Comments for Sometimes, historians get too into the weeds, and lose perspective

Sometimes, historians get too into the weeds, and lose perspective

Sat, 04 Jul 2009 08:39:05 -0600

Other times, they're just pretentious twits.If Joseph Ellis suggested the headline for his article - well, he's both. I'm going to go with a working hypothesis of too into the weeds.Why the Fourth Is a Fraud.Here's the money grafs:Why, then, did July 4 become the preferred date for our annual celebration? Well, although nothing momentous occurred on that day, it was the day when the American public first learned about the Declaration. Copies began to appear in newspapers and go up on tavern walls, although in fact it took several weeks for the news to reach all precincts up and...

Comment from John of Argghhh! on 2009-07-07

Tue, 07 Jul 2009 16:20:22 -0600

Man, oh man. I will be walking on air for the rest of the week.

Heh. A thinly-veiled excuse to not blog for the rest of the week...!

Comment from Cassandra on 2009-07-07

Tue, 07 Jul 2009 16:14:20 -0600

"Bite me"

*snort* :)

Thank you, Cassandra, for your service to all of us.

*Blush*

Man, oh man. I will be walking on air for the rest of the week. I get frustrated a lot by blogging, but I suspect I get far more out of it than any of the poor folks who suffer through my posts :)

Still, thank you. That was very kind of you and very much appreciated.

Comment from Cricket on 2009-07-05

Sun, 05 Jul 2009 13:24:47 -0600

Maggie, I LOVE that musical, and I also have a very good DVD about the founding of America. I use both in teaching the basics of American history. It also doesn't hurt to have ancestry of the Revolutionary War variety, but I digress. Let me say this: As one of millions who has benefitted from the Founder's dream, hard work and courage, they left us a legacy. What we do with it will be our gift to them. We talk about the sacrifices made on Europe's behalf on D-Day,and blimey, I get a little annoyed at their socialist ways, but they have to answer for it, to the veterans who bought their freedom with blood. We have to face the Founders...and Nature's God.

Comment from Cricket on 2009-07-05

Sun, 05 Jul 2009 13:12:37 -0600

Sheesh. Even I know that hysterians don't just deconstruct the past; they seek to use it to show us why our future must forever be tarnished!

Back to the Declaration of Independence: Time was, when most Fourth of July celebrations at the town level included a reading of it, and school children memorized it and the Preamble to the Constitution, and were given pocket copies of it.

As to age, didn't Maggie give Bill the recipe for dirt?

*running very very fast and giggling madly, since I was on the bukkit brigade when Mt. Rainier last erupted.*

Comment from Argent on 2009-07-05

Sun, 05 Jul 2009 13:05:01 -0600

We've found Noah!

Comment from BillT on 2009-07-05

Sun, 05 Jul 2009 12:05:05 -0600

I thought "WOW! The Chief really *is* older than dirt!"

I was there when it was Bunker Mountain. I was a lumberjack in the Sahara Forest. I remember when they were still building the *Second* Wonder of the Ancient World. I ran the Ditch Witch when we dug the Grand Canyon. I built a boat so I could sail the Four Seas.

Bite me.

Comment from Argent on 2009-07-05

Sun, 05 Jul 2009 11:44:58 -0600

Not seen this movie, maybe I should have a look.

Comment from Barb on 2009-07-05

Sun, 05 Jul 2009 10:46:42 -0600

I had the fun of seeing a production of 1776 when in junior high, which was a great experience. I have not seen the film version of the musical, will have to find and watch again.

Comment from Maggie on 2009-07-05

Sun, 05 Jul 2009 10:45:39 -0600

"Personally, I'd call that a momentous occasion."

At first glance I thought he was saying "Personally, I recall that as a momentous occasion." and I thought "WOW! The Chief really *is* older than dirt!"

"1776" the musical, is one of the most fabulous tools for sparking interest in young people who aren't into history. I have it on tape and DVD and would play it every 3rd for the kids that would hang at my house (first my sister's friends and then my children's friends) while we prepared for the 4th of July.

One of my sister's friends will tell you that he got an extra credit question much to the astonishment of his jaded history teacher. He named the members of the Declaration Committee by letting the lyrics to a song run through his head.

Sure it is filled with oversimplification - there is a line that pokes fun at that very idea. In the movie Adams' character says -
"I won't be in the history books anyway, only you. Franklin did this and Franklin did that and Franklin did some other damn thing. Franklin smote the ground and out sprang George Washington, fully grown and on his horse. Franklin then electrified him with his miraculous lightning rod and the three of them- Franklin, Washington, and the horse- conducted the entire revolution by themselves"

It's human nature to want to tie our history up into nice neat packages - but -

Did you not come away from that film with the feeling that the country was torn? That was true.

Did you not feel that Adams and his wife had an extraordinary bond and that their correspondence kept them as close as if they were physically together? That was true.

Did you not feel that these men sensed the incredible importance and danger of what they were doing? That was true.

Can you tell I am a huge fan of this movie? LOL Adams is my favorite President.

I think Ellis has just never been invited to a really great 4th of July party and this post is sour grapes.

Comment from John of Argghhh! on 2009-07-05

Sun, 05 Jul 2009 07:00:12 -0600

Snerk! Argent -there is a *musical* about the writing of the Declaration, called 1776, that for all it's historical flaws and artistic license with the subject, is a more useful (and interesting) take on the event than the tripe Ellis produced.

