Week five or six...I am beginning to lose count.

                 My aunt once told my mother how much she enjoyed watching Gone with the Wind as a child and hoped to one day introduce the film to her children because of “the history.” Apparently, my aunt believes Gone with Wind accurately portrays the antebellum south as a blissful, bygone era where slaves and their masters lived harmoniously before those pesky northerners had to ruin all the fun. First, let me say this: I thank God every night that my relationship with my aunt is only by law. I wish I could say the same thing about several other branches of my family tree. Having said that, I also realize the majority of Americans consume history in the same fashion as my aunt. It is not that these people are stupid; instead, they consciously seek those museums or attractions that reinforce their version of American history. For the majority of Americans, this happens to be a hyper-nationalistic commemoration of the past, rather than an honest reflection and debate. Throughout the history of the United States, museums and historic sites have responded to these “market forces” by crafting a narrative that, while not necessarily true, satisfies their customer base.   In all honesty, “Mickey Mouse history” existed long before Walt created America’s favorite rodent.

               I realize the previous paragraph contradicts statements from my earlier posts. However, this week’s readings and Marla’s cogent observations have led me to revise my earlier beliefs. For example, the majority of Wallace’s article focuses on how corporations sponsoring Disney’s EPCOT center ingeniously borrowed from the 1939 World’s Fair formula, combining the industrial exposition with the carnival, creating an attraction that celebrated consumption and the march of progress with corporate entities at the helm. In the world according to EPCOT, history is simply a gallery of prominent men and the inventions they created. One need not worry about the problems currently plaguing humankind like pollution or world hunger, these ingenious inventors and their corporate benefactors will eventually solve them. While many historians decry this top-down approach, one cannot deny that a large segment of the public craves for this narrative. Disney would be bankrupt if this were not the case.  

               While many concerned citizens and advocacy groups claim to abhor Disney’s sanitized version of history, they frequently employ the same rhetoric and strategies to defend what they consider “sacred ground.” In essence, they create their own sanitized history to compete with what they consider “Mickey Mouse” history; one need look no farther than the Republican party to understand what I am talking about. Conservatives like Newt Gingrich frequently excoriate Disney’s portrayal of American History, yet the best they can offer is their own finite narrative.  From this point, the debate frequently devolves into something akin to a competition between McDonalds and Burger King, with both sides peddling variations of the same greasy shit.

               Therefore, I have become doubtful about my earlier suggestions that public historians compromise and listen to the other side to resolve this problem. It appears the other side does not want to reach a compromise: Museums and historical sites will either provide the “product” their patrons want, or they will take their dollars elsewhere. While one can hope that providing alternatives to the standard narratives will attract the public, I am afraid America’s hubris may be too much to overcome. Wallace does provide some intriguing alternatives such as providing exhibits decoding the historical narratives disseminated by Disney. Patrons might respond positively to these exhibits, investigating how Disney and others present the past.

In the meantime, I will have to be satisfied with smaller victories. Recently, my Grandma Luecke was regurgitating the standard narrative provided by conservative historians that the 1940s and 1950s represented a time when Americans had high standards of morality. My grandpa, irritated, finally looked at me and said: “Your grandma is full of shit. There was the same amount of whoring and boozing then as there is today; people just kept it quite back then.” I guess I will take what I can get. Go Grandpa.