative history is not valid.
Thanks again for a thoughtful post.
Alan, indeed I am of (at least) two minds about this! I am not a professional historian, but rather a professional college instructor, and I’m always seeking innovative ways to help students learn in my discipline.
I’m not ready to say that re-enactments are only good for fun, but you’re right, I would agree that they shouldn’t stand alone. And I don’t think that they have no value for learning, nor that everything is split into education or entertainment. Learning, as we know, isn’t always formal education. Something is definitely being learned, and appreciated, about the past doing games and re-enactments.
The past belongs to everyone, and we can all play (and work) with it to create meaning, understanding and exploration. Historians don’t own the past. But “history” is a scholarly discipline, the methods of which I’m required to teach in order to provide a “general education”, even to people who don’t care about the past or who may never have another history class.
But they will certainly be exposed to news and social media, and people (or political structures) using history to promote a particular policy. Part of my responsibility is to encourage discernment in analyzing historical information. That is done not through recitation of historical facts, but through the method of historical inquiry.
So as a historian, I fear that games and simualtions will give rise not so much to false “facts” (which can easily be looked up and corrected) but to false methodology. It simply is not sound methodology to gather a bunch of documents about an event, throw them together, and create a new story. While two different historians looking at the same evidence may arrive at different explanations, they will use the same methods to determine the value and role of the evidence. Games remove players a full step away from this, encouraging the immediate use of evidence to cater to the needs of the re-enactment or scenario. This isn’t historical inquiry, though it is more fun on the affective level.
As a teacher, though, I love engagement. It makes my job easier when students are happy and interested. TwHistory definitely engages students with at least one primary source. So it could be part of a class where the intent is to expose students to the sources, engage them, get them interested in history. That isn’t low brow. It also isn’t “doing” history, but rather creating something else.
Is this recasting in the same way historians do? No, it isn’t, and so if we say these kind of media experiences are “great for students”, they’d better be analyzed themselves a bit first, and by those whose fields are being used for the purpose.
And thanks to you for engaging in this conversation. It’s interesting and is helping me think and re-think my views!
I find it really interesting if students act out different parts of history that are interesting to them. This is a good way for students to have a better understanding of that time period and the people that were involved to make history. It is funny to see how the students work together to put together a skit or reenactment of a specific time period in our history.