It was on television last night, and I enjoyed reinforcing my view of our foundational mythology once again!

Comment from Grimmy on 2009-07-05

Sun, 05 Jul 2009 06:58:49 -0600

I was raised by teachers (both parents) and, unfortunately for me, reacted toward education much like the stereotypical preacher's kid reacts toward religion.

But, there's stuffs I noticed in my growing up years that might be viable in relation to the issue in this thread.

Teachers who teach narrative intensive issues, such as history (by narrative I mean subjects that are word based rather than math based or structure based like grammar) tend to need to use a bit of circular thinking.

A teacher, or historian, can only go over the same issue so many time before it stops making sense in much the same way a word will render itself down to meaningless noise if repeated a 1000 times. So, divergent threads are sought out, both for the sanity of the teacher/historian and for the benefit of the students/audience.

Those teachers/historians with the proper skill set will follow that thread and work it around and bring it back up into context with the whole pattern. This I think of as lateral circle think. It's a good thing.

But, those without the proper skill set will follow the thread and bring it back up but not all the way. They'll stop and attach their thinking on the subject to another piece of divergence before reaching the top of the loop. This ends up in a form of circle thought that spirals downward and loses ever more touch with context with each descending loop. This is a bad thing.

There's also the problem of intellectual inbreeding. Halfwit snarks and twits tend to use other halfwit snarks and twits as their applause meter/sounding boards. Such intellectually inbred specimens are only readable and appreciable by others such as themselves. This can become an ever more isolated process, like a village lost in the mountains with only 2 or 3 families breeding among themselves for 10s of generations.

Comment from Argent on 2009-07-05

Sun, 05 Jul 2009 03:00:26 -0600

Happy Independence Day to you all.

The problem with historians is they have to put food on the table like everyone else. Ideally they do so by providing us with as complete and useful a view of the past as possible, which we buy in one sense or another because we're interested. Interested in not repeating mistakes, interested in learning smart techniques, interested in the honour of the past feeding into the present and so on.

But as so many of us (by which I mean Americans and in my case Aussies) have lost interest and turned to want the sensational and that which justifies our own views, historians who do the above are dying out. The replacement has to be more of a media whore. This guy appears to have done just that. The obvious way to sensationalise something like July the 4th is to claim it's not July the 4th. Then he bumbles along like a halocaust denialist with things made up and with twisted context.

I commend any historians and refuse to sully their hard work by lumping them with this sensationalist. The sad thing is there's probably a good article about the delays and timing in there if only he'd the skill to make it happen.

Comment from Grumpy on 2009-07-05

Sun, 05 Jul 2009 01:08:26 -0600

@ Cassandra, you raise a rather perplexing question. "Where would we be without "historians" to deconstruct the past for us? The bigger question is what is the *real* motivation for the deconstruction? Some people do the deconstruction within the evidence of the times and/or they lived it. There are other times they deconstruct history to make it political, in so doing, they corrupt the true history. But on the ether hand, there are those who try to help us understand history in the context of laws and culture of the times. This second group, rare, but if you find them, they can be really helpful.

Lady, I noted the quotation marks, but your question itself, is very profound. this is the reason for the split in the answer.

I must admit, I read quite a few blogs, including yours. but I only comment on a few.

Thank you, Cassandra, for your service to all of us.

Comment from OldDog on 2009-07-04

Sat, 04 Jul 2009 23:44:37 -0600

I am afraid that any comment I have about Mr. Ellis (and yes, I use that term loosely) would best be said over at Misha's place.

Or even better at mine where the censor is why, me!

Comment from Cassandra on 2009-07-04

Sat, 04 Jul 2009 22:46:43 -0600

Happy4th of July! Where would we be without "historians" to deconstruct the past for us?

Comment from MAJ Mike on 2009-07-04

Sat, 04 Jul 2009 18:28:52 -0600

Ellis, you ignorant slut!

Comment from Mike K. on 2009-07-04

Sat, 04 Jul 2009 18:13:49 -0600

A few years ago Ellis was caught lying about serving in combat.

Comment from Grumpy on 2009-07-04

Sat, 04 Jul 2009 17:25:23 -0600

John, you are still an officer and gentleman, you stay within the rulez and therefore set an example for the rest of us.. You show your diplomatic skills, by describing this, so-called historian as, "in the weeds". Now for the rest of us, who are less than diplomatic, including me, would describe it this way, everything in the largest font possible. *Bravo Sierra and he is full of the same.*

Comment from olga on 2009-07-04

Sat, 04 Jul 2009 16:05:08 -0600

I think he should be embarassed, the entire article is based on the fact that he has NEVER seen the ACTUAL text of the Declaration (or simply glazed over it when shown, probably sometime in the HS)

And, John, I LOVE the picture!

Comment from Russ on 2009-07-04

Sat, 04 Jul 2009 10:34:04 -0600

Thanks for posting the Declaration, it gives me goosebumps everytime I read it.

Comment from BillT on 2009-07-04

Sat, 04 Jul 2009 09:56:46 -0600

"Well, although nothing momentous occurred on that day, it was the day when the American public first learned about the Declaration."

Personally, I'd call that a momentous occasion.

Just one more area in which Ellis and I diverge...