Public History: A LIBRARIAN AT EVERY TABLE.No. 235.

A LIBRARIAN AT EVERY TABLE
December 16, 2004. No. 235.
Sources & Sites for Community Building.

PUBLIC HISTORY
Public history is of increasing importance to librarians, but the National Council on Public History
links to no major librarian association.

The latest issue (November 2004) of the journal, The Public Historian, has a provocative article by James B. Garder with this abstract:

How does the public understand and use the past? What role should historians and historical scholarship play in the public's understanding of the past? How do we as historians address our responsibilities to the public and still remain advocates for history and scholarly integrity? How do we make the difficult choices that are our responsibility to make? This essay argues that historians working in museums must be advocates for both history and our visitors, negotiating the gap between our understanding of the past as historians and the public's.

Joyce Latham provided a perspective on the role of public history in a librarian's studies: “Why History Matters” at the panel “Dead or Alive? History in the LIS Curriculum” held by the ALISE 2004 Historical Perspectives Special Interest Group (SIG).