Commemoration The American Association for State and Local History Guide [Hardcover]

While stone and metal monuments, sanctioned landscapes, and applied commemorative phrases might appear stationary, their value and role will always be fluid continuously evolving to serve the dynamism of future generations. This collection of essays assembled by Seth C. Bruggeman encourages public historians and other heritage professionals to rattle public memory, to challenge complacent narratives, and to scrutinize and reclaim public memory in order to purposely and productively make remembrances relevant.Commemoration: The American Association for State and Local History Guide serves as a handbook for all who contend daily with the ground-level complexities of commemoration. It covers varieties of commemorative scope and genre, planning commemorative events, and possibilities for assessing and sustaining commemorative impact.Commemoration: The American Association for State and Local History Guide serves as a handbook for historic site managers, heritage professionals, and all manner of public historians who contend daily with the ground-level complexities of commemoration. Its fourteen short essays are intended as tools for practitioners, students, and anyone else confronted with common problems in commemorative practice today. Of particular concern are strategies for expanding commemoration across the panoply of American identities, confronting tragedy and difficult pasts, and doing responsible work in the face of persistent economic and political turmoil. A special afterword explores the role of emotion in modern commemoration and what it suggests about possibilities for engaging new audiences.1. Introduction: Conundrum and Nuance in American Memory - Seth C. Bruggeman2. The Exhibition and the Funeral: Commemoration as Display - Tammy S. Gordon3. Festivals as a Commemorative Genre - William S. Walker4. Reenactment: Performing the Past - Cathy Stanton5. A Local Commemoration of National Significance - Anne C. Reilly6. Get Territorial: Idaho at 150 - Janet L. Gl£•